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Not being confrontational, as someone that knows very little about ham radio, what is the appeal? My impression was that crusty old guys were into it and they'd

Not being confrontational, as someone that knows very little about ham radio, what is the appeal? My impression was that crusty old guys were into it and they'd speak all kinds of technical stuff and I was just not vibing with that whole scene.

nucleardog 6y ago
If you're into RF as a hobby or want to use RF gear in your projects, it's the cheapest, easiest, and most straightforward path to getting access to a whole bunch of radio spectrum and the ability to use a whole bunch of power. With a basic license you can run a 250W transmitter. With an advanced license you can run a 1kW transmitter. You have access to allocations pretty much across the entire spectrum[1]: * LF: ~136kHz * MF: ~476kHz, 1.8-2MHz * HF: 3.5MHz-4.0MHz, 7.0-7.3MHz, 10.1-10.15MHz, 14.0-14.35MHz, 18.068-18.168MHz, 21-21.45MHz, 24.89-24.99MHz, 28.0-29.7MHz * VHF: 50-54MHz, 144-148MHz, 219-220MHz, 222-225MHz * UHF: 420-450MHz, 902-928MHz, 1240-1300MHz, 2300-2310MHz, 2390-2450MHz * SHF: 3.3-3.5GHz, 5.650-5.925GHz, 10.0-10.5GHz, 24.0-24.25GHz * EHF: 47.0-47.2GHz, 75.5-81.0GHz, 122.5-123.0GHz, 134-141GHz, 241-250GHz An amateur radio license (depending on your locale, specific class may be required) allows you to build and operate your own equipment without any required pre-approval by the FCC or whatever your equivalent is. The license is attached to you personally. You can buy, build, or cobble together any equipment you'd like and operate it legally and take personal responsibility for ensuring you're operating within your assigned bands/modes/etc. It's basically an experimenter's license for radio. You can use it to talk to some old guys, participate in emergency preparedness stuff, work communications as a public service for events... but at it's core it's really just a license to use a huge chunk of radio spectrum. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_radio_frequency_allocations#ITU_Region_2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_radio_frequency_alloca...

nucleardog 6y ago

If you're into RF as a hobby or want to use RF gear in your projects, it's the cheapest, easiest, and most straightforward path to getting access to a whole bunch of radio spectrum and the ability to use a whole bunch of power. With a basic license you can run a 250W transmitter. With an advanced license you can run a 1kW transmitter. You have access to allocations pretty much across the entire spectrum[1]: * LF: ~136kHz * MF: ~476kHz, 1.8-2MHz * HF: 3.5MHz-4.0MHz, 7.0-7.3MHz, 10.1-10.15MHz, 14.0-14.35MHz, 18.068-18.168MHz, 21-21.45MHz, 24.89-24.99MHz, 28.0-29.7MHz * VHF: 50-54MHz, 144-148MHz, 219-220MHz, 222-225MHz * UHF: 420-450MHz, 902-928MHz, 1240-1300MHz, 2300-2310MHz, 2390-2450MHz * SHF: 3.3-3.5GHz, 5.650-5.925GHz, 10.0-10.5GHz, 24.0-24.25GHz * EHF: 47.0-47.2GHz, 75.5-81.0GHz, 122.5-123.0GHz, 134-141GHz, 241-250GHz An amateur radio license (depending on your locale, specific class may be required) allows you to build and operate your own equipment without any required pre-approval by the FCC or whatever your equivalent is. The license is attached to you personally. You can buy, build, or cobble together any equipment you'd like and operate it legally and take personal responsibility for ensuring you're operating within your assigned bands/modes/etc. It's basically an experimenter's license for radio. You can use it to talk to some old guys, participate in emergency preparedness stuff, work communications as a public service for events... but at it's core it's really just a license to use a huge chunk of radio spectrum. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_radio_frequency_allocations#ITU_Region_2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amateur_radio_frequency_alloca...