This is directed at new hams. If you are getting into HF, and do not want to spend a ton of cash I have 2 suggestions.

Icom IC-706 MKII G. Great rig, Has HF, 50/144/432. Prices are great for all the radio this is. Now this is the cheap way to do it all, more or less.

If you have a little more cash, then the Yaesu FT-950 is a great rig at a very nice price. Not only is this a good starter rig, but once you have one you may never upgrade, it works that good. In my opinion, this is the best bang for your buck.

I have owned Kenwood, Icom, and Yaesu rigs, currently I have worked
333 countries and confirmed 317. So I know my way around the HF spectrum pretty well. This advice was given based on my experience.
73
TK

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Re: new hams
By: Tommyknocker to All on Tue Aug 23 2011 07:26 pm

This is directed at new hams. If you are getting into HF, and do not want to spend a ton of cash I have 2 suggestions.

Icom IC-706 MKII G. Great rig, Has HF, 50/144/432. Prices are great for all the radio this is. Now this is the cheap way to do it all, more or less.

The 706 is discontinued and getting harder to find (new or used).

If you have a little more cash, then the Yaesu FT-950 is a great rig at a very nice price. Not only is this a good starter rig, but once you have one you may never upgrade, it works that good. In my opinion, this is the best bang for your buck.

Noted.

I have owned Kenwood, Icom, and Yaesu rigs, currently I have worked
333 countries and confirmed 317. So I know my way around the HF spectrum pretty well. This advice was given based on my experience.

I've been eyeballing the IC-718 (HF only), but I've now got a cheap HT (Quansheng) and J-pole for VHF/UHF, so it would be nice to get a base (and more wattage) for VHF/UHF, so the 706 (or something comparable) looks more attractive. I'll check out the FT-950.

digital man

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I have owned Kenwood, Icom, and Yaesu rigs, currently I have worked
333 countries and confirmed 317. So I know my way around the HF spectrum pretty well. This advice was given based on my experience.

I've got myself a Kenwood TS-520 rig with the matching AT-200 tuner and the VFO-520 remote VFO. Works well in my corner of the hobby which is electrical experimentation and a better understanding of the theory. Most of the newer rigs (with the possible exception of the Elecraft K2) are too much computer
and not enough radio for my tastes.

Not needing a power supply was a big plus as well. Puttering around with wire antennas and adjusting/fixing my rig makes the occasional Russia and Spain contact that much more rewarding to me.

I picked up a pair of Radio Shack HTX handhelds (202 and 404) and fiddled with them for a bit. Antenna building is absolutely easier for them, but I got bored with the local repeaters pretty quickly and now I use them mostly to monitor the more interesting nets (a swap net and a tech net). Once you can hit all the local repeaters, there's not much to drive antenna
experimentation.
I think the lighthouse weekend last weekend was the most fun I've had so
far... we were having a BBQ at the time though, so I only made contact with three of the stations. The contest QRM really made the first day tough going... I don't really have an opinion on contesting yet (possibly because my station isn't competitive).

I built a computer interface and played with PSK31 which was fun for a week or two, but it got old pretty quickly... it seems like a good way to build up a QSL collection, but there was no real challenge for me operating there. The surreal world of SSTV is something I peer into from time to time though I haven't yet transmitted anything or seriously looked into it. There is a lot more challenges with it though (at least using the software I've got - QSSTV) so I may get into that at some point.

Now that I've completed my initial "want" list for my station, I'll start
doing more antenna work... I've got a 10m vertical dipole up the side of my house and a homebrew trapped 10/15/20/40 dipole across my yard. I used to
have an 80m segment on it, but that band turned me off pretty quickly and
since I don't really have enough room for it, removing it didn't hurt my feelings.

I've tried a Windom cut for 80m with and had great success with it despite its low height, so cutting one at 40m may be in the cards. I also want to try out a simple doublet of the same length and compare them. The extra two knobs for tuning up won't kill me. My HOA CC&R explicitly bans ham antennas, so I can't do anything permanent or complex, so at some point I may need to develop some quantitative evaluation and comparison method to help me settle on a specific antenna.

