This episode of HamTalk Live is brought to you
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hamstation .com. This is Ham Talk Live, episode
number 40. Last Man Standing producer John Amadeo,
NN6JA, recorded live on Thursday, November 17th,
2016. I'm your host, Neil Rapp, WB9VPG. Thanks
for tuning in to this episode. of HamTalk Live.
Tonight, we'll be joined by John Amadeo, NN6JA,
the producer of the ABC television hit comedy,
Last Man Standing, and we'll take your calls
live in just a few minutes. Last week, we had
Open Lines Thursday. If you missed that show,
you can listen anytime at HamTalkLive .com or
you can catch it on iTunes, Stitcher, Google
Play, TuneIn, SoundCloud, or YouTube. So get
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And after the introduction, you can give us a
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show. So I'll be back with John right after this.
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Live. HamStation has you covered for both new
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them you heard it on HamTalk Live. HamTalk Live
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Eastern Time right here on hamtalklive .com and
if you missed the show you can listen. on the
archive that's on the website Amtoklive .com
or you can download it from most of those podcasting
websites. Originally from Long Island, John started
an amateur radio as a tech plus in the early
1970s quickly upgrading to general class. He
moved to Los Angeles in the early 1980s where
he ultimately upgraded to extra and changed his
call to NN6JA. John has worked in the entertainment
industry as an editor, director, and producer
for the past 30 years. He's produced familiar
shows like Titus, Arrested Development, Samantha
Who, and Sports Night. And he's currently producing
Last Man Standing, starring Tim Allen, which
is now in its sixth season on ABC and is nationally
syndicated. On the show, Tim Allen's character,
Mike Baxter, is a ham radio operator. And all
the radio equipment you see on the set is real
and working. And over the show's six seasons,
A number of the staff and crew have become licensed
and often use the show radios to get on the air.
So John, thank you so much for taking time out
to come on HamTalk Live. Well, hi Neil. Thank
you for having me on HamTalk Live. It's nice
to be on a show that I actually listen to and
enjoy. Well, thank you so much for for tuning
in and for joining us so tell us a little bit
about how Tim Allen's character Mike Baxter Came
to be a ham radio operator in the show Well,
thanks for asking, you know that came about really
organically in that The first time I met with
mr. Allen and we talked about his character Mike
Baxter and then he wanted him to be a man's man,
you know, a hunting, camping, fishing, backpacking
kind of a guy. And of course, these days, when
you do any kind of an activity, even outdoor
activities, there's some amount of technology
that comes along with it. Tim himself is a big
believer in technology. He loves radios and he
loves cell phones and computers and stuff. And
he surprised me by saying, Mike Baxter is a bit
of a survivalist, and he would have radio equipment.
And of course I went like radio equipment. What
do you mean by that Tim? And he said, you know
ham radio and I said well as it turns out I've
been a ham for a really long time and if you
want Mike Baxter to be a ham radio operator I
can totally hook you up and make a ham radio
theme for the show So we did that and as you
said we didn't just do it as a prop for the show
we made it real so I think you know, we can talk
more about that but That's sort of an aspect
of this show that I believe is the first time
anyone's ever done real ham radio on a TV show.
Yeah. Now we were talking a little bit before
the show about there's been a ham radio done
in some different shows, but it's never quite
real. That's true. And I think for me, and I've
seen all those shows, everything from frequency,
um, To how many shows the Munsters had ham radio
the new CW show frequency It goes on and on and
almost always ham radio is shown first of all
inaccurately It's usually an old CB radio or
a big box labeled ham radio with some blinking
lights on or something like that Or it's viewed
negatively that is to say you know hams are guys
sitting in their basement Talking to each other
on these old vintage radios So if we were going
to do ham radio on our show I wanted it to be
accurate and I wanted it to be as positive a
portrayal as possible and I especially wanted
the equipment to be really cool and modern and
Especially digital and that's kind of what we've
accomplished. I think so far So as a result of
doing all this Tim Allen got his ham license.
