They are plenty of jammers with up to a 50 meter range, but they get expensive and bulky. All the ones I've seen online are measured, of course, in meters since they're all from outide the U.S. The small ones that are about the size of a cell phone have a 10-20 meter range, which is more than enough for me. I don't want to bother others. I just don't want to be bothered BY others. Anyone that far away from me is of no consequence to me. Yes, it would be fun to "zap" others just to see it happen. But that would not be my purpose for having a jammer. The girl right next to me at work is engaged to a Secret Service agent on WH detail. But I don't want to ask her or her fiance about this for obvious reasons.

Sure, go for it! Why should your sensitivities be bothered in the least by anyone else's desire to talk on their cell phone? Especially on your BIKE, why should you have to listen to people sitting on a park bench talking to their kids or office while you ride by?!

Seriously, why? I guess I can understand restaurants.. to a degree... ...but if everyone were like you, if I needed to get a phone call, i couldn't leave the house.

Imagine if Rick was in the middle of an serious/urgent cell phone call and someone "zapped" him. Of course, that wouldn never happen.

So you want to use an illegal cell phone jammer to jam legal cell phone calls because they (phone calls) annoy you?

Huh?

Best,

Kurt

I can't remember the last time I rode my bike past someone not in a car outside of DC, so I don't know how a jammer would possibly bother someone on a park bench, of which there are none anywhere near a hwy. I've ridden on and not even in the congested burb streets around where I live. It's all concrete around here.

No Kurt, I want to use an illegal jammer to jam DANGEROUS, albeit legal, cell phone calls which ENDANGER me and all others on the road. They don't merely annoy me. They scare the living $hit out of me. That it's politically impossible to get cell phone drivers treated like the equally dangerous drunk drivers does not make it any less dangerous to be around them or make me feel any guilt for trying to stop their dangerous actions for the brief time they're within my strike zone while on the road when they should be paying attention.

So, you really think the drivers of the cars right next to you are going to go "okay, I'll just call back later" and concentrate on driving? Riiiiight. They're going to do the most dangerous part of cell phone use, which is look down at their phone, realize the call is ended, and look through their address book or re-dial the dropped call.

Why don't you just concentrate on driving defensively and lobby for improved cell phone laws for in-car use instead of imposing your arrogant and illegal jamming that could likely cause a lot more harm than good?

Steve, no. And that's why I posted it here. I really wonder what the effect would be. Unlike Frogger's suggestion, I'm not considering this as a means of vigilante justice or getting even or whatever. I really just want to create a safe buffer zone around myself, since so few drivers anymore care about anything other than their cell phone conversations.

I find it kind of strange that there's such vehement opposition here. It wouldn't bother me in the least if cell phone chatting behind the wheel were a felony and rigidly enforced. Last time I dialed a number while driving was to report one of those "how's my driving" trucks that was a danger to everyone around him (and on the phone, I might add). I've never used a phone in a restaurant and don't ever chat while driving. Jammer or bans wouldn't affect me in the least.

I hope Rick's not in town when I need to be talking about an important matter with my family or finally get that important customer on the line to finalize a deal. Or, when I'm on the line with my doc discussing an issue about my health or maybe talking to the escrow company a few minutes before closing a RE deal. Yeah, I hope Rick and his jammer are close by to impinge on my personal freedoms and dictate what is important/not important in my life (and his).

Motion, if those things are truly more important to you than driving safely, then you should pull over when you do them anyway.

I'm just amazed at how much I read here about people pissed off by other drivers on cell phones, but they all find their own cell phone calls to be ok. Hang up and drive. It's that simple. Life was just fine before cell phones came along.

Rick, you implied that you don't like people talking on cell phones in any public place where you might be nearby.

I thought you meant bicycle not motorcycle.

I have a real issue with this, while you are certainly right, 50% of the stupid driving I see ends up with me spotting the driver on the phone. However I also think your wife is dead on, losing the signal might cause even MORE distraction.

Your annoyance does not preclude my right to use my phone.

Right, I don't like it. But I certainly respect it when it's not in a nice restaurant at dinner time or in a movie theatre or church. I understand the need to conduct business at lunch or whatever. Doesn't bother me. And most nice restaurants would ask someone to hang up during dinner anyway. But for those few occasions when some loudmouth is clearly bothering a lot of people and no one wants to do something about it, it would be nice to jam their call. If it was really that important, they could just step outside. Smokers do it.

Let me get this straight, I'm driving talking to the doctor about my elderly Mother (who isn't in the best of health) and you jam my cell so I can't find out what is happening, or I'm eating out, & she calls me because she needs some help,(BTW, when eating out, I get up & go out side, I don't like others listening in) or my work calls (I'm always on call) and you jam all the cell phones, which could include doctors & policeman who are on call for emergencies. Well, you nare so much better than the rest of us, hope you crash your car while playing with your jammer:mad:

I think the ratio of potentially blocking emergency calls to blocking frivilous calls is extremely low. And Byron, it really doesn't matter what the phone call is about. Sure, it's important to you. That doesn't mean you have a right to drive distracted because YOUR phone call is more important than everyone else's road safety. God forbid you really end up in a place with no signal. Does your world come to an end? It's never made a difference in my life at all.

