Safe Speed Forums

While writing another post, I've gone all nostaligic... I miss the old CB-thing!

Feel free to put any CB-ish entries here.

What I liked about the CB system was that you could communicate with many people in the locality (usually about 4 miles range for my 4watt setup in London), and you could get real up-to-the-minute road information... as well as chatting with "regulars" you got to know when commuting in the same areas.

The mobile phone just doesn't provide that "broadcast group communication" facility. Hmmm, do they still sell CB's? Are they still being used?

Supertramp going 10-10

Maybe they will come back...It is legal to use a CB radio without a hands free kit. Unlike a phone.

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Speed camera policy Kills

Yeah why is that?
I've always thought that lorry drivers and taxi drivers were the latst people you want talking into something similar to a mobile, yet with all the carnage caused by lorries, they are allows to persist.

Its this sort of logic that defies belief in the face of all the publicity.

That's a big 10-4 good buddy, er, 4mls range? you really were a 4watt 'noddy', I regularly used to copy stations in Ireland, S.Africa, and even the USA! without DXing etc.
(mind you, I did have a little bit of 'help', 200watt 'burner', siggy4 antenna, 30ft up! didn't use the 'cooker' too much though, caused a lot of 'bleed over'
They are still available, at least over here, (England...oooops...Britain ?) but my last experience with one, (3yrs ago) there were only 'wallies' using the channels for, music-foul language and threats etc. so not worth the hassle.
Pity really coz as you say, they were great for road information/directions, and warning 'Truckers' in 'Big Wheelers' (with twin smoke stacks up the back ) of 'Smokey Bears' (some in 'Plain' Wrappers' ) on their 'Back Door' or, a 'Bear in the Air' (Police helicopter) and 'Smokey using a 'Hair Drier' on the A1 etc.

Roger on that?
10-10 for now, going to get my 'Nose-Bag' on ! cos the 10-36 is....17-45

I'll 'sit on the side for a bit.
Catch you later good bud.....'Road Runner' (my 'handle') going 10-3 (T-Break)

Owzat??


Well, you did say:>"Feel free to put any CB-ish entries here"


Hanbo.

Breaker on the side.

Ahhh...CB was never any fun when they made it legal on the AM rnage (not FM like we had )

I had a Ham International Concorde with the twig in a dustbin lid up in the roofspace. With sideband I spoke to soemone in Peru once!

Got nailed when the neighbour shopped me to the police (she didn't like us), must have heard me giving it "22 for a copy" and all that on summer's evenings with the bedroom window open. Had to come up with a cock-and-bull story about buying the rig from some tricker in a layby - they confiscated the lot though

Catch you on the flip-flop

yet with all the carnage caused by lorries, they are allows to persist.

Sorry Jules, but as a lorry driver I object to that remark, I have used CB in the past, don't use one now as I am sick of the abuse that comes over the airwaves, and I never once caused any carnage.
Remember, that to get to HGV 1 status, you will have gone through three driving tests that get harder each time to pass.
Not just any numpty can climb into a truck and drive it, you have shed loads of training, before you are even put in for the test, you also have to be over 21(except in the Armed Forces and the young driver scheme)
Yes I do see drivers using the CB when driving, and manouvring, and its the manouvring bit that narks me.
Today, whilst waiting to exit a factory, a car came out while the driver was on the phone, whats the matter, couldn't he wait in the car park until the call was over.
Another was the driver of a Rolls-Royce turning right across the front of me while using a hand held, could afford the car, but not a fixed hands free kit, Pathetic.

A CB microphone can be dropped instantly, a mobile won't get dropped, expensive.
It grips me when I see a fellow professional driver using a fixed kit, with the phone held to his/her ear.
I do see your point, but not the carnage.
A newspaper article in Bedfordshire recently, accused car drivers of cutting up trucks, and not knowing the speed limit for trucks on A roads.

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Semper in excreta, nur quantitat variat.

Ok, thats fine if you believe that you are qualified enough to be driving a very heavy rig whilst talking into a handset.

The rest of us are not allowed to, (and yes I still do, and like you can do it safely). I just think its a bit rich hassling drivers of vehicles far smaller and lighter than lorries which, when it goes wrong, make a far bigger mess.
We also see a hell of alot of lorry related crashes.

Personally I think, (even as biker) that far too much fuss has been made about mobiles, just like speed. If you really cant drive and talk then perhaps you shouldnt be driving.
On the other hand, these laws are there because of the arseholes that cant do it safely, and its them we have to thank for these stupid rules.

On my way home from Bury this morning I followe d a girl, who was clearly using her phone, and her driving was erratic to say the least. I got past her to end up behind a dodder old git travelling way too slow, and with no clear control of his car.
Neither of these numpties will get anywhere near the attention on the road as someone like me, negogiating the roads defty on my bright red sportsbike. It makes my blood boil.

But I stand by my comment, which is there is relly no different between a cb and a mobile, and Im suprised the law allows it. It wont wash at the side of the road if I tell the officer that I would drop my mobile, (as I do) when I need to.

IS it a coincidence that radios and mikes have been part of the police car since radio was first used.--would be a legal nightmare to say wich driver was/wasnot qualified to use one OR was it more politically correct AND A QUICK FIX to ban all mobiles.
Using either a radio or mobile OR any form of comms in a moving vehicle means that brain has to do two jobs at same time.
NOT A GOOD IDEA.

CB - ahhh, the memories.

It's best features for some were also it's worst traits. The choice of frequency was great for ionospheric 'skipping' for cheap, long range communication, but at the same time that meant that during the day you couldn't hear anything because of a world-full of 'skip', plus it meant a decent antenna was too big and ungainly for mobile use (even a K40 was a big ugly clunk!!)

BTW I had an ALAN CX550 (Cybernet board ( but I put in crystal IF filters in to kill the bleedover), 5 bands of 50 channels, with a switch to select the 27/81 offset channels (thanks to an extra crystal).

Always fancied one of those Maycoms they sell now, just to see who's about.