So how often does he get on the air? And any
any secrets about where to find him on the air
every once in a while? Well, you know, he does.
He's we have, of course, on the show, we have
a ton of ham gear. And if anyone that watches
the show, you pretty much see it every week.
And personally, Tim, I know that he asked me
a lot of questions, so I know when he's more
or less on. Of course, I'm not going to divulge
the secrets of when and where he might be because
my goodness, you can imagine he'd get the pileup
of a lifetime and it would probably scare him
away from ham radio. But because it was it was
Tim that wanted ham radio on the show because
I think he saw it as a good way to stay in touch
with his family as he moves around the country.
And of course, he's right. And the first piece
of gear that we got for him was an icon D star
radio because You know as you move around the
country on hf you may or may not be able to make
contact But for the most part with d star you
can go anywhere and at least get back to your
home base You know either through the radio and
a repeater or through a dev app or dongle or
whatever And I can tell that he does use the
radio by by the conversations we have Although
I have to say, you know tim works hard and long
hours. So when he's with us on the show I can
sort of tell what he's doing, but when he goes
home, that's his personal life. So what he does
on the weekends or at nights, I certainly don't
monitor his activities. And that's of course
when he would be playing with radios just like
all of us do. And it's hard for me to report
about that because I'm certainly not spying on
Mr. Allen. One of the reasons we created, we
could talk about later, we created the club,
the Last Man Standing Amateur Radio Club, which
and got the call sign KA6LMS was to allow our
licensed operators that didn't have general class
or above privileges and or TEM the ability to
go on the air using the club call. So that helps
a little bit with anonymity if you want to go
on the air and not be mobbed under your original
call sign. So that might be some secret information,
I don't know. Well, you've been able to use the
rig quite a bit you guys have been able to get
on every week With some of the crew and some
of the cast maybe tell us the best way to find
you on the air from the set of last man standing
and Tell us a little bit about the the setup.
Of course, we see the the rig and everything
But what's the antenna setup? Well, you know,
I've gone through many many antennas Currently,
I've got two inverted V's on the roof of the
stage. So now the quick backstory We are a 20th
Century Fox television show and we air on ABC
and we produce the show at CBS in Studio City,
California So we're in stage 9, which is the
Seinfeld stage. So it's a really good karma stage
We have a lot of luck there and it's about 60
feet high. So on the roof of that stage I've
got a 40 meter inverted V and a 20 meter inverted
V and they are radio waves dipoles and I'm using
LMR 400 all the way up there because I like to
keep as much power going up there as possible
and those those cables come down to our ICOM
IC 7700 in the Mike Baxter office in the fictitious
Outdoor Man store, and that's the basics of it
I can't run any power because I am about a thousand
feet away from the West Coast Broadcast Center
for CBS And they would probably frown on our
operation. If we took their nightly news off
the air, that might cause a ruffle or two. Absolutely.
Um, and they've been amazing. When you think
about where I am physically and the ability to
run a ham radio, it's, uh, it's pretty wonderful.
And it's, it's mostly due to, uh, Tim Holly,
who's one of the engineers at CBS, who's an extra
class and an old friend of mine who kind of helped
us, uh, get permission to do all this stuff.
but it's really worked great. We go on the air
usually on Tuesday nights during our dinner breaks.
The crew plays ping pong and listens to music,
and we go over to the Mike Baxter radio, flip
on the radio, and we work 20 or 40 meters. And
we've also worked D -Star. And we only have about
an hour, an hour and a half, and we'll, on average,
make about 100 contacts. And I don't know of
any other TV show that ever had a real live ham
radio station. transmitting from the set, minutes
before the actors take positions. I mean, when
we're in Mike Baxter's office and we're transmitting,
within about let's say 30 minutes after we go
QRT, the actors are standing right in front of
those radios that you see on the air every week.
