I left some time to think about this. I think many of us would not be in favour of re-issue of old callsigns. This is normal practice in the USA, where many hams seem to change their callsigns nearly as often as their cars, but over here a callsign is seen as more or less synonymous with the identity of a ham. How would we feel if G5RV was re-issued to somebody who wasn’t a family member or club that he had been associated with? I don’t know much about the restrictions on prefix blocks, for instance would double digit numbers be allowable, or four letter suffixes? Be that as it may, I do not think this is an insuperable problem. As for the GB prefix, we have lived with this problem for decades - five of them in my case - and we are used to it. At worst it is a minor irritant that is assuaged by the care of the operators in giving details of location and event. Finally, the question of a secondary locator for England - we have that already, plain G, 2E or M, and isn’t the point of *M, *W or *I locators to separate them from England and the English - we don’t need anything the other way around! So yes, I do not think that the callsign system is broken, any deficiencies are minor and hallowed by custom.
This is something I have held strong views about for some time. In recent years, there have been numerous instances of very old - and often famous - pre-war callsigns being reissued to someone who claimed to be “a friend of the family”, or just someone who fancied having the callsign and prevailed upon surviving relatives of the original licencee to authorise the transfer. It used to be limited, as Brian says, to close family members or clubs with a demonstrable connection to the original holder of the callsign. IMHO, it should have remained so. There are now a number of people around the UK who “collect” old callsigns, and they seem to be able to get away with it!
The simplest way is just to reissue after a fallow period. Of course you cannot tell if this person is a venerable old timer with much experience from the callsign anymore. Instead, you would only be able to tell if the operator had any clue by listening to them operate.
I believe the fallow period is 2years in the USA and VK. It seems to work for them.
But someone might get G5RV? Indeed and whilst it would be a novelty to get a famous reissue it would become very tedious very quickly. Much like the standard greeting everyone gives Kurt Russel in the film Escape From New York “Snake Pliskin I thought you were dead”. Anyone allocated G5RV is going to get fed up being called Louis and asked about a compromise flattop antenna in every QSO. Someone with sense would ask for something bland,
Further, no transfer of callsigns or multiple personal calls etc. If someone close dies (family or friend) the callsign can only go to a club and the club has to always include the club secondary locator letters.
In a stroke this abolishes callsign snobbery, callsign collecting and provides a pool of callsigns that we wont run out of before everyone has died from Ebola, AIDS, SARS, religious strife or asteroid strike!
Well said Brian. There is only one issue that I have with your comment - the word problem. There is no problem. The system is not broken, it is just different. In a world where we are all dumming down, simplifying and increasingly being forced to conform, I think that being different is something that should be applauded.
Mercifully, they will not! G5RV is currently held by the Mid-Sussex Amateur Radio Society, of which Louis Varney was President for 37 years. This is all right and proper. If MSARS had not inherited the callsign, I have no doubt one of the “collectors” would have tried to grab it by now!
Definitely Walt, we could probably guess at which collector that would be. But we wont in a public forum. You’re spot on that his call should have gone to his old club. I’ll offer up G3VA instead as a possible call that would become tedious as everyone asks why the snippet of info they sent to Technical Topics was never printed.
My response has been submitted, complete with typos and ‘smelling pistakes’, it looks like a 5yr old typed it with his toes. Never mind, the content is the important bit.
This whole thing is rapidly moving into the realms of farce. If Cornwall is to have GK as a prefix, then I want to have a GG prefix for Gloucestershire. After all, Cornwall is a county, just like Gloucestershire … regardless of what the piskies might wish for!
Now trying to fathom out the 2m NOV which, in Scotland and within 40km of the border, is an extension to 146.93750MHz! Then there are all the exempt squares too…oh dear!
In some ways this is no different than the two Scottish home coming special prefixes. Up here we’ve been allowed to use A instead of M during the Scottish Home Coming Celebrations(*). So I’m guessing OFCOM will do something similar and allow the use of K for a limited period if you hold a NoV. Possible to celebrate the discovery of meat in a pastie or some other such once in a lifetime event.
(*) My second Scottish Home Coming NoV expires at the end of November. I’d love to know what the Home Coming is all about. I never found out what the first was about either.
Nice to see ofcom has found a petty subject to write millions of words about.
It’s allowing them to concentrate on this rather than;
Persuing the constant abusers of my local repeater who are often using it to transmit music, profanity and, increasingly, the sound from pornographic movies,
Cracking down on abuse… I recall the ‘conviction rate’ for this is non-existent
Stopping delibrate QRM, which has affected many activations and recently been a potential contributing factor for a fellow ham not winning a recent RSGB contest
Basically, DOING THE DAMN THINGS THEY BLOODY WELL SHOULD BE DOING
GRRRR… This is ‘designed’ specifically so we take our eyes off the ball and ignore the important stuff and, well, it appears to be working.
The OFCOM license review has concluded that Amateurs are not confused by the current use of regional secondary locators, the use of mandatory secondary locators is not illegal and so no change is needed to a procedure that has stood the test of time for some 80+ years! Trebles all round
The review is available now at:
I haven’t studied the other changes announced so hereby reserve the right to praise or bitch (delete as appropriate) at a later date.
So yes, I do not think that the callsign system is broken, any deficiencies are minor and hallowed by custom.
