CQ CQ Calling all Hams

[bishopj]

Don't know if their are any on this site but if their is. Do you or would you take
like a handheld 2 meter with you on a hike i been looking up towers their are lot in Va.
I was thinking about taking my 2 meter it a Radio Shack HTX-202 Great little two meter
:confused:

[vamelungeon]

Don't know if their are any on this site but if their is. Do you or would you take
like a handheld 2 meter with you on a hike i been looking up towers their are lot in Va.
I was thinking about taking my 2 meter it a Radio Shack HTX-202 Great little two meter
:confused:
Sure. I've spoken with a ham on the AT on 2 meters who was using one of the local repeaters.

[MintakaCat]

The HTX-202 is a great radio, but not for backpacking. It weighs 1lbs 3oz and that’s without the 6 AA batteries you will need on the trail, because you need your backpacking handheld to run off store bought batteries.

I use the Yaesu VX-3 for backpacking and it works great. Get the AA battery adapter that uses 3 AA batteries. With the 3 AA batteries it only weighs 7oz. Also get a 1/4 wave dual band antenna and you will be fine.

[ki0eh]

But the HTX-202 is dual use, you can also pound tent stakes with it. :D

[JaxHiker]

I carry a VX-5, a spare battery, and the EE-3 antenna that I can deploy in a tree.

[Valentine]

So If I were to get a HAM radio license and this pocket sized radio how reliable or how much of the AT would I be able to use it? Obviosly I don't know anything about HAM radio yet but have been curios for a long time. How prevelant are the repeater towers? How close do you have to be with one of these micro units?

[JaxHiker]

Well, I'm curious how MintakaCat manages with the VX-3. I can't imagine it would fair too well since it's only putting out 1.5W on VHF. I'd go with a radio capable of a full 5W and use a longer antenna to replace the standard rubber duckie.

Unfortunately I'm still trying to figure out the availability of repeaters along the trail. However, from the mountain tops you should be able to manage ok. Of course the external antenna like I use increases your range even further.

[Wise Old Owl]

N3GWD, every time I was driving in the Appalachian mountains the radio wasn't the issue. It was the repeaters in PA, the folks only wanted to talk to the other folk on the other side of those hills.

Take a small hand held and keep the battery disconnected until needed. I had very little success with the locals, but when I hill topped and hit repeaters with it thirty miles away back in the cities - Wow!

[MintakaCat]

Well, I'm curious how MintakaCat manages with the VX-3. I can't imagine it would fair too well since it's only putting out 1.5W on VHF. I'd go with a radio capable of a full 5W and use a longer antenna to replace the standard rubber duckie.

The answer is: Experience. I’ve been a licensed amateur for almost 33 years. Plus I’m a radio communications consultant for various public safety agencies across the county. In addition to that I’ve do a lot of QRP on the amateur bands over the years too.

Rule of thumb:
1.5 watts can go a very long way if you know what you’re doing. 5 watts will do if you don’t. Get a 20 watt amp if you don’t have a clue.

[vamelungeon]

To heck with anonymity, I'm N4AUD, and I agree with hilltopping your HT. You're going to be using line of sight, and at the top of some of these ridges line of sight is pretty far as we all know. Cell phones might not work everywhere but a 2 meter handheld will if you are on top of a hill. There is a problem with getting some of the local repeater denizens to talk to you, but I think if you make it clear you are passing through on the AT, someone will want to talk to you. The farther you are from their QTH the more likely they are going to talk.
An HT might be very handy in an emergency. I've never had a need to use one for that but since you can hit a repeater from just about any summit- at least here in the southern Appalachians- it could be a valuable tool if needed.

[bishopj]

Has anyone use Lithium Batterys in their 2 meter they weight a lot less then other batterys
i know you can't use them in some headlights and digital cameras.have any of you guys use the lithium batterys in your handheld.

Thank

[JaxHiker]

Rule of thumb:
1.5 watts can go a very long way if you know what you’re doing. 5 watts will do if you don’t. Get a 20 watt amp if you don’t have a clue.
Is this supposed to be an insult? 1.5W on a HF QRP rig is a bit different from 1.5W on a line-of-sight frequency. And you ignored the question of how the VX-3 actually gets out.

fwiw I was a communications electronics technician and I'm heavily involved in ARES.

[MintakaCat]

Is this supposed to be an insult?

Nope, didn't mean for to be. Sorry if it came across that way.

I guess my point is that 1.5 watts works pretty well at those elevations on the AT. Maybe I didn't consider your location in Jacksonville where having 5 watts is more the norm due to the flat terrain.

I just don't think you need 5 watts on those mountains to get into the local repeaters. Maybe we can agree to disagree?