So it's pretty exciting. Yeah, absolutely. And
it sounds just like a grand time and a great
place. to come visit and you've had several guests,
uh, able to come out and visit the station and
you've got some people that I know real well,
uh, that, uh, that I've seen, uh, growing up,
uh, tell us about, uh, your, your next, uh, guest
family that's coming out to, uh, to. December
on December 6 now we shoot our show on Tuesday
nights and we shoot in front of a live audience
of about 200 guests and on December 6th the Lee
family is coming out now as if your listeners
are not familiar the Lee family is an entire
family of ham radio operators starting from mom
and dad all the way down to I believe eight years
old is it Hannah or or faith faith. That's a
she's the youngest extra in the country and we're
gonna carve out some time to put the family on
the radio and Hoping we'll get our biggest pile
up ever on that night. So the way to track with
whatever we're doing on the air is to go to our
K a zero X TT Facebook page and I will always
post Information about our operations on that
Facebook page We generally don't know whether
we'll be on 40 or 20 Until we kind of get a sense
of the propagation for that night Then we'll
fish around for a clear frequency and once we
find one I posted on the Facebook page And then
oftentimes we'll spot ourselves on one of the
spotting networks Always have a big pilot And
it's just a lot of fun for us. In fact, we had
operations last Tuesday of one of our club members,
Rob, who's AA6RA, and he was one of the VE for
the Tim Allen test. So he's a friend of the show
and a great ham. And we had tough propagation
last week, but he pulled out about 60 or 70 people.
So my hat's off to Rob. Yeah, I saw the video
from that. He was having a fight. It was worth
it. We had some great ... The trick is it's easy
to just go with the biggest signals, but he really
worked at it and he pulled out some real noisy
signals. That's really what you're supposed to
do, I think. We really enjoy it. Oftentimes,
we record it so other people can enjoy hearing
themselves on the radio. Seeing themselves coming
into the Mike Baxter radios on the set Now I
know James is gonna love that trip too because
he does a lot of Film work too. So mm -hmm. Oh,
yeah, I mean, you know ham radio is not our primary
thing as I'm sure you know We are a family comedy.
We're a multi -camera sitcom. So we shoot for
camera high -definition television It's basically
like a play like a stage play shot in front of
a live audience. So it's a real fun place to
be and you know it's especially if you can snake
your way down onto the stage and you know the
hams have a little bit of an edge because oftentimes
if you're coming to the show and you and you
let me know ahead of time and my uh my email
address is easy to find and i will oftentimes
bring hams down on the stage and let them take
a picture with the gear and all that stuff so
you know we've had just so much fun with this
whole concept of having ham radio on the show
that i don't know hopefully keep going for a
few more years. Yeah you've got six in and you
know on a show that's that's pretty good and
you're still going strong so hopefully that will
continue. Well it's time to pay some of the bills
but I'll be back and we will start taking your
calls right after this message from Tower Electronics
right here on HamTalk Live. This episode of HamTalk
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HamTalk Live or give us a call at 812 -NET -HAM
-1. That's 812 -638 -4261. Now, here's more HamTalk
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HamTalk Live every Thursday night. at 9 p .m.
Eastern Time right here on HamTalkLive .com.
Also, check out our Facebook page and Twitter
feed. Just search for HamTalk Live. Well, it's
time for your calls now. So if you have a question
for John about the Last Man Standing show or
the setup. give us a call at 812 -NET -HAM -1
that's 812 -638 -4261 812 -NET -HAM -1 give us
a call or you can Skype us at HamTalk Live or
you can tweet at HamTalk Live and you can also
post on the comments there if you're listening
on a speaker But if you have any questions or
comments for John, why go ahead and give us a
call again. The phone number is 812 -NET -HAM
-1. While we're waiting on the calls to come
in, John, I want you to talk a little bit about
how you feel the media deals with ham radio and
what as hams we should be learning from that.
Well, you know, I'm glad you asked that it's
like it's important for us to keep ham radio
alive and That means we need to attract young
people or people in general to the hobby But
you know for the most part the media has not
been kind to us they do tend to see us as Old
people sitting in basements talking on radios.
