Tonantius - I had a ham license as a kid. I wonder what would be required to pick it up again. Back then, morse was required and I remember the test being hard. Know anybody who's taken it lately?
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Tonantius - I had a ham license as a kid. I wonder what would be required to pick it up again. Back then, morse was required and I remember the test being hard. Know anybody who's taken it lately?
I've only just started looking into it, but the new VHF stuff requires only a test of how well you can write a check. Not sure what else that gets you (repeater access, etc.) or it's just to keep your conscience pacified. most folks buying VHF aren't running licensed and the FCC has too few resources to enforce it. It's said it will go the way of CB licensing did so many years ago.
I recently obtained a technician license in Amateur radio. $15 to take the test. Many offered locally. There are test review books available. If you have some basic electronic knowledge its easy. If you have no electronic knowledge, its not hard - just a bit more studying.
I don't think you'll see Amateur radio go the way of CB. The amateur community polices its own pretty well.
No code required for any of the tests now for ham radio. VHF radios are not real expensive. It only gets pricey when you upgrade to general, and dive into HF.
Good to know. I'll be looking into it then. Think they'll let me have my old callsign back?
Doubt it, its most likely been re-assigned. I think you only have so long once it expires to renew it, or lose it. There is places in Teller, El Paso counties, and in Pueblo that test. Interesting to note, when I took the test in Pueblo last year for my tech license, it was $15, and however many times I want to test and retest. When I upgraded this summer to general, I took it in monument, and you could retest if you failed, however they wanted $15 additional. I recently read in Woodland Park, when MARC, the ham radio club for that area, does tests, they will not allow retaking a test at the same session. Just an FYI. I will say, if you fail a test, unless you missed it by 1, you will likely fail the next one.Quote:
Originally Posted by USAFGopherMike
I didn't pass mine the first time, retook the same day, passed. Just was missing by something simple. This was 1995 though.
You can look up your old callsign on the web, just google for callsign lookup. (i'm too lazy at the moment to provide a link)
I bought a Sony ICF-B200 emergency crank radio. It's a very small AM/FM radio that also runs on AA-batteies.
http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sony_icf_b200.html
They are no longer in production, but you can find them on ebay from time to time. Very rugged radio, and I rarely use the crank as the batteries last forever.
Necropost, but this looks like as good a place as any to put this!
I've been looking into "Parks on the Air" as a method to practice my mobile HF capabilities. POTA is kind of a do-it-yourself Field Day outing. Ran my first "activation" (actually going to a park, setting up and transmitting) on Friday at Cheyenne Mountain State Park and it went surprisingly well.
My first attempt with my end-fed-half-wave (EFHW) antenna didn't go so well - took me so long to set up that when I was ready, an electrical storm was bearing down on me and I had to tear it down in a hurry.
This time it took me less than 10 minutes to get up and running - and I wasn't in a hurry.
On 20M I hit Eastern Canada, California, Idaho, Washington, Texas and some of the Eastern states like Georgia with my setup, which in my book makes it a resounding success.
Here's info on the setup (I link to Ham Radio Outlet merely for convenience):
The radio is an ICOM-718, an over-20 year old design that's been updated and refined to make it simple and rugged. Something that may sound insignificant, but surprised me at just how much a difference it made was the 718's front-firing speaker. Most radios have a top firing speaker which muffles the sound. The 718's sound is very crisp and clear since it's aimed at the operator.
The antennas are Shark Hamsticks. Upside is that they're easy to set up. Downside is they're loooong, and monoband so you have to swap antennas when you change bands. To make swapping easier I have some Shark quick disconnects.
The antennas are mounted to the top of the car with an MFJ magnetic mount. Note this is for stationary operation only. The mount, coupled with the thin-metal alloy of today's modern cars doesn't make for a very good holdfast to the roof. The 17 feet of coax gets you plenty far enough away from the high frequencies that this setup is designed for to be perfectly safe.
Everything is powered by a random flooded acid deep-cycle battery I got from Sam's or Costco, charged by a Harbor Freight solar power kit (gawd, that was only $100 when I got it two years ago!) that includes the panels and a charge controller.
This is what the setup looks like on my First-gen Ridgeline (you can barely see the corner of the solar panels in front of the front tire):
Attachment 91795
And here's a link to a prepper channel that talks about the ICOM 718:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvIGbSk_Wh0
O2
For recommendations is going depend on a few things...distance to communicate is a big component. I picked up a CB radio just because; mostly for the weather band and to see who or what is using that communications. Lets say in my area I have been getting 100 times more broadcasts on 70cm/2 meter than CB. The antenna size for 10 meter is almost the same as CB...there are a few CB radios out there that can support 10 meter band.
