In response to the last blog posting, a San Diego Amateur radio operator kindly forwarded to the Curmudgeon the enclosed photograph and some of his observations of the monster residential ham antenna that set off the furor with the city government. The enclosed photo shows the situation on the ground there. For identification, this antenna is a MonstIR Yagi ($5K, not including supporting mast or installation costs), which can be remotely tuned to resonance from 40 through 6 meters (7 through 50 MHz).
The antenna is installed at a prestige home in the pricey Mount Soledad section of the neighborhood of La Jolla. The residence is essentially sitting at the bottom of a small, natural valley, surrounded by low hills on three sides (the three that lie in the general direction of North America and Europe)! It is not an optimum geographical location from which to operate a contest-grade ham station.
In the photograph the antenna is depicted in its “storage” position. The motorized winch on that mast will crank the aluminum rods up to a level of about 85 feet above grade. Not surprisingly, that takes the Yagi right up to eye level for people looking west out the windows of the row of houses above and behind his! And that leaves those home-owners quite understandably howling that their multi-million dollar hill-top view of La Jolla beaches and the Pacific has been greatly compromised by an installation over which they have no control and from which they get no benefit. If the Curmudgeon lived up there on “Got-Rocks Heights,” he too would be right in the middle of the howling mob as well!
If the ham in question transmits to the east with any (competitive) amount of RF power and the antenna is at its full extended height, the people in the homes above will be irradiated with his station’s reactive near-field emissions. The Curmudgeon has done RFE exposure evaluations and he understands that the FCC-mandated non-occupational emissions limits for the homeowners will still not be exceeded even with this setup. Thus the health of the neighbors will probably not be at put at risk by the operations of the station. But why should they have any exposure at all from the elevated, proximate antenna?
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This “VOA-wannabe” Amateur station should have been built out in the back-country and then operated via Internet remote control. That would have been rational, and the ham technology for doing this kind of thing is well established. Instead, a seemingly willful Amateur licensee installed this monstrosity at his home. And, perhaps $250,000 in legal fees and court costs later, all the 3,700 City of San Diego Amateurs will find out whether he gets to keep it. And also whether they get to keep their own, generally far more modest Amateur Yagis.
It’s enough to gag a maggot!
“Let’s keep SAN DIEGO safe for RF!”
The Old RF Curmudgeon
Curmudgeon: a crusty, ill-tempered, and usually old man…
This amateur is only exercising his right. I personally think it was quite KIND of him to put up an antenna that can be lowered so that when his station is not in operation, the antenna is lowered out of the neighbors sight.
Your question, “Why should they have any exposure at all” from his antenna sounds like a bleeding heart liberal trying to impose his will on someone else EVEN THOUGH the ham is 100% legal. You know what – LAWS are there to be obeyed. Idiots like you are there to be scoffed at.
I heard about this on another site. Here is what I posted there and now it’s here.
Wow!
I didn’t see this until today when browsing my spam. I can’t beleive the majority of sentiment is really against the ham operator. Steven Christ is the only valid comment on this topic – “It is nobody’s business what I put on my property.”
If the guy is legal the guy is legal, end of sentence, period.
We sound like a bunch of frightened children. Stop it.
Friends, this is how it starts. Think! Take ham radio out of it…
What if one day they don’t like your Hummer?
What if they say they don’t like your religion?
What will happen one day when they tell your family is too big?
What if they say your dog is too ugly?
What if they say your flag is too big?
Don’t laugh. This IS how it starts.
I guess the idea that my home is my castle is just too old fashioned.
That I’ve worked like a dog all my life to pay for it means nothing.
And please stop with the RF exposure crap. I get more radiation from the cell phone strapped to my head and the monitor I stare at every day, all day at work than this guy’s neighbors will ever get. If you are afraid of a little radiation, sit under a nice shade tree is my advice.
I just can’t believe it. This is America. We are supposed to own our property.
Remember this. All societies which are really free have a very few basic tenants. Free speech, right to bear arms and land ownership.