And of course, there's so much more to ham radio
than that I'd like to see a little bit less coverage
of emergency operations only, and maybe a little
bit more coverage of how much fun ham radio is,
and how much one can learn from it. I know for
me, I just delighted in everything I could learn
about electronics and radio propagation from
playing with ham radios, and a little bit less
about emergencies, but you know, on field day,
you get a lot of coverage on local news, and
all they talk about is how hams are preparing
for the ultimate disaster. And although we certainly
are capable of handling disasters and certainly
do participate in that, what I think they're
missing is just how much fun it is and how much
one can learn from it. I would agree that, you
know, there needs to be some balance there of
those kinds of things and hopefully we can work
on that and make it a little more... balance.
There's so many different aspects of ham radio.
And it's like, you know, somebody asks you, well,
just what is ham radio? And, and it's kind of
hard because there, there's so many different
modes and so many different things that you can
do with it, that, um, it, it's hard to sum it
all up. Yeah, it's almost an obstacle. I have
to tell you, because we've now licensed something
in the neighborhood of 30, 30 some odd people
on the show. Um, And they'll they'll pass their
test and then the VEs are so exuberant about
ham radio and they start filling them with Oh
and you can repeaters and satellites and you
know all in they and like you see their eyes
start to glaze over. Oh my god It's like it's
too much information because ham radio is a massive
hobby There are so many little subdivisions of
things you can do that. You don't want to scare
someone away and I've heard The term people use
on the elevator speech, which is to say the very
short concise explanation of what ham radio is
and we all need to have that in our back pocket
because honestly on the show the one thing I
could hope for would be that someone might see
all that equipment on my show and ask their neighbor
who has a ham radio antenna Hey, what is that
stuff and what is ham radio and how does that
work? And then hopefully that person that one
of my viewers could say in a very simple and
concise way, here's what Ham Radio is and what
it could do for you in a way that might entice
somebody to check it out a little bit more. Very
good. 812 -NET -HAM -1 is the phone number. Give
us a call. 812 -638 -4261 or you can tweet us
at HamTalk Live if you're mic shy or... You can
also Skype us at HamTalk Live, so give us a call
with any questions or comments about The Last
Man Standing and John's role in that with both
the Ham Station and producing the show. Now you've
had several guests. We talked about the Leah
family coming soon. What are some of the other
guests that you've had and any others coming
up soon that we should... take note of? Well,
you know, over the years, I've had some wonderful
people, you know, Gordon West came to our show
very early on, and did an entire episode of ham
nation live from the set, which was real fun
for us. And, and Bob Hile came by and they both
got to meet Tim Allen. And that was a fun night.
And then of course, I've had Katie Allen and
Katie Allen came down to the show with With Dwayne
her husband and also at that same time Chip more
jelly and Janet more jelly came down and all
of them worked the station and got got their
each their own Huge pileup, but of course none
bigger than Katie's because Katie was you know
She's a fairly known commodity as a ham radio
celebrity and also coming from the stage was
was a good way to go I've had Michael Corey Who's
the I believe the emergency manager coordinator
for the a double RL came and work CW. In fact,
there's a a C a QSL card on my QSL wall of fame
from Japan from a contact that Mike made We regularly
have guest operators I will say that it's a it's
a little hard for the crew. The crew loves the
radio stuff and wants to play with it But when
we're on the radio, we're minutes away from shooting
the show so it it can sort of be distracting
too So it is it is helpful for me to have guest
operators and I've had a number of skilled guest
operators Not the least of which is Rob a six.
