HAM RADIO
Bill is a retired policeman formally serving under call signs KMA367, KJC625, and KQR573. Law Enforcement is where he first learned that “radios save lives;” and is now an FCC-licensed amateur radio operator at station K2PTL. Bill will tell you “Though the FCC may call us “amateurs,” there’s nothing amateur about serious Ham Radio Operators.” Albeit Ham Radio has become his hobby, during disasters, it serves a greater purpose in providing communications and facilitating triumph through tragedy for his neighbors around the globe, while their communications infrastructures are down.
As required by some ARES-based emergency radio groups, he has completed the following training and certification with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). He has been certified in SA-100.I, ICS-100c, ICS-200b, IS-230.d, IS-700b, and IS-800c.
He has also completed the basic and advanced Storm Spotter, Spotter Convective Basics, and the Role of the Skywarn Spotter training courses with the National Weather Service (NWS) spotter program. He now serves as an NWS-trained Spotter. Working together, saving lives!
Bill is an active participant in ARES groups. Besides general rag-chewing, he participates in EmComm activations on 20 Meters and various Nets on UHF, VHF & HF, and when the opportunities arise, he loves serving as a Net Control Operator.
Before moving to Tennessee, he started the Ham Radio Enthusiasts group (a SoCal Inland Empire group of Hams). He also served as an ARRL-accredited Volunteer Monitor (VM).
Bills Radio Room:
- HT is a Kenwood D74A, with D-Star
- Mobile on vehicles are a Yaesu FTM-510DR-ASP and a Yaesu FTM-100D.
- The home base for UHF/VHF is a Yaesu FT-991A, with a 17′ Comet NCG GP-9 antenna (mounted on a long mast on top of our shop). For Net Control duties, a Heil Pro-7 Headset w/ a boom mic.
- The home base for HF is an ICOM 7300, with a Hy-Gain Crank-Up Tower, & a KIO Hex Beam antenna (10,12,15,17&20 meters). And 75-80 meters comes thru an Alpha Delta DX-80 dipole. With an LDG AT-600Pro-II Autotuner. Update: Left the tower behind in Calif.
- Maritime is Cobra MRF77B GPS Stationary Marine Radio (Coast Guard registered with MMSI & DSC).
Earlier Bill mentioned the adage “Radios save lives.” As a Christian, he wants you to know that “Jesus saves souls!” To know more about that, read his Gospel tract here or below.
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[1] Regarding serving as a VM. I served until almost the end of my second three-year term. Though I am grateful to the hard-working Hams who administered the VM program, I did not appreciate the FCC attorney who trained the VMs. During a mandatory online training, the following occurred:
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1) Early in the program, during a mandatory online seminar, she told VMs to “get your Covid vaccines so you can go outside and enjoy yourselves.”
2) To not investigate or report profanity on the air, she said profanity is “not actionable.”
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So this FCC attorney will not deem profanity as bad, but advocates and promotes vaccines and obedience to COVID mandates as good. I knew then that I could not tolerate her, nor her attempt to infiltrate the Ham community with her Covid tyranny. To obey or submit to her unbiblical authoritarianism, or to acquiesce to her nonsense, would have been a compromise. Moving forward, on 02/28/25, I allowed my ARRL membership to expire. We need to Make Patriarchy Great Again!
Being new in Tennessee, I attended my first dinner for Ham Radio operators in West Tennessee, a couple of counties North of us. During the introductions, one asked, “Where are you from?” When I said “California,” he loudly replied, “Not another damn Yankee!” Further investigation later revealed that he flew the Yankee flag at his home (I fly old Dixie). So, who’s the “damn Yankee?” And then of course I have had to put up with this all-too-common cliché – “Don’t bring your politics with you!” Only an ignorant person would assume everyone from California is liberal. Frankly most of the aforementioned are ‘left to the center’ Republicans, or all the way to the left liberals.
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A response to those who hate “transplants.” I was a California resident for over 60 years and moved to Tennessee in 2022. I have never voted for a Democrat and never will. I am ‘three clicks to the right’ of Ronald Reagan, and way to the right of today’s pro-socialist, pro-homosexual, pro-abortion, ecumenical, egalitarian (feminist), big government Republican party. Unlike most native Tennesseans, you won’t see the Yankee flag on my flagpole, but you will see my large 5’x8’ Confederate flag as seen here. Unlike native Tennesseans, I am a Tennessean by choice, not birth. American by birth, Southern by choice. Albeit I am thankful for the Tennessee Natives who have given me the right hand of friendship (though they be few). But most importantly. By God’s sovereign grace, I am a born-again Christian, and here’s my Gospel tract that by His grace this sinner distributes daily. Imagine that. A former Californian obsessed with bringing the Bible and sound doctrine back into the Bible belt. https://www.theexpositor.tv/the-good-news/