Holland based DA-RC member 19DA109 Marcel reports that in New Zealand, since 2 June 2011, 41 Division operators now have legal access to 27 MHz frequencies. Marcel and other DA-RCies hope that this will see an influx of radio operators from this small pacific island country to the 11m band in the future!
According to licensing changes in NZ, cb radio operators can now use the Australian/US style 27 MHz (26.965 to 27.405 MHz) 40 Channel CB rigs as well as the New Zealand 26 MHz (26.330 to 26.770 MHz) 40 Channel ones. This is great news indeed!
Information shared by Marcel also indicates that the New Zealand 476/477 MHz UHF Personal Radio Service (PRS) (UHF CB in Australia) has also just been updated. Existing 40 Channel 5 kHz deviation units are still ok, but new to the market models should be 80 Channel 2.5 kHz deviation ones. The new PRS radios have Ch’s 41 to 80 12.5 kHz above Ch’s 1 to 40.
Details of the changes can be found at http://www.rsm.govt.nz/cms/pdf-library/licensing/gurl-cbr.pdf
With the now operational 27 Mhz what Channel are we using as a calling Channel ?
I note a lot of US and OZ CBers on Channel 11……are we going to add to the pile ups on it ???
What I would like to see is the FRS UHF radios in the USA upgraded to five watts and some real radios that people can install in their cars and homes with coaxial cable and external antennas. 27MHZ is fine but sometimes the DX/Skip is thick and I cant even talk across town and that’s where FRS/UHF would really come in handy if there were radios that were of good quality (better than those quarter watt toys from walmart).
I bet many truckers would switch to UHF to get away from the DX/Skip noise on 27MHZ too.