[JaxHiker]

No disagreement. I'm sure you have much more experience than I do using low power in the mountains. Around here the VX-3 has minimal usefulness though I do know people that are happy with it. Since I don't know the locations of all the repeaters I wasn't sure if you'd run into trouble trying to get out with 1.5W. We're cool. :)

[MintakaCat]

We're cool. :)

Good, maybe I was a little short with my first answer.

I guess what should say is that over the years of dealing with mountains and VHF radio communications the difference between 1.5 watts and 5 watts doesn't change things much. This is because when you're in the shadow of one of those mountains, there just isn't much you can do to get your signal around it.

On the other hand, when you're in sight of the mountain with the repeater, even just a half a watt does the job just fine. My point was that carrying the extra weight of a 5 watt radio doesn't make much since in these conditions. The jump from 1.5 to 5 watts is not even 6db.

Most of the time, in order to make a difference in getting into a repeater on the AT, a difference of 20db or more is needed before you start to notice that your coverage is better.

The mountains around the AT are cruel to radio communications, which is why you see so many of them with radio towers on top of them. It's not uncommon to be able to hit a repeater 25 miles away and yet not hit a repeater just 5 miles away. The radio coverage shadows created by these mountains are very strange and sometimes drives you nuts in figuring which repeater to get into.

I like to think of the radio coverage in the mountains as either a make or break situation. There's very little grey area up there unlike a normal situation where the terrain is mostly flat.

[BR360]

Mintaka Cat, thanks for the info. That is very useful.

BTW, I was a Tech, but got involved in other thngs over the years and accidentally let my license lapse.

Is the FCC requiring Morse Code for a General license now? I thought I heard it had been scrubbed from req.

[JaxHiker]

There is, sadly, no Morse code requirement anymore. imho it should at least still be required for Extra.

[rlharris]

Brad and I are only day hikers but I always carry my VX-6R. I usually tell someone when we're leaving the van (mobile rig) then hilltop or put out my call during the hike. Finally let them know when we're back to the van.

There are spots along the trails where reaching a repeater is questionable but usually we'll get to a sweet spot faster than those relying on mobile phones.

There are several hikers/hams in this area. We all care HTs when hiking, snowshoeing, skiing, etc. We listen for each other and for hikers from out of the area. Some monitor several repeaters. Canon Mtn is well-monitored.

K9UDX

[waldick]

Hi folks, I'm K8LAW...

Last year we hiked north from Rockfish Gap in VA. I thought about bringing my HT, but figured I'd run out of battery before the week of hiking was done...

Anybody given any thought about a solar charger...although i found not much sun under the canopy of trees...:(

Somewhere i read about an insole insert that charges a battery with every step...can't seem to find the article now though...:-?

[JaxHiker]

I don't usually have the HT on the whole time unless I'm in a group and trying to keep the front and rear in contact. I doubt you'd get enough sun to give a good charge.

[Funkmeister]

BishopJ: I sometimes carry a 2 meter handheld rig, though not always. In my ancient Alinco radio, I only use lithium AAs when I have some consideration for weight.

My Alinco rig is not lightweight, falling into the tentstake-pounder category. Probably a pound or so, and I never bought a NiCad pack for it, just the AA shell. I have a 2-meter J-Pole for it as well as the duck, and usually take both antennas. I also have a 8AA external battery pack I made which bumps my RF output to about 5 watts. I rarely carry it, because the JPole antenna with 1.5w is about as good or better as the duck and 5w and weighs less. Once I was on Mt Blue in western Maine and from there I could hit the repeaters in Augusta (Maine), guessing more than 60 miles away. I used it to make a phone patch (from my radio to repeater to telephone interface) to learn that my friend's wife had given birth to their firstborn. If I fly in a private plane, I can cruise at 8000' and hit guys that are about 70 miles away. Usually, hams use the least amount of power to establish communications, so I try to turn down my signal to the .5 watt setting when possible. Less power, less battery drain, longer battery life.

MintakaCat suggests the VX3 as a backpacking radio; if you have the money to spare and the desire for a way-cool radio, go for it.

No one mentioned it, but many of these VHF radios have an extended receive function, so you can hear stuff like the National Weather Service, a fairly useful feature hiking. You may be able to hear plenty of other things, too, like Forest Service, local police and fire freqs. Maybe not useful hiking, but this is: you can modify your radio to transmit on these frequencies with often just some surgery inside the radio. It is ILLEGAL to transmit on these out of the amateur band(s), but were I or someone seriously injured and needed an evacuation, I'd consider
transmitting to anyone at any frequency for rescue arrangements and worry about the fine later.