For pure local GMRS would be a simple solution, license is not too bad considering how long it lasts. The hardware is from cheap to fair. I would skip the free FRS radio because the GMRS dose the job so much better. There are a few cases where FRS is much better - but that is only the fact that it is rule based use versus license base use.
For long distances, I would say the 2nd level ham license that lets you go out and reach someone would be required.
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Licenses
GMRS - just go online with the ffc, pay your money - get a license good for a number of years. I think it is the same 10 year period as a ham license.
FRS (Family) - no license is needed...
The FRS is authorized 22 channels in the 462 MHz and 467 MHz range, all of which are shared with General Mobile Radio Service (GMRS) which requires an individual license for use.
CB - what license - you don't need nothing like that...well; way - way back in the day you need a license but I think that requirement was dropped about the time Smoky and the Bandit move came out.
Ham licenses are broken down into 3 groups. Each level requires that the user pass a specific test. The test questions are published by the FCC and there are many online sites that can help a person study for the test. The first Ham license pretty much gives you line of site usage. The second level provides pretty much gives you the ability to go out and reach someone. The 3rd license provides a bit more capability of the General Ham license with a few tweaks to what Freq you can use.
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So which Ham license - -
For local ham use; you will need the technical license. Not that hard to pass; esp if you go on line and start taking the online same questions that pull directly from the official question pool. And yes, they do publish 100% of the question pool for all three (3) ham license classes.
(Tech license) The first ham radio license should be a snap, and if you are ok at taking tests, you could take the follow on general ham license on the same day. The old question pool I took, I think about 40% of the questions semi-sort of matched between both tests.
(General License) The second license opens the majority of the capabilities, and lets you reach long distance range.
(Extra License) - This license opens a few additional bands, but for most people not enough benefit.
Which license I would need
For in town use; tech ham license works fine...to go the distance; the general ham license is a must...the Extra class license while semi-useful - not sure for SHTF.
There is a hybrid setup that can be done to expand a cheap ham radio for local use if you want to increase you line of site support...
If you have access to a tower or mountain - then even the hand held units can work wonders; assuming you have a quality repeater installed....but that is sort of a different discussion.
---------------------------- mobility - or lack of that ------------
Hand held, base station, car mount...would be the normal configurations regardless the the tech behind it....
Car / Truck - could be a home base unit designed to be mobile.
If you can; join someone on a true field day and see what hardware that they are using to be semi-mobile. You pretty much can get all the hardware you need to fit inside a 2 foot square box. well; everything but a rigid antenna that is. There are some cheap - to good quality compact magnetic car mounts for CB, GRMS, and UHF frequencies. I did find the mag roof mount hardware I bought like to stick once I hit about 75 mph.
For larger simple to remove antennas - look at the trailer hitch hardware so you can remove the antennas without too much issue.
For home use; the hardware used for a car could be used at home...but it does provide the ability to use larger antennas depending on the need depending on VHF, UHF, or HF bands.
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Line of site...with a dash of SHTF...
If you can't take your radio with you; what use is it?
The hand held size hardware does provide portability often at the cost of range.
But the had held hardware is easy to move around, easy to power from a car batter, and also can be powered by a smallish solar panel. This setup is real useful for locations that attract bad weather like a trailer park attracts tornadoes.
The nice thing about battery only power; is that there is no RF noise caused by active charging / transformers.
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Some cheap hardware choices for hand held Ham Radio...or GMRS or CB...
For semi-disposal price range baofeng is ok for the price. I have started poking at radioddity - for the digital hand held. Radioddity also sells Baofeng, and unique harware. ICOM/YAESU does have a lower end radios that does perform better than the baofeng if you want to buy better quality hardware.
For long distance; yea, nothing is cheap - even the cheap hardware can be quite expensive once you add all of the supporting hardware necessary to get online.
So do you need simple in town use, on the road, base station for home use...or something that can reach out over seas...lot of choices, depends on what range you are shooting for.
For CB radios - I would start to think of this as semi-disposable - maybe go to a local truck stop and see what they have to offer. Radioddity does sell that type of hardware; but I found that such things as the mic is hard wired into the unit. The price is sort of cheap; the hardware dose work, but break the mic - the fix is a lot harder to do.