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HAM Radio who is it for?

6K views 31 replies 13 participants last post by  Will2 
#1 ·
I am into hobby electronics.... building circuits and gizmos mostly because I like to learn new things all the time.

I wanted to get into HAM, but one thing stops me, and I am hoping someone will help me out with this here.

I would think that HAM operators just listen to the radio LOL. Obviously folks dont just build these things, get licensed to listen to Radio Free Europe. If you have a HAM ..... what do you do with it?

What entertainment value does it have or what other things keeps you interested?
 
#2 ·
I have been a ham for over 20yrs. I am a licensed amateur extra class.

Ham radio is now usually designed to help in emergencies. Most of what we train for is emergency communications. During Katrina for example, amateur radio was the only form of communications available. With no electricity land lines and cell phones were useless. DHA is now requiring many of their people to become licensed hams. Not that will do many of them any good because you need to know how to operate your equipment. It does no good to have a CDL if you can't drive the big rigs. As practice hams provide communications for many a marathon, bike race and other events. This is so hams can get used to working with a net control which is what you do during a disaster. As for me and my best friend, he lives a little over a mile away from me, we just talk on a 440 simplex frequency. And we discuss nearly everything under the sun.

Also understand that not all hams are interested in emergency communications but the majority are. And we have a chance to talk to people all over the country and other parts of the world. This is not a cheap hobby though. The gear I have I have accumulated over a period of years, much of it bought used.

If I can help you in any way let me know. There are also other hams here too and they are willing to help.
 
#18 ·
I have been a ham for over 20yrs. I am a licensed amateur extra class.

Ham radio is now usually designed to help in emergencies. Most of what we train for is emergency communications. During Katrina for example, amateur radio was the only form of communications available. With no electricity land lines and cell phones were useless. DHA is now requiring many of their people to become licensed hams. Not that will do many of them any good because you need to know how to operate your equipment. It does no good to have a CDL if you can't drive the big rigs. As practice hams provide communications for many a marathon, bike race and other events. This is so hams can get used to working with a net control which is what you do during a disaster. As for me and my best friend, he lives a little over a mile away from me, we just talk on a 440 simplex frequency. And we discuss nearly everything under the sun.

Also understand that not all hams are interested in emergency communications but the majority are. And we have a chance to talk to people all over the country and other parts of the world. This is not a cheap hobby though. The gear I have I have accumulated over a period of years, much of it bought used.

If I can help you in any way let me know. There are also other hams here too and they are willing to help.
I would love to pick your brain as I know nothing about these systems. I hadn't thought about it till now but I should incorporate ham radios into the off grid motor home project!
 
#3 ·
I had not thought that people use it for events and such. I woild also think you can get news from the source or area affected now that I think about it.

As for the expense, I saw prices and Wow that was an eye opener. I saw a kit to build hour own which is.something I would be interested in, but at the same.time not sure if that is something I would want to build myself. I have to remind myself I am not trying to enter a science fair project lol
 
#4 ·
There used to be a company called Heathkit. They provided kits for radios. They were real popular during that time and not only are the radios still around, in many cases they are fetching top dollar. My buddy has several of them. Check out what people who have bought them are saying and see if it's worth it. If the reviews are good and you have the talent to do it, I say go for it.
 
#5 ·
I have been a ham since 1987 and I'm not very active in the warm months but I get laid off every fall from paving roads. Some of us local hams started a club with about bb 20 members and we recently put a 220 MHz repeater on the air. Now we can talk with each other using a small handheld transceiver (walky talky)anywhere in the county and surrounding counties. Inceptor is right some radios can be a bit pricey but I just bought 2 new Baofeng ht's for 40 bucks with free shipping off ebay. There was a contest over the weekend called November Sweepstakes. We managed to make contact with 82 of the 83 sections of the US and Canada. I hate the cold weather so ham radio is something to pass the cold snowy days of winter. I would go on but it has taken awhile to write this. Like my keyboard is not responding.
 
