FCC Rules Index Page

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Maintained by Robert Meister WA1MIK

FCC Rules:

The official FCC rules and regulations are codified in Title 47 of the Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) and are found on the FCC web site at the FCC's Rules & Regulations for Title 47 index page. This would make the official legal name of Part 97 to be 47CFR97. The above link will eventually take you to the Government Printing Office (GPO), which is the repository for all official U.S. government documents. If you go to www.gpo.gov and click on the item "FDsys" or "GPO's Federal Document System", you can choose "Code of Federal Regulations" in the "Browse" menu at the right side of the page. Choose a year, choose Title 47 (Telecommunication), expand the selection, and drill down to the Part you want. Sites get reorganized from time to time, so it's best to start at the top (www.gpo.gov) and work your way down.

Changes in the rules are published in the Federal Register during the year as they happen. After October 1 of each year, the Government Printing Office compiles all the changes, additions, and deletions to the FCC rules and finalizes an updated CFR in the following January. That CFR is published in Febuary and is valid until the following year's October issue is published the following Febuary. Yes, that sounds confusing, but, here's an example that may clarify things: The October 2009 edition of the Rules was published in Febuary 2010, and was valid until the October 2010 edition was published in Febuary 2011.

The rules sections most of interest to amateur radio operators are provided below as locally downloadable files for the current revision. As this is primarily an amateur radio related web site, the only section of the FCC rules that are applicable are Part 97, so that's all we're maintaining here.

Speaking of rules, the amateur radio service has undergone several major changes in the last few decades. In February 1991 the Codeless Technician class was created. In April 2000 the Morse Code requirement was lowered to 5 words per minute for all classes and the number of classes was reduced to three: Technician, General, and Amateur Extra. In February 2007 Morse Code was eliminated from all amateur radio licenses.

After almost two years, a most current issue of the FCC Rules dated 01 October 2016 finally came out as a PDF file. Additional obsolete issues of the Rules are available through the FCC or GPO web sites listed above.

Current FCC rules Title 47 Part 97
The official PDF version.

Other FCC Rule-related Articles:

Repeater and Auxiliary Station Control by Robert W. Meister WA1MIK
A look at two major rules that govern station control. Always an interesting topic for discussion.

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This page originally posted on Sunday 14-Aug-2011.

This web page, this web site, the information presented in and on its pages and in these modifications and conversions is © Copyrighted 1995 and (date of last update) by Kevin Custer W3KKC and multiple originating authors. All Rights Reserved, including that of paper and web publication elsewhere.