n 9th July I attended the CB Open Forum at the NEC Birmingham, and to be honest it seemed a waste of time. There were speakers from the Radiocommunications Agency, the BCBC, and the RSGB, all giving there opinions on the future of CB.
The addresses by the 4 speakers only lasted 3/4 hour in total, with the remaining 2 hours given over to answering questions from the floor. It was disappointing that after 2 hours of Q&A the meeting was abruptly brought to a halt despite there still being many visitors wishing to ask questions, the chairman simply said that was the end of the allocated time and closed the meeting !!
Unfortunately there were very few "sensible" questions asked, it was nearly always the same question asked in different ways - "what are you going to do to get rid of the wallies?", with always the same answer - "lack of resources and low priority of CB ".
The only information of slight interest from the meeting was that despite tests showing no significant interference from "legal" SSB, there is practically no chance of it becoming legal in the UK in the foreseeable future. The reason they gave for this was that despite the fact that the sets did not cause interference, they were of the opinion that users would use amplifiers on the sets and this would then cause interference !!
With regards to "packet", the RA are still testing and evaluating types of "data" systems, and it looks likely that some kind of "data" system will be legalised in the future but not a full "packet" system as on the Amateur bands.
Overall the RA were certainly not giving any information away and as a public relations exercise I am not sure that the Forum was a good way to spend the "limited resources" that they kept referring to.

new compact mobile rig from Midland, very similar in features to the Midland 78 plus (which is currently not available), but featuring the new "ESP Noise Killer".
The set is quite basic with only volume, squelch, push-button channel-change, band-change and scan button. There are also channel change controls on the mic (the same compact mic as used on the other Midlands).
The "ESP Noise Killer" can be switched on/off by pressing the squelch control. Midland claims this can reduce background noise by up to 95%. I am not sure whether I like the way this changes the RX audio, but it's probably just a case of getting used to it.
Performance is good and the nice simple design makes it ideal for use mobile, there's all the controls you need without any of the fancy gadgets. Our first batch sold at £79.50, but we can now offer them for £10 less !!

eptember will see changes in our mail department with Angela leaving us to move down to London and someone new stepping into her shoes.
During the past 6 years many of you will have spoken to Angela when placing your orders, and I am sure you join us in wishing her well in her future endeavours.
I hope that you will be patient with anyone new who takes your order in the future, it will obviously take some time for any newcomer to get used to the vast array of equipment we stock. Please remember that if you ever have any problem whatsoever with our service I am always available to look into it and try and sort it out for you. Any problems please ask for Doug, or e-mail me at doug@kcb.co.uk.

odulator have now gone back to using a decent quality whip with the original modulator, so we have them back in stock. The original modulator was our best selling antenna until the start of this year when they changed the whip they used to a cheaper less flexible whip. They are now back to their original good quality.

iny mic screws, the ones which fit in the body of the mic plug, are now back in stock after being unavailable for almost a year !! Still priced at 7p each or £2.50 for a pack of 50.

  believe our service department is probably the best around, manned full time by a technician dedicated to the repair of CB equipment.  We  repair both equipment we have sold and that bought elsewhere.
We are pleased to offer our repair service to our mail customers, but unfortunately because our charges are so low (they have not increased since 1991 !!) the postage cost is often more than the cost of the repair.
Please note that we only repair legal FM radios, we can not touch AM or SSB equipment so please do not send any AM/SSB radios to us because they will be returned untouched at your expense.

ust arrived we have the highest capacity rechargeable AA batteries currently available, a massive 1500mAh.
These are Nickel-Hydride and so in addition to their high capacity they also have the advantage of not suffering "memory" like standard ni-cads.

Please remember that we also stock or can obtain a vast array of batteries for many uses, from watches to alarms to mobile phones. Please phone us with your requirements and we will be pleased to quote you a price and availability.