I am new to the hobby, got my general right off the bat back in June, started on DMR and then moved to digital modes like FT8 and a few weeks ago joined in on the WASA net, boy was I a mess, I kinda panicked a little, but, these folks let me learn and didn’t knock me for making mistakes. I joined again tonight and was much better. 10/10 would recommend!

I have my dad's old Norston CX–165 radio it still works he's had it since... I don't know the 60s I think? It can tune into airplanes have a doctor's service vehicles, anything that has radio really.

I just thought people here might find it interesting if it's the right place to post this. :)

When you bring home a piece of gear that spent years transmitting inside ARRL headquarters, you can’t help but wonder if it still remembers where it came from. This morning, the newest addition to the Box 324 Radio Club bench proved that radios have a funny way of finding their way back home.

Rewind to this past weekend at the Nutmeg Hamfest. We were walking the floor when we spotted our buddies John and Josh! We were on the hunt for a new full-power rig for the club and they had exactly what we were looking for: a clean, heavy-duty Icom IC-756PROII. But this wasn't just any hamfest find. Tucked into its pedigree was a legendary piece of Connecticut radio history—it was an official bulletin radio straight out of W1AW in Newington.

We talk a lot about the big-picture work the League does on the front lines: defending amateur spectrum, fighting legislative battles, and pushing the hobby forward. But their equipment surplus cycle deserves just as much credit. When the ARRL rotates out station gear at local hamfests, it creates a vital pipeline for grassroots clubs like ours. Running a small local club station means every penny counts, and getting access to proven, well-cared-for commercial gear is a genuine game-changer. Instead of gathering dust in a backroom, gear like this gets recycled right back into the community—anchoring a club shack, training operators, and standing ready for emergency communications.

We hauled the radio back to the station and got right to work. We set it up on the bench stacked with our Sky Toppower supply and a classic RIGblaster we scored at the fest. We connected the audio cables, and got the entire station wired up and playing nice.

We’ve been putting the rig through its paces under our club call, K1MFD, but the real highlight is captured in the clip above: scheduling and completing a contact straight back across the state to W1AW.

A former W1AW bulletin workhorse, picked up from the hamfest tables, wired onto our bench, and reaching right back out to talk to its old home station. You couldn’t design a more satisfying full-circle moment.

Club Page: https://www.facebook.com/K1MFD

Huge thanks to everyone involved. If you hear K1MFD out across the bands, throw your call into the mix—this radio has plenty of history left to make. 73!

Only missed 3!

Just finished running comms for a two-day gravel event in the Cascades. Role was net control at the start/finish and relay between SAG and the two water stops, plus a couple of volunteers roving on simplex to cover the sections our club repeater couldn't reach. Fifth year doing it, and I always try to debrief myself after. Writing up what I want to change while it's still fresh.
Setup. HP682 on belt, speaker mic clipped at the lapel, two spare batteries in the vest, a logbook, and a cheat sheet taped to the inside of the clipboard. The Hytera has been doing these days with me since 2023 and the only reason it stays in the rotation is the battery holds up for a full shift and I don't have to baby it. Nothing fancier would do a better job for what I need it to do.
What worked. The channel plan held up this year. Last year we had too many groups on one simplex which turned into step-on soup during the morning rush. Splitting SAG and rest stops to separate frequencies with a dedicated relay channel between NC and SAG lead killed probably two thirds of the old chatter. Also for the first time I did a hard battery discipline, fresh battery every few hours rather than running them toward empty, and nobody dropped offline mid-conversation this year.
What didn't. There's a canyon section between rest stop 1 and the turnaround where our repeater has basically never worked and I keep telling myself I'll set up a hilltop simplex relay there. Didn't do it. One of our rovers ended up tracking that section on cell, which is fine until it isn't. Also our incident log on paper is slower than I want. Thinking about moving to a shared sheet next year but phones at rest stops is its own set of problems.
Mostly posting this because I know a lot of y'all do similar event work. If you've landed on something cleaner for the paper-vs-shared-sheet question I would read it. The canyon issue I own and I'll fix before next year.

