HAM Radio License

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paulsreef

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I was thinking about getting my HAM radio license, for tracking with GPS, along with everything else a radio could be used for. Is it worth getting???
 
The license is free and good for 10 years. The technicians license test is pretty easy which is all you you for gps telemetry. You probably have to pay to take the test. Now is a great time to study for it but finding a proctor to administer test might be difficult at this time. Lots of online study guides.
 
It depends on your interest and what you see yourself doing. I am a HAM but not really. That is to say I am licensed but I haven't been on the air in 6-7 years or so. I really wanted to get into the hiking with a HT thing and hit the local repeaters and maybe do some simplex but truth be told, where I was at was more of an old boys club and I mean old. The local repeaters were filled with the same old guys talking about their bursitis and what nots and were not interested in talking with a new callsign. Then I figured it would be interesting to use my Tech to do a little DXing on 6 meters until I found out that you have to buy an all band transceiver to get one with 6M. That translates to a lot of money. So now I am happy with my Marshall RDF tracker in my rockets but occasionally I'll pick up an issue of Amateur Radio just to see what's going on. One day I will set up that all band radio, build an antenna and see what kind of fun there is to be had but that day is off in the distance for the time being.
 
I am afraid I wouldn't be using it for the same reason, though reaching someone in Europe would be more interesting. I wanted the handheld mostly for tracking. I don't know much about the actual HAM hobby, the study guide book to prepare for the exam is all know about radio so far.
 
Having the technician license makes you legal. Having an HT radio is handy at large launches for communication but I’ve seldom used mine. Bottom line the test is easy and with the right radio you can even use it for tracking, at least with Altus Metrum products.
 
Well ... this OM likes talking to new or younger hams. The 6 meter band is a hoot. Used radios that include 6M are relatively inexpensive and a 6M Moxon antenna is very easy to build. Ignore the old pharts and explore the limits of the Technician license i.e. satellites, moon bounce or meteor scatter.

For the OP, getting the Tech license is fairly easy, but as the first reply said finding a testing event might be very hard right now. There needs to be a minimum of 3 certified testers to administer the exam. While studying read up on the General as well. If you pass the Tech exam you will be offered the General exam for no additional cost if taken at the same session. The General info is not that much more difficult just different. However, the bands available to a General cover parts of nearly all ham bands. Cost is about $15. Drop me a PM if you want to know more. BTW I’m a 70 year old old phart. Enjoy the airwaves!
 
I'm an old phart too and I agree with dinoburb. Ham radio is a myriad of hobbies in one. Get you license and try out all the bands and modes you can. Most of all, have fun!
 
Ham radio is a collection of hobbies accessed through the same license. I have been licensed since 1977 and drifted between specialties every few years. it has never been boring. Working ham satellites is pretty fun, and so is worldwide HF.

Fairly simple gear on VHF/UHF FM can be used for APRS (GPS) tracking and telemetry. We can use much higher power and better antennas if you want to fly high and far.

In addition to tracking and telemetry, simple FM gear can be useful for communications to, from, and at some of the remote locations if you go to LDRS, XPRS, BALLS, etc.
 
I am afraid I wouldn't be using it for the same reason, though reaching someone in Europe would be more interesting. I wanted the handheld mostly for tracking. I don't know much about the actual HAM hobby, the study guide book to prepare for the exam is all know about radio so far.

You might want to check out a local club. Like rocket clubs, there tend to be folks with a variety of interests who love to show off our toys.

The ARRL web site has a lot of information, and a new magazine aimed at those starting out.
 
Well ... this OM likes talking to new or younger hams. The 6 meter band is a hoot. Used radios that include 6M are relatively inexpensive and a 6M Moxon antenna is very easy to build. Ignore the old pharts and explore the limits of the Technician license i.e. satellites, moon bounce or meteor scatter.

For the OP, getting the Tech license is fairly easy, but as the first reply said finding a testing event might be very hard right now. There needs to be a minimum of 3 certified testers to administer the exam. While studying read up on the General as well. If you pass the Tech exam you will be offered the General exam for no additional cost if taken at the same session. The General info is not that much more difficult just different. However, the bands available to a General cover parts of nearly all ham bands. Cost is about $15. Drop me a PM if you want to know more. BTW I’m a 70 year old old phart. Enjoy the airwaves!
I'm Canadian, our test has 100 multiple choice questions. A result of 70% gives you your basic license which is equivalent to your tech license. During the same test, if you do well and score 80%, you get the advanced license.
 
