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FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

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Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#41

Post by themodelplumber »

silman wrote: post #24
AWildC182 wrote: post #4

This has one unspoken bonus feature: Not having to talk to an octogenarian about politics. I know it sounds silly, but I suspect this is one of the huge features driving it's success. Amateur radio is plagued by bad actors and grumpy old men, along with the general age imbalance that makes it fairly unpleasant for young people and extremely unpleasant for anyone who sounds vaguely feminine...

As someone who went from nothing -> Amateur Extra when i was 23 (25 now) from a random spurt of inspiration to learn ham radio and then promptly did nothing with the license i agree with this. I don't know exactly what i was expecting from getting the license but i will say that i didn't expect it to basically just be dominated by old conservative men who don't appreciate younger folk stepping in on their air space.…

> Part of me was excited [...] decode ISS transmission [...] cheap as chips baofeng

You can totally do this without spending more money! I've got my first award hanging on my wall for using my cheap as chips Baofeng to do this very thing. The award itself is really cool and has "INTERCOSMOS" across the top in English and Russian, along with an illustration of the Russian ISS module(s). The decoder I used was the free Robot36 app on my Android phone. I believe there is another SSTV event coming up on October 27.

If you don't want to speak to anyone, this kind of activity is awesome. Turn squelch off, TDR off, dial in 145.800 and hold your Baofeng next to your phone running Robot36. You can easily monitor the ham sats and other sats too; heck you can just sit on a park bench and do this really easily. If you want portable sat & ISS tracking, there are apps that do this really well.

Since I got my extra last year, I've volunteered at three events (1 ultramarathon and 2 public safety drills at local hospitals), joined a club I like (TheGuildGlobal.org), and talked to people all over the world. I haven't set up the outdoor antenna for my donated Swan HF rig yet (thanks to some super nice local hams) but Echolink is actually really fun; I didn't believe it until I tried it. And how else can you talk to someone in Japan and someone in Scotland within minutes of each other. I heard the guy in Japan dropping his jaw open when he found out I lived in the same city in Japan where his daughter lives, so you never know. (A day after that I talked with a guy up in Seattle, where I'm originally from, about the Green River Killer for a few minutes. Fun stuff. Haha.)

I haven't had a single old man conversation that I felt I couldn't politely and immediately end. Heck, I've had old timers cut out on me with "welp, I just arrived at my destination, have a nice day, K1ABC clear." It's that simple and normal.

Anyway, I hope you'll give it another chance. Find the stuff you like and build on that. Find people you don't mind talking to, and talk to them. Find nets you like and chime in. There are some really awesome people out there who aren't political and who would love to talk just about anything you see here on HN. I know because I'm one of 'em. Hope to hear you on the air sometime --KM6NHH

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#42

Post by BaldricksGhost »

AWildC182 wrote: post #4

This has one unspoken bonus feature: Not having to talk to an octogenarian about politics. I know it sounds silly, but I suspect this is one of the huge features driving it's success. Amateur radio is plagued by bad actors and grumpy old men, along with the general age imbalance that makes it fairly unpleasant for young people and extremely unpleasant for anyone who sounds vaguely feminine...

I'm in my 50's and I've been a ham for over 30 years. I understand where you are coming from. I do also operate FT8 and have thought to myself at times how nice it was to be making contacts without having to listen to people ranting.

That said, there are plenty of hams who don't want to complain about politics, we just notice the curmudgeons more. I've had some great HF SSB QSO's lately that never touched on politics.

Some of the more technical modes tend to appeal to hams that are more interested in the technical side than the hams that frequent HF SSB or VHF FM.

There are many bands and many modes. If your VFO lands you on a QSO that you don't want to hear, QSY to another and call CQ.

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#43

Post by silman »

themodelplumber wrote: post #41
silman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who went from nothing -> Amateur Extra when i was 23 (25 now) from a random spurt of inspiration to learn ham radio and then promptly did nothing with the license i agree with this. I don't know exactly what i was expecting from getting the license but i will say that i didn't expect it to basically just be dominated by old conservative men who don't appreciate younger folk stepping in on their air space.…

> Part of me was excited [...] decode ISS transmission [...] cheap as chips baofeng You can totally do this without spending more money! I've got my first award hanging on my wall for using my cheap as chips Baofeng to do this very thing. The award itself is really cool and has "INTERCOSMOS" across the top in English and Russian, along with an illustration of the Russian ISS module(s). The decoder I used was the free…

I definitely will try to do that SSTV event.