All right, who was there last week? And in fact,
you can see a video of Rob on our K a zero XTT
Facebook page kind of a fun night so, you know
we We use it as best we can and we get as many
people on the air and as many contacts as we
can possibly make Unfortunately, we can only
do it during our dinner break. So it's a it's
only an hour to an hour and a half And we are
as as our all hams. We're at the mercy of the
propagation of each individual night So we do
the best we can We've worked 20 meters. We were
40 meters. We had a couple of weeks ago we had
Ed and Amy who are part of the D star info? organization
working D star and I wanted to do that so that
you know, there are technicians that cannot cannot
context on 20 or 40 and Ten's not such a good
band for us at night on the stage as you can
imagine So that gave the technicians a way in
And I think our goal is to work as many modes
and as many bands as we can. So everybody has
a shot at us Well, that's great. I appreciate
you doing that. I'm sure speak for a lot of others
that appreciate you. taking the effort to to
make all that happen and so if you have or if
you have a question give us a call at 812 net
ham one that's 812 -638 -4261 give us a call
we've still got a little time left here in the
show so give us a call and chime in here on last
man standing 812 net ham one so how many of the
crew And the the cast Have ended up becoming
hams as a result of all this Well, you know,
I don't actually have an exact number I I think
we're in the middle 30s of a licensed ham members
and of course what happens on a TV show is from
season to season people come and go so People
that I might have licensed in the first season
Might have left in the third and then some new
people took tests So, you know overall probably
30 35 On the show currently probably in the 20s.
I have a couple of people that are studying right
now Probably three people that are studying right
now that will level test in the next few weeks
Generally when a crew member takes and passes
a test we give them a free handheld radio and
Some other incentives to to do it, but I think
it started for me when I realized many of my
young crew members You know the TV show is you
know, they say about war It's like hours of nothing
followed by moments of terror and a TV shows
like that Well, we have we have a pretty much
hard days or tend to be ten hour days And you
sit around a lot and then suddenly you're like
involved in the production, which is very intense
So it occurred to me that rather than having
my production assistants and writers assistants
Sitting around Facebooking and texting each other
they could they could learn something so I proposed
in season one that if if the kids wanted to you
know pick up the question pool and start reading
and talking about the Questions that we would
do it and provide them with a radio if they pass
the test and and we had quite a lot of takers
and It's funny Hear them going from downloading
music illegally one day to talking about SWR
the next I Thought that was just so much fun.
I the first time I heard somebody talking about
Wavelength wavelength versus frequency outside
my office. I'm like, oh we may be on to something
here Yeah, and then You know and it's not I would
think that people think like well, we've made
a whole lot of technicians but that's not true
either because We've got a number of people that
have since upgraded to both general and extra.
And I'll tell you that our video engineer, Doug,
he's an extra class. And one of my favorite success
stories is our mixer, Laura. Now Laura came to
us with no idea about ham radio. And most people
on the show had no idea what ham radio was. And
Laura got excited about it. She studied, passed
the technician with us. past the general in the
next year and past the extra third year. And
she's now K6MIX, which is a perfect call sign
if you're a sound mixer. Oh, yeah. That's beautiful.
She's really enjoying it. She got on the air
last season and first time ever on HF created
a big pile up and worked it pretty flawlessly
when you consider, you know, you know what a
pile up is like and my goodness. When we get
a pile up, it could be 1 ,000 people calling
your name. So she did great, and it was a real
fun thing to watch. But of course, when we turn
the radio off, we've got to go shoot a show.