Hey guys!

Happy Tuesday! I am posting a bit later than I had wanted to, but I suppose better late than never! I jumped around a bit more this week and attempted to capture SSTV broadcasts from the following locations (grids):

• N. California (CM88mc)
• Half Moon Bay, CA, USA (CM87tj)
• Drage, Germany (JO53dk)
• W. Montana, USA (DN26)
• Austin, Texas (em10dk)
• MARANUP, WESTERN AUSTRALIA (OF86ab)

Each of these was captured from an online SDR listed on http://kiwisdr.com/public

Frequency: 14.230 MHz
Mode: USB

Here are a few of my favorites from this evening. 😄
Until next week!

Edit: Added MHz to Frequency

I’ve been going through the subreddit and reading a lot of threads, but it is all completely new to me. From what I gather, if I want to be able to communicate with my family a couple miles away during a hurricane/aftermath when there is little/no cell service, then I’ll need a license because the 2watt MURS and FRS don’t have much range unless you’re in an open field (correct me if I’m wrong, please).

It looks like a license doesn’t require a test and is about $35 for 10 years and we only need one for the household. That is reasonable.

So if I move forward and get a license for…GSMR (I think that’s the acronym), what’s a decent budget model? I’ve read both good and bad things about Baofeng. My kid‘s school uses a Motorola APX 900 and those work well in my area, but I couldn’t see where regular people like me could buy them.

Another use case, my kid’s best friend lives almost exactly 1 mile away. I don’t want them to have a phone yet and was considering a 2 way radio for that, but I didn’t want to spend the money on one that won’t reach under normal conditions (there is a school and about 20 houses between our homes, and it’s very flat). Is there a MURS or FRS that could make that range and if so should I go with MURS? I read it’s less popular so would be more private. Any recommendations?

So i have an icom 2700h and i dont know if i broke something trying to remove the mic i had plugged in but its not registering the mic im using... is this a fix or replace type situation

So, I have been playing with APRS with a HT, audio cable and APRSdroid via AFSK. There's a couple of Digipeaters in my City (Panama), so one of them can pick my signal at different locations near my home or near it's area. I managed to make it work after several trials (the Squelch in 0 was my problem) and have managed to see and try to contact other stations (no response from them yet... I guess, they aren't checking their APRS DMs, haha).

Anyways, I was wondering how are you guys using it? Are you on AFSK or via Internet directly from your mobile phone? Do you have a dedicated radio for that task + another one if you need to do voice? or are you using something like the BTech UV 50 Pro that has it integrated?

I haven't added a Voice Frequency in my APRSdroid setup, as I guess I'll need to carry a separate radio, or just plain use APRS via Internet and use my radio to talk to people...

My other big question is: the wilderness/4x4 route use case: If I take this on my next trail, how will other stations pick my signal as I'm positive there will be no Digipeters or iGates on the Panama countryside.

Any tips are welcome, 73!

All licensed Hams welcome...

https://coosradioclub.com/2026/10/13/w7q-shakeout-nets/

**

Hello, so for about 2 years now I’ve been hearing a slight radio station through my fan. I know it’s a radio station because sometimes I hear the VJ coming on saying the call Letters (I can’t ever make them out) it’s sounds like country music some nights, and alternative music sometimes. The other night I thought it was maybe a tv show, because I hear police sirens and people yelling. I don’t know maybe it was a movie.

I ended up buying dirty electricity filter after doing some research and it wasn’t cheap and I thought I did the trick. But a well or 2 later is did it again.
So I thought maybe because my fan blades had a little dust on them maybe it was producing a certain frequency and picking up radio waves so I would clean my fan blades and it would still continue.
I know a few people at my work in skill trades and one of the electricians came over to make sure everything was wired correctly and I didn’t have a faulty ground or whatever he checked it and said everything looks great nothing‘s wrong so I figured it’s not electrical, but is there any way that my families can pick up radio signals or TV waves or anything like that? Is that even possible?

Please if you have any idea what I can do that would be very appreciated.