The other thing I'm working on is a central accessory switching/control
system.
Right now I have the mic/speaker/PTT control to my right with a splitter from the headphone jack and a separate mic connection I need to manually fiddle. Putting that all on a switch and adding a mixer so I can monitor multiple radios through the same headphones is on the drawing board. Running the CW jack to it as well seems like a good idea.

Which brings me to another bit I'll be working on... code. Don't have a straight key yet, but I plan on acquiring one (likely a cheap MFJ) and forcing myself to learn. There's always something happening on CW and using a
computer to copy seems like cheater.

Anyway, that went longer than I expected.

72 de Stephen K6BSD

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Re: Re: new hams
By: Deuce to Tommyknocker on Fri Aug 26 2011 00:07:20

QSL collection, but there was no real challenge for me operating there. The surreal world of SSTV is something I peer into from time to time though I haven't yet transmitted anything or seriously looked into it. There is a lo more challenges with it though (at least using the software I've got - QSSTV so I may get into that at some point.

"The surreal world of SSTV" is probably the best name for that mode that I've heard so far (and as you know, I have a strange love for SSTV.) I'd like to delve a bit deeper into it myself and see what kind of contacts I'm able to make using different SSTV modes. Having a QSO in that mode can be a lot of fun as you scramble to assemble a picture to send in reply to what you're currently receiving. Good fun.

echicken
electronic chicken bbs - bbs.electronicchicken.com - 416-273-7230

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Re: Re: new hams
By: echicken to Deuce on Sat Aug 27 2011 08:12 pm

"The surreal world of SSTV" is probably the best name for that mode that I've heard so far (and as you know, I have a strange love for SSTV.) I'd like to delve a bit deeper into it myself and see what kind of contacts I'm able to make using different SSTV modes. Having a QSO in that mode can be
a lot of fun as you scramble to assemble a picture to send in reply to what you're currently receiving. Good fun.

Yeah, it absolutely looks interesting, but I want to watch for a bit more before diving in.

There's a lot of unwritten rules apparently that I need to learn first.

73 de Deuce K6BSD

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Re: Re: new hams
By: Deuce to echicken on Sat Aug 27 2011 20:13:46

Yeah, it absolutely looks interesting, but I want to watch for a bit more before diving in.

I occasionally leave my rig tuned to 14.230 during the day while I'm off at work, and have my SSTV software running. Sometimes I've captured a fair number of images by the time I return home, comprising one or both sides of SSTV QSOs that happened during the day. This can be a good way to watch a bunch of traffic just to get a sense of how people operate in that mode.

There's also worldsstv.com, which people participate in by having their system automatically upload received images. Once you start transmitting, it can be a good way to see how well you're getting out. I frequently see my pictures reaching points in Europe and South America.

There's a lot of unwritten rules apparently that I need to learn first.

FWIW people don't seem overly anal about operating style on this mode. Some say that you should initiate a QSO via voice (calling CQ and initiating a contact) before transmitting a picture, but most people do not seem to bother with that. Folks generally seem to wait for silence, then send a picture with 'CQ' or 'CQSSTV' on it somewhere and wait a few minutes for a response before trying again.

The general flow of a contact seems to be this:

- Station A calls CQ (with a picture)
- Station B responds with a signal report for Station A
- Station A responds with a signal report for Station B
- Station B sends a closing message to Station A
- Station A sends a closing message to Station B

Normally each of the above steps includes a new picture with text superimposed on it, although sometimes the signal reports come in the form of a retransmission of the picture being reported on, just to show how it came through.

I saw some old SSTV hardware in Dayton this year and regret not picking it up. Maybe next spring.

echicken
electronic chicken bbs - bbs.electronicchicken.com - 416-273-7230

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