Amateur Radio · VHF/UHF · Summits On The Air · Colorado Mountains · Adventure
Amateur radio transceivers have improved dramatically over the decades and they pack a lot of capability into relatively compact radios. In this post, we will take a look at the typical configurations and how they may impact setting up a flexible amateur radio station today. This discussion is focused on currently available new gear, with … Read more
Pikes Peak is a great summit for a SOTA activation. You can hike up, drive up, or take the cog railway to get to the top. Pikes towers over eastern Colorado and has an excellent radio horizon in all directions. It is easy to work a bunch of stations on 2m FM. With a bit … Read more
Those of you who follow my blog know that my primary ham radio passion is operating above 50 MHz. But I also enjoy getting on the HF bands for POTA and chasing DX. I’ve also done a few holiday-style DXpeditions: V29RW and ZF2NR. Compared to my friends that are serious about DXing, I consider myself … Read more
Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) is a unique organization in the world of amateur radio. ARDC is organized as a foundation with two main roles: management of 44Net and a grants program. The foundation has assets a bit over $100M and funds grants roughly at the $5M level each year. (These are very rough numbers. … Read more
Jim Wilson K5ND recently completed the third edition of the book Magic Band Revealed. Of course, I had to read it and I surely did enjoy this book. Jim hits all of the different operating and propagation modes that hams use on 50 MHz: sporadic-e, F2, TEP, meteor scatter, ionoscatter, etc.
When radio amateurs get ready to put an HF station on the air, they often have questions about what antenna to use. The good news is that there are many options to choose from. The bad news is that there are too many options to choose from. It can be overwhelming. This post describes an … Read more