Also I want to add it’s not every night, I might be 1 or 2 nights a week. “Weird music playing though my fan”

I know it recommends using a max power of 50watts when doing FT8 because of the duty cycle but my question is, if I am not using it consistently and occasionally see a CQ from far away like Japan or something, would it hurt to bump it up to 100 watts for an attempt at one contact and then back down afterwards. I feel like this would be ok as it would only be using it for a couple of minutes but wanted input from others that might do this or have reasons why not to.

I don't have a budget. I am looking for ways to listen online. Thanks.

I don't know who all might be interested in this, but never hurts to throw it out there. I setup my mobile rig for wireless CAT Control and logging...including from WSJT-X.

It can be done using a DigiPi (https://digipi.org) and Ham2k's new logger. While I am using an IC-7100, it can be done pretty much from anything that has pre-existing USB CAT/Audio connection capability...like a IC-705, X6100/6200, FT-891 with a digirig, etc...

I included many details in the video description, but if you have any questions, feel free to ask...

Key components:

* Rig setup capable of CAT Control/Audio via USB connection

* DigiPi, which requires a Raspberry Pi of at least a RPi Zero 2W

* Device capable of running Ham2k's Logger (or any other logger that can make use of rigctld) & a web browser to operate the DigiPi

Helpful but not required is a Wi-Fi network for it all to connect to, but if one is not available, the DigiPi can act as a hotspot...I.e. "Field Friendly" ('ish)

... And of course, power, but it doesn't take much to power a RPi Zero 2W

73 de KC5VAZ

Hello all

I threw together just the 10m section of a POTA performer antenna today just to test some ideas out. When I test the SWR of the antenna itself, it's between 1:4 and 1:5 or so using a 20' section of coax. When I plug in in my office (shack) it drops to close to 1:1 - this is through a 50' section of RG8. No balun or RF filter on the line. I'm trying to sort out why I'm seeing this much of a drop and what to check in the Coax. I am using a Nano VNA for the SWR reading.

As for the Seattle question - I know 10m is pretty quiet these days, but is anyone in the PNW getting anything on 10m at all? I think I heard one faint conversation all day, and I'm suspecting it's because I'm out in the foothills and I simply don't have enough height on the antenna with my surroundings.

thanks!

Well I thought the thread that I wrote up in

"r/Ham Radio" would crosspost into

"r/amateur radio". Please refer to my thread in

"r/Ham Radio" as everything is explained there. I apologise for any inconvenience.

73,

De, N5LYS

I've got tired of hearing how "M17 does not sound as good as analog FM". Of course it does not, because it can't, due to technical reasons (speech compression). Can something be actually done to fix it while keeping the compatibility with the rest of the protocol intact? Sure - improve the speech synthesizer at the receiver end. I managed to train a FARGAN-like neural network and make Codec2 3200bps sound more natural. This is a part of M17 Project work, and more updates will follow. More details through the link below.

You can give the samples a listen here: https://m17project.org/2026/10/13/codec2-neural-enhancer-tests/

After 4 months of daily practice, last night I finally went for it. I turned the knob down to the bottom of the 40m band, and called CQ. A guy responded, just a little too fast. I tried my best to copy his call and remember all the abbreviations and prosigns and protocols, but man I kinda fell apart. I was having a hell of a time sending “6B”. He slowed way down, and patiently repeated himself over and over. I limped through my side of the QSO, and I’m pretty sure he dialed the keyer speed back even a little more, to just slower than I have been practicing, and over the course of 22 minutes, we exchanged names, signal reports, our QTH, and I told him this was my first CW QSO ever, apologized more than once for continuously screwing up, and thanked him a few times while he responded with words of encouragement.

This morning I put a QSL card in the mail with a thank you note. I am posting this to encourage other CW noobs to get on the air and go for it, and to encourage the more experienced ops to take the time and slow down and work a noob like me. I am beyond grateful, and words do not describe the excitement and the rush I felt logging him last night. I hope I get a card back, because it’s going up on the wall next to my first HF contact card ever.

Anyway, I had to say something. Woke up thismorning with a pep in my step that is going to be hard to shake today. Thanks for reading, and 73!