#10 ·
One of the great things about amateur (ham) radio is that it covers a vast amount of the radio frequency spectrum, offering various operating ranges.
The "HF" bands, covering roughly 1 - 30 MHz offer medium to long range communications which can be effective even with relatively low power and a modest antenna. I have worked 175 countries with between 50 and 100 watts from my truck on 75m, 40m, 20m and 15m using an Icom 706 radio and a tunable "screwdriver" antenna. (about $1200 worth of equipment). At home I have some vintage tube radios from the 40's thru the 60's that work very well and are fun to use... I also have some state of the art all-band, all-mode gear which can run on 12volts and covers all the bases. Used stuff can be had for a few hundred bucks and antennas can be made from simple wire. Handheld radios (VHF/UHF) start at $30 for the basic baofengs to a couple thousand dollars for commercial vertex P25 digital units. Most of the sub-$100 handhelds work just fine for general purpose use and offer direct communications up to a few miles, or using public repeaters, up to hundreds of miles. Add echolink or similar voice-over-IP connections and VHF/UHF repeaters can be linked to provide communications with similarly equipped repeaters anywhere in the world.

As for what we do with all this, well let's see...

- General communications... talk so someone local during your communte to work or to someone on the other side of the world to exchange ideas or just chat.

- Emergency Comms... Hams routinely provide emergency communications all over the world whe commercial infrastructure fails... no power? no phones? no Internet? no cell service? Ham radio still works.

- Contesting... compete with other hams to see who can make the most contacts in the most locations... There are many type of contests and they're going on all the time.

- Personal comms... you know.. communicating with friends a family in places/situations where other methods don't work.

etc..etc..etc..
 
#15 ·
Field Day is always fun. I have also worked with EMS during floods.
Plus I commuted 78 miles one way to work and would talk to my husband on lunch and breaks on a 5 watt hand held Yaesu. It makes it nice to be able to talk that far and not depend on a cell phone.

One of the great things about amateur (ham) radio is that it covers a vast amount of the radio frequency spectrum, offering various operating ranges.
The "HF" bands, covering roughly 1 - 30 MHz offer medium to long range communications which can be effective even with relatively low power and a modest antenna. I have worked 175 countries with between 50 and 100 watts from my truck on 75m, 40m, 20m and 15m using an Icom 706 radio and a tunable "screwdriver" antenna. (about $1200 worth of equipment). At home I have some vintage tube radios from the 40's thru the 60's that work very well and are fun to use... I also have some state of the art all-band, all-mode gear which can run on 12volts and covers all the bases. Used stuff can be had for a few hundred bucks and antennas can be made from simple wire. Handheld radios (VHF/UHF) start at $30 for the basic baofengs to a couple thousand dollars for commercial vertex P25 digital units. Most of the sub-$100 handhelds work just fine for general purpose use and offer direct communications up to a few miles, or using public repeaters, up to hundreds of miles. Add echolink or similar voice-over-IP connections and VHF/UHF repeaters can be linked to provide communications with similarly equipped repeaters anywhere in the world.

As for what we do with all this, well let's see...

- General communications... talk so someone local during your communte to work or to someone on the other side of the world to exchange ideas or just chat.

- Emergency Comms... Hams routinely provide emergency communications all over the world whe commercial infrastructure fails... no power? no phones? no Internet? no cell service? Ham radio still works.

- Contesting... compete with other hams to see who can make the most contacts in the most locations... There are many type of contests and they're going on all the time.

- Personal comms... you know.. communicating with friends a family in places/situations where other methods don't work.

etc..etc..etc..
 
#17 · (Edited)
Ham can be used for ore than Dxing (long distance communications) or local communications. There are a wide variety of modes. I have my advanced certification which means I can pump up a wireless router to 1000 watts, you can transfer images, faxes via wireless like faxing via telephone lines only through the air, data modes, weather forcasting with radar, tracking aircraft, radioastronomy, satalite communications, model aircraft or other remote control drones, and a wide variety of other things - check your local laws.