Valentine: your answer is 'it depends'. These radios work on 'line of sight'. Terrain between you and another person prevents the signal from getting there no matter how close you might be. Your antennaS are important, too. The little black ones are convienent but not great for longer-distance communication. A larger one is better as it radiates your signal better (a broad statement, and not exactly correct but close) but is less convienent than the little one. With a decent j-pole antenna, I can hit a repeater across flat Rhode Island from about 20 miles away with 1.5 watts. I capalized the 'S' in antennas above because both antennas are important. So is their altitude.

Mintaka makes an important point: there are lots of dead spots where you just can't hit a repeater. While carcamping in NH I often can't hit the local repeater (Mt Wash) but can hit one plenty farther away. There's too much hill between my radio and the repeater.

WOO also makes a good point: there are plenty of crotchety geezers that don't want to talk to other people, just each other, complaing about their doctor's appointments or their wife's hairdresser appointments or whatever. They are entirely allowed to do so. But there others who find new people interesting and offer advice on those new to their area.

No one mentioned this, but Valentine's questions imply he's a new guy, so here's something perhaps not obvious: You don't need a repeater for communtication. You can tune to frequencies (called 'simplex') where repeaters aren't allowed, and you can use your radio as a walkie-talkie (think FRS radios).

This is a straightforward forum, so I'll be succinct about these two off-topic things...learning a bit about ham radio and practicing may help in an emergency. If something wiped out telephone communication for a quarter of the US, repeaters and ham radio could help in the interim. And I'm surprised that there's no presence here, but there's an online bunch of guys who combine hiking and ham radio, called the Adventure Radio Society. Search online if you want to learn more. They have a contest called 'Flight of the Bumblebees', which requires you to have some human horsepower to get to your operating location.

I've attached a repeater list for the AT. Likely outdated, but might answer some general questions. RATS...it wont let me attach the file. If anyone wants it, let me know and I'll email it to you.

I also regret the no-code requirement. I'm almost 50, been licensed since 1990, and am old enough to be a 20-word Extra.

This isn't trail related, but the only time I used my handheld for something really important: I was flying to visit my parents in Reading PA on Christmas Eve, 2001. I had an alternator failure in the little Skyhawk I was in halfway there but elected to continue the flight. The alt failure killed my radios in the panel, along with the avionics. So I used the wet compass and the VFR chart in my lap and dead-reckoned my way to SE Pennsylvania. I abandoned the thought of flying into a 'larger' airport like Reading and instead elected to go to the little airstrip in Kutztown where landing without a radio would be less problematic. But this was weeks after 9.11, and I was worried that I might get mistaken for a bad guy and shot down since my transponder quit working over the Hudson River, which the hijackers used to vector themselves into lower Manhattan. So I found some guys on the ground with my radio and told them the story just incase there was a big problem and they called the airport (Kutztown) to announce my arrival. It all worked out fine; seems no one cared one way or the other. Except for my dog, who took a dump in the back seat to voice her displeasure regarding flying noisy little airplanes.

[Funkmeister]

I tried to upload a list in my previous post and it didn't work. Here's one in a Word doc, with some formatting problems, but at least it will be a start.

Repeaters come and go, so no promises on the accuracy. I downloaded this in June 2006.

[ki0eh]

And I'm surprised that there's no presence here, but there's an online bunch of guys who combine hiking and ham radio, called the Adventure Radio Society. Search online if you want to learn more. They have a contest called 'Flight of the Bumblebees', which requires you to have some human horsepower to get to your operating location.

Thanks for this info, I had not heard of these folks before. Unfortunately it seems to focus on HF CW QRP - I sorta did my time with CW for the tests but don't feel too competent at operating that way.

I'd like to get started with the newer digital modes, and there's a placeholder on the ARS web site for doing it their way, but it seems I need an "Elmer" for that since I can't even make anything work at home.

[JaxHiker]

PSK31 is fun.

I haven't tried it yet but have some friends that have been enjoying Olivia. It sounds pretty amazing. You can pull signals out that you can't even hear. Right now I think MixW is the only software supporting it, though.

Some of the guys around here (and my brother) have also been playing around with Hellschriber.

I really need to get off my duff and get my 718 checked out. Rx audio is suspect. What sounds great on the TS-2000 is non-existent on the 718 for some reason. Hope I didn't blow the front-end somehow. Of course, maybe I'll pick up a 7000 when the tax man returns my money. ;)

[expenditioner]

Im surprised knowone has mentioned using simplex frequencies while at higher elevations.I take one everytime I go.Always someone chatting on 146.52MHz.
Tom
KC4TCM