A lot of people may hear the terms “amateur radio” or “ham radio” and have questions or are interested how they can get involved. These questions and answers are for those that are not yet operators or new to the hobby.
What is amateur radio?
I have a phone in my pocket, why would anyone need a radio? Even though mobile phone service is available in most of the United States and around the world, there are still rural and in some cases populated areas even nearby Gratiot County that cell service can get sparse. In disaster or emergency circumstances, cell service, internet data, and even “land line” phone services may be out or overwhelmed; in those cases radios that do not require a third-party intervention to get a message out is indispensable.
What can you do with a radio? The actual possibilities are endless. Ham radios were sending emails, color pictures, and even video long before there was an internet or government local area network. Radios were able to send video before there were television broadcast companies. Beyond the technical aspect of the hobby, radios are great for hiking, camping, event coordination, off-roading, long-distance contacting, talking to your family or friends down the street, making contact with astronauts in space, or helping your community in a crisis.
I can go buy a walkie-talkie at most electronics or sporting good stores, what is the difference? The radios sold at most stores operate on different frequencies and at lower power than amateur radios. In the USA there are FRS (Family Radio Service) radios which are the most common at stores and are usually good for nearby communication like within a small neighborhood and are only in hand held walkie talkies with very limited channels. In vehicles CB (Citizens Band) radios can be common although they generally are mounted inside the vehicle and are severely limited on power and a limited number of channels. The next level is GMRS (General Mobile Radio Service) radio that is also quite common at the big box stores. GMRS do require a license to use them, but do not require test, only a fee. With a GMRS radio, share a lot of the same channels/frequencies as FRS, but you can reach farther around your town or city with higher power limits and repeater use. Ham radios generally are only available through specific retailers. Amateur radios can be specific to only certain frequency ranges or all available frequencies depending on what you buy. These do require a license to transmit on, and a test is required to get the license. Depending on the license level, depends on what frequencies you may transmit on. Listening without transmitting does not require a license however and is the reason Amazon sells them.
What are the levels of amateur radio licenses? Currently in the USA there are three license levels for new hams. The technician license is the first level of licensing and is the most common license. Many amateurs are perfectly happy with and only need this level. Technician gives privileges to use VHF and UHF frequency and very limited HF frequency privileges. The second license is the General class which opens up segments of most of the HF bands to operators. The third and most difficult level is Extra class. Extra class opens all amateur frequencies in the USA to operators along with allows you to use your license in foreign countries than the other classes can not. Extra class also allows you to get qualified to administer FCC exams for all 3 classes.
What do I have to do to get a license? To get your first license you will need to take the technician level exam and these days it is easier than ever to find a test location. First you can check our event section to see if there is an upcoming testing date here in Gratiot County, if not, then check the ARRL website and you can set the distance you are willing to travel for a test and it will give you a full list within that distance. Since Covid-19, they have made it even easier by offering online testing from various organizations that conduct them through Zoom calls and can conduct them almost anytime of the day. Once you know when the upcoming testing days and locations are, you can study for the exam. Licenses are tiered or progressive, so you can’t skip to any level you want to and you must start at Technician. You can purchase study guides from Amazon, the ARRL, most bookstores, and even through audiobook applications; or there are free resources that give you all the current question pools on YouTube and other websites. Make sure that any book or free resource you use though has the current questions because the questions change every four years. There are also many websites and mobile apps that you can take practice exams on. Now that we scared you with thought of studying for a test, here is the truth about the big and scary government test; you only need to get around 74% of the questions right to pass the test and with the Technician and General exams only being 35 questions each, that is only 26 correct answers. Now don’t go thinking it is a cake walk, there is still 411 different possible questions in the pool for Technician, 454 for General, and for the Amateur Extra 50 question exam a whopping 622 questions in the pool that you will want to study for. After you study and pick a date to take the exam, there is usually at $15 testing fee and after you pass the test ( you can also take the next level test usually for no extra cost at that time too if you pass), you will have to pay the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) $35 for a licensing fee. Usually after your FCC fee is paid, you are issued a FCC call sign anywhere from within a day to a couple weeks.
Do I have to spend a lot of money on equipment if I get my license? Not at all unless you want to. With smart phone technology, if you have a modern phone, you don’t even have to spend any money to start using apps like EchoLink or AllStar which allow you to talk through connected repeaters around the country and world. Both of those apps do depend on data service or wifi connections to work and if you don’t have that ability or would just like more traditional means, QRZ.com has a “New Ham Jumpstart” program that allows you to purchase an entry level VHF/UHF radio for a huge discount. Baofeng also makes some good value handheld radios that you can order on Amazon for $15-20 and those are so popular that you can find many books and accessories out there to help you get the most out of those little radios. After you buy a radio, your next purchase, and probably the most expensive one that you have to make till you get a higher quality radio is an antenna unless you make your own. You will want to research what kind of antenna to buy based on whether you want to talk in your house, your vehicle, or in the woods and plan on anywhere from $25 to $100 based on quality and what you want to use it for.
What if I don’t want to get my license yet, can I still use a ham radio? Without a license, you can own and use a radio to receive and listen on. There is no law saying that you need a license to listen to radio operators talk and there is actually a lot you can still do. You can program your local NOAA weather station in, some municipalities still use VHF/UHF frequencies for emergency services that you can listen to. There is a lot of radio traffic that you can listen to. In emergency situations, the FCC specifically says that you can call for help on an amateur radio if you need to and within the license exams, operators are specifically instructed to assist in any way possible during an emergency. Some radios also have emergency alert buttons that will transmit a distress call to all operators within range and your GPS location to APRS websites and operators nearby.
If you have more questions that this does not answer, please feel free to contact us.