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MadMonkey wrote:Any recommendations on a relatively inexpensive setup for home? My dad used to have an awesome base station but it was sold off after he passed on.

I'm pretty much using my license for video equipment on my RC planes and multicopters. I really need a radio.

Rather do a non-handheld first. Just something to get my feet wet. I've had my license for about 12 years but still haven't owned a radio

There is a Tentec Triton IV on QRZ.com ham ads for $395 with two filters and power supply. That's a pretty decent starter radio these days for HF and leaves lots of dough for antennas which is where you ought to spend the money.

MadMonkey wrote:Any recommendations on a relatively inexpensive setup for home? My dad used to have an awesome base station but it was sold off after he passed on.

I'm pretty much using my license for video equipment on my RC planes and multicopters. I really need a radio.

Rather do a non-handheld first. Just something to get my feet wet. I've had my license for about 12 years but still haven't owned a radio

You need something for an antenna. What are your choices? Do you have room for a horizontal wire, a a decent height 30-40' or so? Depending on your land situation and budget, there are lots of choices. Having a good antenna makes everything else work so much better. Old Timers say that for every $100 you spend, put $90 into the antenna the rest into transmitting and receiving. That's pretty tough to do unless you spend a lot on an antenna but it illustrates the importance we place on having the best antennas possible.

You probably mean something on HF bands. There are lots of very good radios for sale, used, that are simple to operate. If you are interested in learning or have already learned Morse code, you can really find some great radios, most operate voice SSB, or CW code anyway. You need not spend a great deal of money to start either.

If you interested in VHF/UHF FM, you can buy a decent little radio for $100 on QRZ.com or at a hamfest, and in the DFW area they are held quite often I believe. There might even be a ham swipe meet. Get a simple antenna an talk on the repeaters in the area, if that is your cup of tea.

Try finding a ham club up there in the area and getting an "Elmer" to help you figure out what the choices are and how to implement them.

Beiruty wrote:Internet plus Voice over IP and Video Conference killed the ham radio hobby.

Really. I hadn't noticed. There are more licensees than ever, more gear out there, more experimenters, more tinkerers, and to hear the pile ups these days, you sure wouldn't realize the hobby was killed.

When I was licensed in 1959, there wasn't nearly the breadth of activity one could get involved in, no satellites, almost no VHF, no repeaters, going mobile was a real challenge and expensive. There were no transistors, synthesized radios, handheld walkie-talkies or anything else, electronic keyers, almost no antenna restrictions, and much more.

I remember hauling probably 100 lbs of radio gear, about what I weighed then, up to the National Guard Armory to string up an antenna and get on the air to pass health and welfare traffic during one of the hurricanes when people fled away from the coast up this direction. I needed the Armory's electricity, too. Now you could do it with the radios in your pocket, no electricity from the Armory needed, no antennas!

What could you do back then? Well there was getting on the air on shortwave, build your own gear, experiment with antenna configurations, explore the new world of VHF/UHF, not very popular around here since there was nobody to talk to in range. There were traffic nets to pass National Traffic System traffic, DXers, of course and ragchewers. A few devoted all their on the air time to complaining about the new-fangled SSB mode ruining the airwaves.

Yes, you can talk to anyone in the world now for a few cents or dollars. Either the idea of sitting there in your house making direct contact all over the world by radio grabs you, or it doesn't.

I'm looking forward to getting back on the air soon. I've been refurbishing a shed on the property into a workshop/reloading area/ham shack, slowed by weather and the ravages of old age and decrepitude, but it's getting there. I have antenna restrictions to deal with, so I've been plotting and scheming about that. The original idea to put up a multiband HB vertical has morphed into what is likely to end up an inverted "L." The BigIR will stay in the garage for now as it is mechanically and electrically complex, a lot of moving parts; simple is better for my purpose!