So we have to be careful about how much stress
we put the crew through before the show. Usually
while we're operating, if anyone's ever watched
any of the videos I've posted on the KA6 LMS
Facebook page, can hear the noise level slowly
growing and while we're operating at a certain
point it becomes impossible to operate because
the audience loads into the to the audience to
the bleachers the warm -up we have a warm -up
comedian who entertains them while we're waiting
for the show to start and there's a DJ playing
music so you're the operator trying to make trying
to bust pileups and at the same time you're listening
to loud music coming from the DJ Jokes coming
from the warm -up guy and also the crews playing
ping -pong in the background You know, it's just
that you know moments before the show starts
before we all sort of take our places so it's
a it's a challenging place to work for radio,
but it's it's it's sort of I think it adds to
the fun and the immediacy of being on the radio
moments before the show starts that reminds me
of some of the CW, uh, training, uh, videos,
uh, that Gordon West made, uh, because he would,
you know, be going along and then all of a sudden
the vacuum cleaner starts up and you got a copy
code or the vacuum cleaner, you know? And, and
so it is distracting. It's tough to, uh, to be
able to focus on that while you've got, uh, all
the music blaring and everything, so that is
difficult. It's like real world training. I did
a few weeks ago, I tried something I think is
fun, and that is because people are very disappointed
when you have to pull the plug, and there's a
point where you just really need to get off the
stage because we need to make that set ready
to go for the actors. So I had a camera pointed
at the audience in real time. I posted it as
a little tile in the bottom of the image so you
could see the operator working on the main part
of the screen and in the bottom corner you can
see the audience slowly loading in and you can
hear the noise level increase and I thought it
was really kind of cool because you can kind
of see why oh they have to get off the air now
because now there's 200 people talking and clapping
and yelling and screaming and the music is playing
so it at least gave our ham fans a sense of what's
really happening while we're on the radio. Um,
you know, now if you're on CW with headphones,
it's not so bad, but if you're, if you're on
SSB, it's kind of hard to keep talking once you're
hearing, uh, loud music playing in the background
with audiences cheering. Yeah, that, that would
be a bit of a distraction. So it sounds like
a lot of fun and a great thing that, uh, that
this all come together. And so I'm so glad you
stopped in here and gave us a chance to get a
little insight on how the whole production works
and how you're able to. get the the rig going
and get it the station operated so give us a
call we're going to run out of time here shortly
but give us a call if you have any comments about
the show or questions about the show or anything
for John to give us a call at 812 net ham one
that's eight one two six three eight four two
six one we have just a few minutes remaining
so I want to give everybody a chance to to call
in and say hello or ask anything about the operation
there. Now here's something I need to do, because
I worked you guys a couple of weeks ago with
some students of mine at school. What do you
do with QSLs? What's your QSL? Well, we are absolutely
well we are we're ka6 LMS for last man standing
and What we ask is that you simply send us We
like to have your qsl card if you have one and
if you don't it's not essential maybe just a
note on a piece of paper and a self -addressed
stamped envelope to the address on our QRZ so
our QRZ page is good for ka6 LMS and We will
respond with this special ka6 LMS To SL card
that we had made and it's it's a it's a very
cool card. I mean We have a number of QSL cards
that we've created over the time again. We've
been on for six years now So certainly the first
one was Mike Baxter's card k a zero X TT Which
is a fictitious call sign, although it sounds
real pretty real and we've been giving those
cards away for years We've given probably eight
thousand k a zero X TT cards away Then the next
one we had created was Mike's daughter Mandy
the middle daughter Mandy who is seen on our
episode 217 on the radio and she became Kf0 Xie
which if you kind of write that on a piece of
paper spells foxy because she is foxy and we
had a special call special QSL card made for
her and we've given many thousands of those away
And then we decided at a certain point, let's
have a club. So we created the Last Man Standing
Amateur Radio Club and got KA6LMS, which I like
that call sign quite a lot. And we don't really
ID as Last Man Standing because there are some
rules and regulations, as you imagine, with the
FCC. We're not specifically promoting the show.
We can't really talk too much about. You know
if you if you call me on the radio I'm not going
to tell you to tune in on Friday nights at 8
o 'clock on ABC because that would be wrong Right,
but we can do that on the internet. Well we can
And I always say that Most important thing that
any ham can do for ham radio really is to watch
Lesman standing on Friday nights on ABC But we
would never do that on the air, but so we're
a little vague about that But I think that you
know the hams know where we are and who they
are I think they delight in seeing the radio
equipment on the set and Just knowing that it's
real and that it all works It's kind of an unusual
thing. I don't know anybody that's done it But
it was a lot of fun for me to do personally.
