CB Radio was being used by truckers, reps and motorcyclists.......Well, it was essentially truckers but in those good old early days of personal communication, I can claim to be one of the first people to use it in my car to request help to find customers localities while on the road as a rep.
Soon, most people had at least tried a CB Radio but most pretended to be Southern State USA Truckers having seen "Convoy" and most conversations were in the codes of the day and were incomprehensible to beginners....
I was pleased when my pal Doug followed me into CB and invested firstly in a basic 40 channel AM CB then chopped it in for a Side Band with which we could reach Portugal one day then the East Coast USA the next, thanks to being able to "skip" in different weather conditions. He invested in a huge Sigma-4 aerial which stripped everyones TVs when he fired it up using a high wattage Booster.
I tended to concentrate on local communication CB, handle (user name) "Brown Ale", though I also had Side Band, handle (user name) "Three Legs".
I developed telescopic aerials and was very careful to get the SWR spot on, this pushing the signal to maximum distance without destroying the neighbours TV picture.
So we set out for the TT that year, Doug with the Van and the bikes and a large aerial to use when stationary and one of my aerials to use whilst on the move, and I followed on with my equipment.
BROADBAND I/D CARD -------- IOM CLUB CARD ------------ HANDLE REGISTER
On the Island I had joined the CB Clubs the year before so we visited a get-together ("eye-ball") one evening to meet other CB'ers.
By the end of the evening we had come up with an idea to follow Dougs progress during a practice with CB Radio users being sited round the course at intervals which allowed contact round the circuit with a link up at Windy corner so Doug could be monitored all the way round. Remember, this is before Mobile Phones !!
The experiment was a great success and worked well, with me being link man at Windy Corner. However, CB was not allowed any where near the Grandstand area in case it interfered with police communications so while the use of CB Radio was expanded in this unique way it went no further and we subsequently concentrated on using CB to chat to people round the Atlantic Ocean coastline.
When I returned home I wrote it all up for a CB Radio magazine and also persuaded some of my rep colleagues to use CB in their car because by now I had negotiated permission to install CB officially in my company car. Later my family and I visited East Germany and got permission to use my sideband while in Berlin-Schmockwitz and "talked" to CB'ers in Southampton and Wales.
Back home, I helped to set up "TWINS", the Two-Way Independent Network System which helped to regulate Local CB use in our area, cooperating with the police well before CB became legal.
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