I have a TenTec Omni VI+ and a 706GMKII right now, and I'm thinking about going into the world of SDR with one of the Flex radios. Before I moved I visited a ham in San Diego with all three of the then existing models, and his demonstration was very impressive. I'm not sure how I would handle a radio without knobs. I worry about the "old dog, new tricks" phenomena that afflicts me more and more these days. I had such a hard time with the 706, a button masher's paradise! Many times I wished I had my "C" line back!

Charles L. Cotton wrote:

JALLEN wrote:W6OGC here, first licensed as KN5VET in 1959. I've built antennas, worked DX, edited a book, "DX IS!" with my brother, been an EC, Secretary/Trustee for a 1000 member repeater club, T-hunter, handled phone patches to VN in the '60's, met Barry Goldwater, been a VC of the ARRL, of which I am a life member.

I am antenna-less at the moment due to the hopefully impending sale of the house so I can come home. One vexing issue in buying our new home there is the pervasiveness of antenna restrictions.

That's an impressive Ham resume! Where are you going to live when back home?

In the hill country northwest of I-35 between San Antonio and Austin somewhere, hopefully not as far out as Kerrville/Fredricksburg. I need to be within an hour of the UT Medical Center, ideally Comal County or environs.

Our neighborhood has antenna restrictions, but not an absolute ban. Antennas cannot extend more than 10 feet above the peak of the main structure. That said, there are no antennas that I can see anywhere. I'm going to put up a dual band vertical, a 2 meter homebrew beam by G0KSC and a multi-band vertical for HF.

I have a SteppIR vertical for 80-6. Even that might be agin the rules at ~33 or so feet tall. Because of the lung issues, I require a one story house, which are probably something like 18' high. I put up a loop here that tuned 160-6 around the eaves of the house but it was fairly pathetic, and lots of noise. I'm too old and decrepit to go the tower and yagi/quad bit, though. In my previous existence I put up a 60' tower and monster 4/4/5 el quad, with the Drake "C" twins and L-4B, and could talk just about anywhere I wanted. Isn't it great to be young and foolish and healthy?

I'm hoping to be able to find a house on 1-3 acres with no restrictions.

The 6BTV has been around for a long long time and is fairly highly thought of. Get yourself a copy of "HF Vertical Performance Test Methods and Results" by Silver and Morris. You can find it online I'm sure. Installation techniques are far more important, yay, critical, than the particular store bought vertical. DX Engineering has it down pretty well.

Martha isn't happy so all of these are going to be pretty elaborate because they have to virtually disappear. The ground-mounted HF vertical will be easy because I'm going to hide it behind a tree. Long, buried coax isn't a line loss problem at HF frequencies. The dual band vertical and the 2 meter beam will be located in a secluded part of our back yard (hidden by trees) on a specially designed mast that will raise and lower electrically. (Thanks Jim.)

I'm really lucky here. My wife LOVES hams. Her first husband was a ham, too. I figure she has a thing for us guys who Seek You! My first wife acted like those radios had blond hair or something.

I hadn't even thought about getting active again until someone here on the Forum mentioned one of the new Chinese dual band HT. I researched it (Wouxun) and in the process, got interested again. It's ironic that my interest in ham radio was rekindled on a gun board.

Chas.

It isn't as much a hobby as it is a disease, and once you have it, there is almost no cure. Symptoms abate periodically, but then you relapse. Somehow the idea of sitting there in the Texas hill country with a DX-40, an old receiver and a wire talking to folks all over the place, even to California, where Ricky Nelson and Annette Funicello lived, and even Hawaii and beyond, was irresistible, at least for me.

73 Jim Allen

W6OGC here, first licensed as KN5VET in 1959. I've built antennas, worked DX, edited a book, "DX IS!" with my brother, been an EC, Secretary/Trustee for a 1000 member repeater club, T-hunter, handled phone patches to VN in the '60's, met Barry Goldwater, been a VC of the ARRL, of which I am a life member.

I am antenna-less at the moment due to the hopefully impending sale of the house so I can come home. One vexing issue in buying our new home there is the pervasiveness of antenna restrictions.