I installed it all myself Climbed onto the roof
of the stage put up the antennas bounce them
with my Comet ca 500 antenna analyzer and made
them mean, I don't know that I've tuned any antennas
in my life any better than those they're they're
completely flat SWR and with the IC 7700 we're
putting at about 200 watts, so I think we're
ahead of the game and We make a lot of contacts
I'm happy for everyone that tries to contact
us and we do the best we can to dig everyone
out Even if you're not a strong signal call us
and we will try our best to contact you Send
us a sazy get our QSLs. It's You know, we do
it for a reason. We do it because we enjoy it
and because we have a love of hammer radio and
we want to try to keep this great hobby going
as long as possible before, before the cellular
companies try to horn in on our spectrum. Take
it, take all the spectrum away. Absolutely. Well,
um, we do have a picture of the, um, KASIX LMS,
um, QSL card on our Facebook page and a Twitter
feed. So you can check that out. We do have a
tweet here, um, for Mike would, uh, he was, uh,
talking, uh, referring to the, uh, working the
pileups, uh, with all the stage noises that my
dad learned CW and the British army with instructors
that were whacking canes on tables to distract
them. Yeah. It's it's reality. You got to deal
with, uh, with all that noise around. And so,
uh, so it's true. It's like that. You know, there's
a point where I'm, I'm usually on, on the stage
with whoever's operating and you know, we feel
bad about having to pull a plug at some point,
but you could just, we just look at each other
and go, okay, well at this point that crowd is
cheering and the, you know, the warmup guy is
telling jokes and all this stuff is happening.
I'm going to have to kill that. How do I do that?
Just like this. Like this, as a matter of fact,
speaking of take the battery out of a phone and
it stops ringing. And it's exactly like whacking
a cane on a table because as I say, you know,
I have had comments from people. It's like, I
love your show, but I hate your fake laugh track.
And to them, I challenge them and say, come to
our show and be become a part of our quote unquote
fake laugh track. Because the laugh track is
200 people that love the show and love Tim Allen.
They laugh their heads off and applaud and that's
great for the show But of course, it's bad for
ham radio operation because it's pretty distracting
Well, it sounds like a lot of fun just you know,
you may have to fight through that a little bit
but that's it, but it sounds like a lot of fun
Yeah, always a challenge and you know, that's
that's a lot of what a ham radio is all about
is trying to figure out how to work the place
you want to work with with the conditions that
you're dealt on a given day and of course we
know conditions these next few years are not
going to be great so you got to accept the challenge
and fight your way through it. I agree and I
think what we're going to try to do is use all
of the modes and all of the bands that we can
to try to extend that so we have not at this
point done anything like Any of the digital voice
formats, but I'd like to try to do that and we
probably at some point We'll do some ready. We'll
do some You know some of the digital text formats
and everything we can do and I just want to try
to include everybody We've done a number of CW
sessions already, but beyond that I want to do
whatever I can to get more people to contact
us who want I know the technicians have a tough
time because Ten meters would not really be that
fruitful for us at four o 'clock at night Especially
this time as we approach solar minimums So that's
why we did a D star night and I think we'll do
other digital voice formats as time goes on and
other Text like formats. So we're gonna try to
cover all the bases and include as many people
as we can That's wonderful, John. Thank you.
And speaking of running out of time, we've run
out of time. So thank you so much for coming
on and we'll be listening for you. My pleasure.
All right. Well, that is a wrap for this week's
edition of HamTalk Live. I'd like to thank my
guest, John Amadeo, NN6JA and everyone out there
in cyberspace for listening and our tweeter tonight
and invite you all back in two weeks. We are
going to take next week off for Thanksgiving.
So give thanks next week and then we'll be back
the following Thursday. And our guest that following
Thursday at 9 p .m. Eastern Time will be Harold
Kramer, WJ1B. He's going to be here to talk about
his key collection and his experiences as the
former COO at the American Radio Relay League.
For a list of all of our upcoming guests, visit
HamTalk .com. So for now, this is Neil Rapp,
WB9 VPG, saying 7 -3, 7 -5, and may the good
DX be yours. 7 -3 and good luck from ham talk
live