Worth it! Wait until you try arps! You can Rdf with much stronger transmitters (a big plus when your rocket lans in a gully) . You also have communication- cell is not everywhere.
 
For finding and mapping your rocket? No, HAM is not worth it. There are plenty of license-free 900 MHz GPS on the market. In fact, the rocket GPS on the cutting edge of things, Featherweight, operates in this band.

I read the technician study guide and found it completely irrelevant to tracking a model rocket. It is mostly regulatory mumbo-jumbo and pointless memorization. Spend your time on rockets.

If you want to live in your basement and talk to the old pharts about their bursitis, then go for HAM.
 
Gettina a Ham license is pretty cheap, and if you don't know a whole lot about RF and the like it's a good education. It's a gateway to using more power, higher range tracking transmitters, although for most sport flyers the 900 MHz stuff is plenty adequate. If you like to talk to people and have time for another hobby besides rocketry, you can get into the Ham hobby pretty cheaply... there's always plenty of used equipment around, particularly on 2m, and rolling your own antennas is one of the backbone skills of Ham radio.
 
OK, so I have a HAM license (got it for APRS - and it is kinda cool) but the Featherweight tracker will track to 100k+ feet and is FCC certified without a Ham license. I still renew my HAM license every 10 years, but just because it is cheap (and kinda cool)....
 
OK, so I have a HAM license (got it for APRS - and it is kinda cool) but the Featherweight tracker will track to 100k+ feet and is FCC certified without a Ham license. I still renew my HAM license every 10 years, but just because it is cheap (and kinda cool)....

Actually renewal is free. Only the tests cost, due to reimbursing the VEC for their costs. You can just renew on the FCC web site.

Has anyone actually used the Featherweight to 100,000'? Is there a current record for rocket flights?
 
It's worth it. When I started in rocketry in '06 I tested Technician and General at the same time. Missed a few on the Tech test but only one on the General. I wasn't ready for the Extra test so I didn't take it although one could do all three in one sitting and fee if so inclined. GPS tracking back then was pretty much confined to the Ham bands although there were some high dollar systems available at the time on 900Mhz. That was my impetus for getting a radio license. Built some illegal 1 watt transmitters for the commercial FM band 88-104Mhz but decided it's more desirable to get licensed and stay legal. Two meter and 70cm bands have better propagation than 33cm/900Mhz bands. Don't get me wrong, I have a pile of Egg stuff that is perfectly adequate for sport flying and finding rockets in tall grass or standing corn on 900Mhz.

There are a few GPS trackers on the 2 meter band that output at 1 watt that would be perfect in a 4 inch Von Karman nosecone with the length to accommodate a 1/4 wave antenna. I suspect that would be a killer tracking system out on the playa.
If one uses a 2 meter tracker, avoid the national frequency of 144.390 as that has the potential of clogging up the national digipeater system. Yes one could set their path so a local digi wouldn't re-transmit the position but it might be better to select a different frequency for local tracking. The minimum interval one can set is 5 seconds for trackers although I setup a laptop/GPS/radio and tracker software for static testing and had success with once every three second APRS transmissions and decoding on a handi-talkie (D72A)

As an aside, due to the experience I had with APRS, I was able to hack APRSIS32 ( https://aprsisce.wikidot.com/) to work with the EggFinder stuff to have a map in hand.

Kurt
 
Has anyone actually used the Featherweight to 100,000'? Is there a current record for rocket flights?

Actually, before it was even released, it flew at BALLs to 137k feet. the rocket came in ballistic but the last readout took them right to where to dig.
 
Hey Kevin,
did it have good GPS data at apogee? That would be worth putting on the website.

That was several years ago. I don't know if we had recording even enabled at that point and I don't have that phone anymore...
 
One can hack GPS mapping programs by using the GPS input to the program to track the rocket in realtime. APRSISCE/32 can be hacked easily. One instance takes the incoming NMEA strings and displays the rocket. A second instance takes the local location and pipes it to a network address that the first instance can plot.

I suspect I was missing data points of the rocket by packet collisions between the two instances of the program running. The easy remedy would be plot your local position once, shut down the second instance of the program (or just shutoff the network connection in the first instance) and then after the rocket is down, fire up the second instance of the program and use that to track out to the rocket.
 
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