Interest in Getting into Ham Radio

You can talk around the world on a cb. Its easier to do on ssb, and doesn't require a lot of power, contrary to popular belief. You need a good antenna set-up, and conditions conditions conditions. Same would be needed with ham frequencies as well.

I've thought about getting licensed myself, and just never did do it. I think most would tell you to study up, and go ahead for your general class license, but you do have to take your technician test first. You will be pretty limited with just a tech license, general will open up alot more operating capabilities. Jmo as a non-ham lol

There are quite a few sites on the web with practice test, they will give you an idea of what you should know and study for. If you decide to go for it, I wish you the best of luck.

 

I'm a VE and give the Ham test every month. It's very easy to do if you just take your time and think. True you need to pass the Technician test first. And the General License will give you about 90% of the Ham bands to talk on. The license is good for 10 years. And no re-test. The cost can be as much as $15 or less. Some locations it's FREE! You can go to the site that's below and take the practice test. It's all of the Q&A's for the test. When you can pass at about 90% you will pass your test. You can take more that one test at one time.

Ham Test
https://hamstudy.org/
Free Test Locations
http://www.laurelvec.com/?pg=exams

 

Ive been a Ham for a while - sometimes its nice to have a conversation on amateur, i just came back on the road so i am not all set up, but i did run APRS and it was cool having QSO's with other drivers when you would see them come past, plus with new Technologies such as DSTAR you can stay in touch longer, there are many many facets to the Hobby and i have enjoyed it i would take the test, its not hard

 

It's a lot quieter on SSB too.

I've been a ham since 1981.
I currently hold a Extra Class License.
I think it's worth it but it's not tremendously different than CB'ing.
It's communicating with others, building antennas, amps etc.etc.
The latest in technology.
I have been running a Software Defined Radio since about 2006.
Look them up. Flex Radio Systems.

Software-defined radio (SDR) is a radio communication system where components that have been typically implemented in hardware (e.g. mixers, filters, amplifiers,modulators/demodulators, detectors, etc.) are instead implemented by means of software on a personal computer or embedded system.[1] While the concept of SDR is not new, the rapidly evolving capabilities of digital electronics render practical many processes which used to be only theoretically possible.
A basic SDR system may consist of a personal computer equipped with a sound card, or other analog-to-digital converter, preceded by some form of RF front end. Significant amounts of signal processing are handed over to the general-purpose processor, rather than being done in special-purpose hardware (electronic circuits). Such a design produces a radio which can receive and transmit widely different radio protocols (sometimes referred to as waveforms) based solely on the software used.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software-defined_radio

Companies still make the regular old hardware equipped radios too. I was just giving an example of where we are in the hobby.
My antenna (at home) for use on 160 meters through 10 meters (1 antenna from 1.8 MHz to 29 MHz) consist of a ladder-line feed dipole or doublet antenna that is approx. 135 feet on each side of center and this runs down into the shack to an Amertron ATR 30 and feed into a 1:1 balun on back of the tuner. Anyone that tells you it can't work doesn't understand why it can and does work. No pruning for SWR. No coax in the chain at all. You can build the antenna and feed-line yourself if you choose to do so and it will work as good as anything you can buy to do the same thing. I primarily work 75 and 40 meters but during the winter 160 is good and quite too. It's fairly simple to work 40 through 10 meters on a truck and I've even worked 75 meters too.
https://www.google.com/search?clien...eid=opera&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8#q=doublet+antenna

The last time I looked, the test were all on-line and you could study and practice them there and be ready in no time to take the actual test. It's not terrible hard at all.

I have several amps that I can use and they are all homebuilt but the one I primarily use is a old broadcast tube 4-1000 tetrode amp running as a triode in grounded grid fashion. It will do the legal limit of 1500 watts easily and has done so for more than 20 years now at my desk without a failure. The tube wasn't brand new when I bought it either so it's probably a 70's or 80's model tube that was a pull from an old AM station.

Good Luck

 

Let us now how you do with the test your gonna enjoy the hobby being out on road as a driver what type of radio will you run and Antenna system ......

 

Mobile, I would run a Hi Q antenna. That's going to be about as good as it gets for mobile hf antennas. Kenwood, Icom or Yeasu mobile. The Kenwood BS 2000 is really nice as are many others.
I would look to work all bands from at least 40 meters up to 10 meters on HF and 2 meters and 70 centimeters (440 MHz)can be done with a single antenna setup for both. This can be done with the right single radio like the 2000. If you sleep at night 75 and 160 meters is probably out and you wouldn't need those two bands in that case They go really short during the daytime. 40 meters is good for several hundred miles mobile during the day and goes long at night.
20 meters through 10 are open pretty much like 11 meters. If the skip is rolling on 11, conditions are good on 20, 17,15 and 10 too. 20 meters during peak sunspot activity will be open 24 hrs a day.
Good Luck

 

Did things change since I let my license expire? When I was first licensed as a general, it gave me privileges on all amateur band ???

 

Does that radio mentioned have built in tuner I've seen numerous HRO out there with different Antenna systems on there big rigs