Realistically Rick...

One of those obnoxious jagoff's are simply going to make call after call with their now non-working phone inside that place going "Hello? Hello? Beep beep beep Hello? Dammit..." Redial beep beep beep, and on and on....

...and the soccer mom is going to be looking down through her phone-logs for the number and redialing while not watching the road putting you at more risk.

Which annoyance is worse?


...Frankly it would be better if those place like posted a Cell phone ban" at the front door. Turn it off or be asked to leave. I would.

Yes, I agree! But those requests are routinely ignored, as evidenced in the memorial service I mentioned here earlier. And even where it's a law to drive with hands-free, it's not enforced and totally ignored. I believe NJ and NYC have such laws now too. I haven't driven in NYC in a while, but haven't noticed any difference in my regular trips to NJ. Just amazing that eveyone else's calls are a driving distraction, but if it's you personally, it's of the utmost importance.

You should move to Alaska or somewhere very remote. The world has changed and you seem to be having trouble adjusting to it. Seen it many times, very common for old curmudgeonly farts :p

Worked in NY.

Yes you still get violators but you can see them coming from a mile away.

They do look like drunk or impaired drivers.

Commuting between TX and NY for 6 months really made me notice the difference.

Here in TX every 3rd, 4th driver has a phone stuck to their heads.

I personally feel cell phone laws are necessary.

I'm all for it.

The jammer thing is just such a bad idea. I honestly believe you would create a more dangerous situation.

How about a sign that says 'Jammer in use - cell phones will not work in this restaurant'?

Eat there, or move on, your choice.

I live in NJ and work in NYC. The cell phone laws are a total joke! They are practically unenforceable.

+1 my pet peeve. Especially loud people on cell phones. No one is THAT important to interrupt the rest of the world. It's also a sign you have terrible time management.

Talking on the cell phone in public out loud as a fashion statement died in the 80's with ponytails and leather neckties.

rjp

True,

But in my area of NY, LI specifically it was a drastic improvement.

I love how this rick gets to determine what cell phone use is "dangerous" and which is not, or are they all dangerous.

He thinks he would be jamming all of the bad phone calls and not any vital ones and can somehow tell the difference. Plus without any real knowledge of near field and far field transmissions he "thinks" he will have the perfect sphere around him of trouble free zone. Keep "thinking", heck actually spend the money for a box with 3 antennas to jam that wide of a bandwidth with very little power or amplification.

If the jammer had any real power to it, detection would be easy and similar to how the spectre iii and iv's work. Thats a radar detector - detector.

Its really a matter if there are people looking for it, and rick thinks no one is. Then again the FCC, cell providers and service providers (comsearch) do not have cars and trucks roving and mapping the current tower transmissions for both clarity and license revenue purposes. Each of these similar to wifi mappers locate and triangulate via gps and signal strength. Sure you could get by for quite some time but who really knows. Good luck with that.

The thing that really gets the goat is the same people who whine about the govt making stupid rules or having bizarre paperwork are the ones who themselves feel they can dictate whats dangerous, whats acceptable, and whats not.

Some motorcycles drivers are dangerous lets jam them, some sports cars are dangerous lets jam them. ugh

Disconnects are a way of life for cell phones. How do these people currently deal with them? If a disconnect causes someone to crash into a tree, maybe there wasn't any room for them in the gene pool in the first place.

And don't get me started on the dorks who wear the Borg earpieces 24/7 :rolleyes:

Just when I thought Thom and I would never even agree on what day it is....we are in lockstep on this one.

Depends on where you live. In NY my cell service was nearly useless. Here in TX it's so good that I'm not bothering with a land line.

Rick, suppose when their signal is cut off, those easily distracted people don't crash into a tree, but instead into you? That's my point.

Anyway, I did some looking into the jammer you linked to. You can buy them for $44 at dealextreme. There are a lot of user reviews, and links to websites showing how people have tried to get them to work. It looks to me like (1) this cheapo jammer may come tuned for Asian and/or European frequencies, not US carrier frequencies, (2) you may have to open it up and adjust some pots to get it to jam successfully, using phones from each of the carriers in trial-and-error tests, (3) even if/when it is adjusted correctly, it only works in a smallish room indoors, or if you are within several feet of the cellphone outdoors, and may not work at all in areas where cell signal strength is high, (4) it actually seems to take a few seconds to terminate someone's ongoing connection, during which the person doesn't necessarily notice anything.

