Serial Read Prog Not Working

[groundFungus]

@linkpad

if ( Serial.available()) // Check to see if at least one character is available

char a = Serial.read();            // Start Sequence 1/3
char b = Serial.read();            // Start Sequence 2/3
char c = Serial.read();

if 1 byte is available, read 3 bytes. Does that sound like it should work right? Check out the serial input basics tutorial.

You declare some char variables (a-e) outside of loop() then declare the same ones again in loop(). Why?