I don't think i "get" echolink. You hook up your radio to your computer (somehow? I don't know how i'd do this with a baofeng) and talk into it and then it uses the internet to send that across the world to other peoples radios who are also connected to their computer? It just feels like a discord voice chat with radios as the input/output device. Am i missing something?

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#44

Post by 509engr »

resters wrote: post #39
AWildC182 wrote: post #4

This has one unspoken bonus feature: Not having to talk to an octogenarian about politics. I know it sounds silly, but I suspect this is one of the huge features driving it's success. Amateur radio is plagued by bad actors and grumpy old men, along with the general age imbalance that makes it fairly unpleasant for young people and extremely unpleasant for anyone who sounds vaguely feminine...

I feel the need to clarify AWildC182's comment because I think it reflects poorly on amateur radio as an inviting place for younger people. There are some "scenes" in amateur radio that are dominated by older, somewhat conservative leaning discourse. Some VHF and UHF repeaters are like this, and there are many groups of people who chat with the same group every night on 80m SSB. Some newcomers start out on VHF/UHF re…

The general responses to suggest getting off of voice modes either HF or VHF, and into digital or contesting has problems for people not living in a large city with multiple clubs to choose from. I’ve been an active ham for more than half of my life now and been finding the toxic culture in local ham club is frustrating, and real problem to recruiting younger people to the hobby.

I used to participate in the local club but quit after a few too many times hearing racist comments from the (not-octogenarian) club president with no reaction by other members, I decided to call it quits. That also means the tools and instruments I used to be able to borrow, or having a few extra sets of hands to help put up an antenna has gone away. And I won’t recommend the club to other people who have asked about getting into the hobby, at least not without telling them what to expect.

I still have a fellow ham I talk with who is a non-club member in the area, but he’s been in and out of the hobby as well for the last few years.

Sure this is one datapoint, but the value of having a local club with available knowledge, and tool and junk boxes to raid makes it a lot easier to stay active in the hobby.

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#45

Post by crankylinuxuser »

silman wrote: post #31
mmaunder wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guys, no one is forcing you to listen to that stuff. Get off the voice bands, get on digital and you'll have a blast. Here's a fun talk at Defcon from Balint Seeber, a ham who focuses on security, to get you in the right headspace. I attended this and the group of 6 of us that hung out afterwards with Balint was some of the most impressive people I've met at Defcon. One had built a bug sniffer. Another was intercepti…

So what lower-cost radio do you recommend to get started on non-voice bands? I see the bitX40 people made a new model called the µBITX. What bands and protocols will that open me up to? I also looked at the RTL-SDR but thats receive only and i'd like to do some transmitting and explore my options. Basically just looking for a cheap option that lets me explore the most bands/protocols.

I'm not parent/GP...

I bought a ADALM-PLUTO from Arrow. $98 shipped. It's a SDR that goes from 325MHz-3.8GHz, and with a "hack" will go from 70 MHz to 6GHz. 7dBm (or 5 mW Tx).

You'll need amplifiers to go from 5mW to QRP (~1W). I did find one on Banggood for 1MHz-1GHz with up to 35dBm gain. I'll still need one for 2.4GHz and 5.8GHz, but that's a small price to pay for having nearly 6GHz of spectrum to read. ( https://www.banggood.com/1MHz-1000MHZ-35DB-3W-HF-VHF-UHF-FM-... )

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#46

Post by mmaunder »

mmaunder wrote: post #28
silman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who went from nothing -> Amateur Extra when i was 23 (25 now) from a random spurt of inspiration to learn ham radio and then promptly did nothing with the license i agree with this. I don't know exactly what i was expecting from getting the license but i will say that i didn't expect it to basically just be dominated by old conservative men who don't appreciate younger folk stepping in on their air space.…

Guys, no one is forcing you to listen to that stuff. Get off the voice bands, get on digital and you'll have a blast. Here's a fun talk at Defcon from Balint Seeber, a ham who focuses on security, to get you in the right headspace. I attended this and the group of 6 of us that hung out afterwards with Balint was some of the most impressive people I've met at Defcon. One had built a bug sniffer. Another was intercepti…

Oooh that's a tough one. I haven't been in the market for a while, but even used gear like the Kenwood TS2000 which is now about 18 years old is still pricey. And a Yaesu FT817ND which is a low power HF radio comes in at around 800 bucks.

