PeteCamp wrote:So it would require carrying on a conversation or sending some sort of information back and forth, at a power level sufficient to swamp the receiver, on a frequency not allowed to hams except on a low power, non-interfering, basis, sorry, still illegal, even carrying on a conversation.
If I destroy it, they would have to prove I knew it was government property
I don't care to argue about this with anyone. I have no idea of your qualifications or expertise in ham radio or radio equipment design. Suffice it to say that the issue is not who or what is transmitting, or even really on what frequency. The issue is the reality that most manufacturers do not design sufficient discrimination into receivers to keep them from being overpowered by nearby transmissions of a legal nature on different bands. This has been a well known problem for many, many years. It began with TV receivers. FCC rulings have almost universally decreed that if you don't want your receiver overpowered by adjacent legal signals, then design and filter it better.
No one has to use an illegal frequency. It doesn't even have to be in the same band. A perfectly legal transmission by a ham on a nearby band can shut down numerous types of receivers because of the huge differences in legal, allowable power output by ham radios. As long as the ham radio is not putting out spurious emissions, and is on a legal band, the burden is on the receiver to reject that interference. Unless the GPS owner complained to the ham, he would probably have no idea there was a problem. I could cite numerous technical articles, but it's not worth it.
Suffice to say that on a legal band (and amateur radios have allowable bands everywhere), carrying on a conversation, regardless of mode, or broadcasting certain types of legal information for other hams, it is not illegal to carry on that conversation. If the GPS does not have the adjacent channel rejection, I can filter my transmissions somewhat to assist it in overcoming the blanketing effect. But ultimately it is the problem of the GPS manufacturer.
Anyway, as I said, this is a legal, but not practical solution. And given the current administration and AG Holder, do you really think they wouldn't find you guilty of destruction of govt property?
Pete - AE5J
de K5NRA, Then why argue with me? I did say "swamp the receiver" and as such most would understand I did not mean operating in the same frequency or band, and it matters not how much or little rejection the receiver has, if the ham operator is interfering, on purpose, then the ham operator is at fault, which is NOT legal. It is illegal to carry on the converstaion if you know, or even suspect, or should know, that you are causing interference. Lots and lots of FCC case law on that, even up to and including hams interfering with poorly designed telephones which were demodulating signals from properly operating ham stations, not even rf devices. The hams, in multiple cases had to shut down, or confine operation to certain hours, especially in cases of TVI, even including poorly designed TV receivers.
While I agree that the manufacturers are putting out some pretty poor equipment, I have seen lots of evidence of that, including a dimmer switch that worked real good as an rx on 20 cw, without even a high power signal nearby.
When I was the FCC Commercial licensee for NY Telephone Company, for the upstate region of NY State, I was involved as an engineer as well as as a ham, in investigating many such cases, and answering FCC queries and pink slips about them.
I could go into all of the other types of investigations I have done and equipment I have used, but the point remains that if they even suspect you are interfering, on purpose, you will be in as much trouble as if they suspect that you found and removed the offending device. and they would still have to have, including Holder, some sort of indication that the device had been found, which would be quite obvious if you were to suddenly set up a station in your vehicle that was capable of interfering with a 1.5GHz receiver, whether by desensitizing it or by mixing signals.
