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HAM/CB operators ... how old are you?

Which age group do you belong too?

  • Total voters
    52
My first radio back into cb was a few years after my divorce and I was alone. Back in the late 90s & that was only a New Cobra 29 NW ST that I paid to much for at a truck stop. I didn't get to serious about it because of child support and mortgage. It wasn't until I retired in 2015 and paid the house off for the second time that I started buying SSB radios and getting more serious, plus joining forums to learn more as I went about Working On My Bucket List. What A Journey !!!
 
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Perusing eBay you can identify SK items sold by non operators increasingly often. Over the past year or few I see a trend where prices are dropping for whole/complete units while the cost of Parts steadily rises. Tearful when the old sets are parted-out. I'd be interested to learn the extent that sentiment drives repair for the non-pro operator.
 
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I
whiteastro said:
My first radio back into cb was a few years after my divorce and I was alone. Back in the late 90s & that was only a New Cobra 29 NW ST that I paid to much for at a truck stop. I didn't get to serious about it because of child support and mortgage. It wasn't until I retired in 2015 and paid the house off for the second time that I started buying SSB radios and getting more serious, plus joining forums to learn more as I went about Working On My Bucket List. What A Journey !!!
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I have one of the Cobra 29 LTD NW before they came out with the ST's (Sound Trackers), also have several of the older Cobra radios ( Cobra 146 GTL, Cobra 148 GTL, and a Cobra 29 LTD Classic), but my favorite radio for talking DX is my Ranger 2950 Mirage.
 
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BC Coyote said:
... Anybody that thinks there is a rosy future for CB or ham is delusional. Young people could care less, middle age folks are too busy trying to make ends meet, and the older folks who have money to spend on gear are dying off fast.
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This is my worry (?) / concern as well. Poll numbers so far indicate we got 20-30 years left (hi! hi!).
 
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I don't talk about age . . . it makes me feel old. As long as everything inside still works OK - I'm good. I've operated stations in Indiana, SoCal, Wisconsin, Georgia, and now Colombia. Started in '66, and never been in a home without a CB antenna up. I guess I'm just a diehard. Bought a Cobra 139XLR in '78 and still run it. Tried several other rigs over the years, but always come back to the Cobra.
Cb will never return to the "CB Craze" says of the mid 70's, but it was a hell of a fun time to live through.

- J.J. 399
 
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whiteastro said:
Last summer I got a young guy maybe in his single digits but maybe the beginning of his double digits who wanted a cb for the PA function so I give him a cheapy AM Cobra. He come back later wanting another one with PA so gave him another but took him in the garage and let him listen to skip rolling in so he could see what he was missing. He started smiling so you have to plant the seed and hope it grows ! I'm 73.75 YO
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When we lived in Georgia, my son and 2 of his friends were going 4-wheeling in the mountains one weekend. I hooked them up with some old Midland CBs and mag mount antennas I had. They said that they probably wouldn't use them much.
When they got back, the first thing my son did was ask if they could keep the CBs. They are still CBing to this day.
Whiteastrro is 100% right. You just have to plant the seed.

- J.J. 399
 
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Reading through the comments, Unit_399 made a comment that jarred a memory. I remember our parents bought me and my brother some walkie-talkies for Christmas around 1975-76. Dad was messing around with my walkie-talkie setting inside the house, he was talking to a guy in a neighborhood back behind us a fairly good distance away, when the guy ask what dad was talking on and found out he was on my walkie-talkie, he was dumbfounded. I remember the guy saying, You mean to tell me I've spent all this money on a base station and your talking on your kids walkie-talkie??? He couldn't hardly believe a kids toy could talk that good. I think back in the day walkie-talkies talked far better than the cheaply built kids walkie-talkies I bought my kids, the one's I bought for my kids didn't seem to talk much better than the two soup cans and string we played with as kids.
 
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G-Golly Wally said:
Reading through the comments, Unit_399 made a comment that jarred a memory. I remember our parents bought me and my brother some walkie-talkies for Christmas around 1975-76. Dad was messing around with my walkie-talkie setting inside the house, he was talking to a guy in a neighborhood back behind us a fairly good distance away, when the guy ask what dad was talking on and found out he was on my walkie-talkie, he was dumbfounded. I remember the guy saying, You mean to tell me I've spent all this money on a base station and your talking on your kids walkie-talkie??? He couldn't hardly believe a kids toy could talk that good. I think back in the day walkie-talkies talked far better than the cheaply built kids walkie-talkies I bought my kids, the one's I bought for my kids didn't seem to talk much better than the two soup cans and string we played with as kids.
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I had a set that my older cousin gave me when I was a kid. You know all the adjustments inside that look like they were made for a screwdriver? I was talking to a guy one day and asked him what channel I was on.



He said "All Of Them!". Haha!
 
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DXman said:
Gee - I only see one vote in '76+ group, wonder who that is? LOL.....
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That's a old Coyote hunter that lives up in the Pacific Northwest, the guy is a Legendary DX chaser.

73
Jeff

( I hear he got banned one time from the DX Contests because he was just to good at working Dx)
CDX 178 DX Man.JPG
 
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I turned 16 years old in February 1979, living in a small town. All my friends had a cb in their car/truck and we were constantly talking. Besides meeting up somewhere, this was the only communication we had! We didn't use the phone because we were never home!! If my dad was looking for me, he would get on the radio... "get your ass home". Although that rarely happened.
Growing up in a small town 1970's... so much freedom.
The cell phone of our generation.
 
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