I really would like to hear from others, but I would look at getting an SDR that can handle HF frequencies down to at least 7Mhz if you want to have some serious DX fun.

I have a HackRF One, but it retails still at around $300 bucks. I have a feeling if you use the google and shop around, you may find a SDR and converter combo that'll get you down to 7Mhz with low power.

Then building your own antenna is trivial. Because you're using very low power, you can actually build a dipole antenna that doesn't even need a balun. I've used stealth antenna wire which is super slinky and nice to work with to create a low power antenna (in ham speak, we call low power 'QRP'). It's basically just coax that splits the core and shield into left and right branches. You use the stealth wire for the branches and you calculate the length based on frequency. So it's locked to a specific frequency like the 7Mhz band. But they're super effective as long as you string them in a tree. The whole kit can be bundled up into a backpack, taken for a hike and when you get to your destination, have a picnic, string up the antenna in a tree and make a few DX (long distance) QRP (low power) contacts on your laptop. Yeah, it's a geeky hobby. [insert joke about preparing for the end times]

But again, I'd love to hear from other hams on here re developments in low power low cost HF SDRs.

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#47

Post by BenjiWiebe »

hanoz wrote: post #29

Is there any way I can pick this up using an RTL-SDR dongle?

Yes. Make sure you are using direct sampling, attach a long wire, string it up. Use an audio pipe to pipe the audio from your SDR software into the WSJT-X software, which also lists the default frequencies for a given mode. Enjoy!

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#48

Post by tormeh »

AWildC182 wrote: post #30
mmaunder wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a regular on HF and I've found the community to be welcoming and I've learned a lot from people with half a lifetime more experience than I have. Retired doctors, aerospace engineers and other interesting fields. There are many younger contesters who move very quickly and just work to make contacts. Bad actors? There are a handful, but FCC has taken enforcement action against several. https://www.fcc.gov/general/…

You're definitely right that there are a lot of really cool people out there. I had a similar experience joining an EAA chapter to discover that a whole bunch of them had worked on Hubble. That said, the FCC in my experience has been pretty lax about policing the amateur bands. You can go to any online SDR and tune around to find obnoxious, toxic, and illegal behavior within minutes. I've also found that if you're lu…

> You can go to any online SDR and tune around to find obnoxious, toxic, and illegal behavior within minutes

Ah, so 4chan for old people.

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#49

Post by ip26 »

resters wrote: post #40
silman wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who went from nothing -> Amateur Extra when i was 23 (25 now) from a random spurt of inspiration to learn ham radio and then promptly did nothing with the license i agree with this. I don't know exactly what i was expecting from getting the license but i will say that i didn't expect it to basically just be dominated by old conservative men who don't appreciate younger folk stepping in on their air space.…

> I have yet to actually speak to anyone because i don't feel like there is anything i would want to say. That's true for many people. You don't need to use it to make a statement or to express your individuality, you can just participate in contests, enjoy propagation, etc.

Yes, but if you don't have anything to say and you don't want to hear the things other people are saying, then what are you doing? Thus the remark that the radio was shelved.

Re: FT8 – Tipping Point for Ham Radio?

#50

Post by GlenTheMachine »

geofft wrote: post #37
kawfey wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like in an emergency situation, voice would still be the preferred mode since ARES and other HF radio organizations are dispatched to fill in coverage gaps that would have been there otherwise. You also need a working computer with the latest software, a digital interface, and have practiced digital mode operating skills.

In an emergency situation I'll probably have my cell phone, too. What I'd love to have is an app (or packaged web app using WebAudio) that encodes/decodes PSK31 so I can plug in an audio cable from my iPhone to my Baofeng and start typing.

I agree. So, why not a JS8CALL app?

As I understand it, the real go-to mode for EmComm is still CW. Which implies very experienced operators. At some point in the future, you'll have more operators experienced with digital modes than Morse code. So...

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