If you don’t have the right to do what you want with land you own then you don’t really own it.
It would be different if the poor slob was really hurting someone but he isn’t.
I just can’t believe the capitulation on this topic. We used to fight this stuff.
I’m going to the Curmudgeon site right now and reply directly. This is wrong on so many levels.
Hey, I wan’t to donate to his defense fund. More power to him. I’m glad he is rich and powerfull enough to fight this. And I wish the man well and the best of luck. It’s guys like this who keep us free and we should honor him.
Maybe he is a bit of a nut. Maybe he is not likeable. Maybe he is just trying to make people mad. Maybe he is on a power trip. I don’t care. It is his land. Whatever his reasons, it is his land and he does not have to justify them to me, at least for one.
Please, please, please – stop giving of your rights. It will lead to no good.
73 de KJ7R
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This ham has no right to operate. His license does not give him any guarantee of a right to do anything but hold a license. The community needs to know who he is talking to and why. Radio can reach a long way and our country is at war…how do we know he isn’t talking to a terror group?
How do we know the radiation studies mean anything? Can his radio listen to conversations in my home? Can he intercept phone calls, baby monitors, or anything else but amateur radio signals? If he can and if he does, than we have a privacy issue!
Really, let’s be real…amateur radio is old, outdated, and rather quite silly. We have the internet, telephones, and he could even sit down and write a letter to someone and none of that requires an antenna or a radio.
I am just finding out about amateur radio and so far all I see are people who are strange, inappropriate, and think they have some sort of importance.
“… an installation over which they have no control and from which they get no benefit.” —- Amateur radio is the LAST line of communication to go down. Hams provide emergency communications and intercommunication between agencies during disasters (including the local fires years ago) that the government is NOT CAPABLE of supplying. The only reason that police, fire, federal and all were able to communicate during the week following 9-11 was because of amateur radio.
“But why should they have any exposure at all from the elevated, proximate antenna?” —- They are getting less exposure from this antenna, on less harmful frequencies than they are getting from their own cell phones, or leakage from their own microwave ovens.
And to “Space”. “His license does not give him any guarantee of a right to do anything but hold a license.” —- FEDERAL LAW (per the FCC) grants him the RIGHT to put up an antenna installation adequate to communicate as he wishes. It also says that his licensed radio takes precedence over your unlicensed (part 15) baby monitor, cordless phone, and remote control appliances.
And, by the way, ANY twit with a $200 scanner can listen to your baby monitor and cordless phone, license or not. For what it matters, this particular antenna is not designed for those frequencies, so you have more to worry about from the drug lord next door.
Here is my “curmudgeon” take on it. The neighbors should be bloody grateful that he built an installation that HAS a stow position, so that they only “have to suffer” when he is actively using his rig.
What a complete idiot. Is his right to put up an antenna on his property. And even a bigger idiot for crying about rf waves when your surrounded by high freq cellular waves every day. Radio waves at his freq passes right through human tissue with zero harm. Once again a complete idiot crying about what he understands nothing about. When all the power went out in San Diego and cell phone towers where over loaded people went into a panic….well guess what? When natural disasters happen it’s people like this guy who has a large antenna will be able to communicate important vital life saving information and those crying about there beautiful view will thank God such people with this equipment even exist. What a friggen idiot!
@SpaceAgeMage – You are plain wrong about everything you say here. A ham licence provides the right to use certain bands of the radio spectrum for hobby purposes including voice communication. There is no censorship of these communications. You don’t know if he is talking to a terror group, but there is no privacy for amateur radio transmissions so they would have to be very amateur (licensed ham ) terrorists.
You can trust the radiation studies because they were carried out using scientific method and peer review. If you understood a little about science you would be comfortable about this being the best that it is possible to do.
Most amateur use of the radio spectrum is secondary, and is not on the bands used for baby monitors, which are also secondary. So eeither of these applications has a right to interfere with a primary service.
Antenna installations are subject to local planning rules and have nothing to do with the ham licence.