So it seems like this cheapo jammer is not going to create a sweeping zone of instant cellphone silence around your bike as you split the lanes. Maybe if you ride right next to someone for several seconds, in an area that is 2 bars for his particular carrier, you could eventually interrupt his call.

My impression is that this jammer would be better for cutting people off in a small indoor space like a Starbucks or on a subway train.

For your idea, I'm guessing you'd need a more expensive and powerful jammer, probably wired to the bike.

As you can tell, I got kind of interested in the jammer idea myself, although I was thinking an appropriate use would be movie theatres, and not keeping the thing on constantly or immediately jamming every call, but using it if someone made/took a call and continued to loudly talk on and on about obviously non-emergency stuff - i.e. someone truly obnoxious. The problem is, that person would probably have to be within a few rows of you.

If you learn of a cheap jammer that actually works out of the box, tell me about it - but by PM not public post, kindly.

And of course my interest is purely academic, as I would never wilfully violate the US Code nor any other statute, code, ordinance, regulation, bylaw, paragraph, footnote, semicolon, comma, or period.

I whole heartedly agree...

BUT I also strongly disagree with the jamming idea, as others have said how do you know if you are not going to inadvertently interrupt a life or dead situation call?

I have a cell phone, I don't bring it with me to church, turn it off when I go out to eat... what we need here is a tiny bit of common sense.

I've been told that cell phones may interfere with airliner system functions. IF that is true wouldn't a jammer cause even more problems? (I have no idea how the sytems on airplanes work)

I am in 100% agreement with this statement.

I doubt you'll find anyone on this thread who doesn't share this annoyance; driving while holding a cell to your ear is distracting to the driver. Speaking on your cell at the table during a meal is, IMHO, the absolute height of gauche. That kind of stuff really grinds my gears!

My disagreement is with the proposed method. I have absolutely no problem with the owner of a business like a restaurant or movie theater operating a jammer. However, the idea of someone with a moving bubble of cell phone jamming around them strikes me as self-concerned and not particularly respectful of others. That's the root of my objection to the idea.

IF that is true, then I'd totally drop the idea. Case closed. But how in the world can a jammer rated for a radius of 10-20 meters affect a plane thousands of meters away or even a tower, the closest of which would still be about that far away, even if I were near an airport?

And I just don't get the "it may be an emergency call" suggestions. Cell signals drop all the time. I've never heard of someone running off the road because their cell signal dropped or someone unable to get 911 because they were in a dead spot. I've been in plenty of remote locations with no cell reception. Lack of service didn't deter me in the least from going there. Life really did exist and went on just fine before cell phones.

Most on this thread addressing your wife's concerns agree with her. You yourself understand cell phone use in a car reduces safety, yet can't understand how a dropped call aggravates the situation? Why bother to ask for our opinion if you're going to completely disregard it?

I never said I was going to disregard everyone's opinions here. I would be interested to know how many dangerous situations have been caused by dropped signals. I'm not aware of any accidents caused by that. What I will disregard, though, is that some people think their personal cell phone calls are the most important thing in the world and far overides safe driving. Those people's opinions don't count with me. Road safety trumps all when on the road. When I've played hooky from work and gone on a trip and the Blackberry started buzzing, I just pull over, check the messages and make my calls. I don't view it as a right to endanger everyone around me because I have to check my voicemail or call clients back, important though those things may be for my job. They are not important for anyone else and doing such while driving makes a dangerous situation for others.

Where's your common sense? You think there's no loss of attention paid to driving while looking at your phone to see if it's connected and re-dialing? You need statistics on dropped cell phone call accidents? You can't guarantee in advance that your selfish behavior isn't going to cause an accident. Someone or some child could get hurt or killed so you can create your "safe bubble." But I guess it's okay, because you won't get caught.

He'll accept your opinion if it's the same as the one he started with. ;)

Scenario: Rick enjoys fantastic afternoon ride on his BMW through the rolling rural hills of Virginia.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, annoying cellphone-addicted gum-chewing mallrat twit in car, on cellphone, cuts him off; Rick averts disaster by dumping his bike in the median but breaks an arm and a leg in the process.

Local volunteer fire-rescue, having it's Sunday Afternoon lunchtime meeting at Applebees, never gets the call because the jammer-equipped morality cop sitting in the next booth didn't want to be bothered by other people's needless meal-time cell phone calls.

You can't be MORALITY VIGILANTE, Rick; no matter how right you are about the topic. Morality vigilantes bomb abortion clinics and stuff.

Uh, where did I write anything about jamming calls for kicks or to implement some morality? I really only care about road safety. Anyway Gogar, I think the chances my crashing my bike are exponentially greater than my chances of not being rescued because of a lack of cell service, whether due to a jammer or just a plain dead zone.

First post of your thread:

:confused::confused:

And how is that in any way morality vigilantism? If it makes you feel better, I'd be sure to turn it off anytime I got near a tour bus on the hwy. or was at a concert;).