Just bear in mind a 1000 watt wireless router is very very powerful. Bear in mind an advanced cert up here also lets you build equipment and set up towers. Radio towers normally need to be signed off by a professional engineer.. with the advanced certification you can do what required P.Eng qualification in the civil realm.


The downside to ham is that all communications must be non secret. Then again the government apparently listens to everything aside from world leaders these days anyway.
 
#28 ·
seemed like I was replying to someone, but there is no question there. 'Course I could've been talking to my self again. They say it's ok as long as you don't answer. :???:
 
#32 · (Edited)
It depends on the type and scale of the SHTF. IN some cases the waves may be tied up massively, or jammed out if there are adversaries or individuals trying to stop communication or coordination using wireless communcations.

Telephone lines may not be tied up but they could be down. If the emergency is of large enough scale then there could be dead air as those lines will be reserved for when they are needed.

There are active nets in most areas, people chat, and they do practice net operations are actually required then they are called into action.

Groups like ARES exist for helping communications. Many major municpalities will have their own emergency operations centers, in addition to local police force emergency operations centers, which in turn will have either regular staff, or volunteer staff. Weather reporting network, emergency weather reporting individuals ect often will all be organized but may use language that you may not fully undestand. Normally scripts are used which will not give much additional information but will give the information you need to know.

Local areas will have their own local emergency plans, from a federal, subfederal and local levels, which in turn will coordinate.

The dificult part is that people are often expected to listen to the commercial areas which may or may not be coordinated with emergency broadcast system - which was discontinued, much like emergency phone reporting network was grandfathered, and the emergency notification system was inbuilt into cellphones (which can be triggered by sending the right code to a cellphone)

all in all while you can get information of insecure networks, you will need to know how to decode ham communications that use standard coding - which can be accomplished with a sufficiently powerful computer without great dificulty. Advanced communications systems however use real time random switching technologies that most people will not be able to tap into which requires a lot more computing power - it gets more complex the more advanced the system gets. Only government can legally use advanced coding technologies - the most encrypted systems tend to be newer digital cellphones (monitored by the communications companies), and some marine systems but once again these are able to be easily broken and are not secure. It is however illegal to listen into coded messages which are not intended for you.

The idea of ham is that it is not a pubic broadcast (aside from nets, local reporting, and weather, calling and a few others) however a message goes from one person to another. Of course you can listen in to open communications they really arn't intended for you which presents potential legal liabiities if retransmitting or transfering that info. False flag in an emergency is also easily accomplished since anyone with a radio can broadcast, unless it is from your net or hams you know.. it could be anyone.

All sources of information are intelligence sources, but they arn't necesarily the truth, if you trust local authorities get your info from them, you will need trusted sources, otherwise in SHTF it could be anything... wireless communications are not secure.. cable TV is a little safer but can still be spliced or implanted, not as commonly though.. but go cable or dsl for info for information reliability.

Of course if you know people the chance of computer remodeled false flag is pretty low unless it is foreign attack or a major "terrorist" organization that is acting through a coordinated false flag.

The good thing about ham is you can build your own tech and there are massive open bands in the experiemental range of the many terraherts which can be used for new and advancing technologies such as wireless seethrough technologies --- and communications.

In a natural emergency situation any communication is better than no communication. In a manmade emergency it could be a liability if the source of the disaster is aware of the advantages of wireless communications as a tactic, such as false flag or fox hunting.

SHTF covers such a wide gamut, none the less having it as an option enhances a preppers capabilities, especially for a prepper group that is spread out accross a city, or region. having your own legal channel through a unique communications method can be good, even ham digital paging network.

http://mark-rodgers.com/HamPager/

encoding messages is not legal, the grey area is encoding hardware which may be legal, but that is not legal advice.
 
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