HAM Radio - a Hobby, Combat Tool, Emergency Service, and Research Unit

Recently, I discovered the wonderful, vast and exciting world of Ham Radio (Amateur Radio). Upon learning about Ham Radio's different uses and benefits in almost any situation it can be deployed, I decided I must learn everything there is to learn about it and get into this awesome field of communication. I've been asked by friends and family, why, what's the purpose? After explaining it in detail to them and describing the technologies and equipment utilized within this sub-genre of telecommunications, most of them were equally if not more excited about Ham Radio than I am! As the title of this post suggests, I am going to discuss what Ham Radio is, it's different uses and what it has to offer.

As anyone who knows me already knows, I have always been very interested in technology and electronics. If you know me, you also know that if something interests me, I learn everything there is to know about it. So, for the past month I have been conducting detailed research, using the Internet, on Ham Radio. I also obtained two books: the first is an RF Engineering Manual and the second is a Ham Radio Operators Manual, both are well over 1000 pages and cover every aspect of Ham Radio. The RF Engineering Manual is more of a text-book style read and doesn't just talk about Ham Radio, instead it provides very complex formulas for learning various aspects of RF Technology, RF

An example of a Ham Radio Station

standing for Radio Frequency, as well as insight into the various obstacles one will encounter during the operation of a radio station, building or repairing radio related hardware and more. After skimming through the two I decided I should start with the Ham Radio Operators Manual first and once I have an advanced understanding of RF Technology I'll dive into the RF Engineering Manual. From my vast research online, I started assembling my own book using a 2" three ring binder. I have been printing out articles detailing various aspects of Ham Radio as well as key references that every Radio Operator should know. I currently have 12 Chapters from subjects on Antennas to Q-Codes and am still adding more daily. This homemade Ham Radio book will substitute further details on topics that are covered by the two books I bought. I can tell everyone reading this, that at this point, I have learned a lot about Ham Radio, building Radio Stations, setting up Antennas Farms and Arrays and Operating various types of equipment, but I am in NO Way an Expert on HAM Radio.
So lets begin....

What is Ham Radio & Where/When is it Used?

Amateur Radio Frequencies

Another Ham Radio Station. Note how this one is integrated

with 2 computers and few different Amateur Radio

Transceivers. Even the desk is made specifically for Ham

Radio Operations with the Antenna Switches built into it.

HAM Radio or Amateur Radio is a form of Radio Communication covering a wide range of frequency bands allocated for use by the FCC for Licensed Users only. Frequency bands covered, range from HF (High Frequency) at 1.8Mhz all the way to EHF (Extremely High Frequency) at 250Ghz (250000Mhz). There are several bands in between, each with its own frequencies which have their own purpose and uses.  Some frequencies within bands are reserved for use by certain types of equipment, business, or governments. For example, HF Bands are at the bottom (or top depending on VHF (Very High Frequency) comes after HF and covers 50Mhz to 225Mhz. There are many reserved frequencies inside the VHF bands, including FM Radio which starts at 87.5Mhz and ends at 108Mhz as well as local VHF TV Channels. The next band of frequencies after VHF is UHF (Ultra High Frequency), starting at 420Mhz and ending at 2450Mhz (2.45Ghz). Reserved frequencies within the UHF bands include but are not limited to local UHF TV Channels, Cellular Phones, Landline Cordless Phones operating at 900Mhz or 2.4Ghz (2400Mhz), as well as WiFi equipped devices (routers, laptops, access points, and cell phones) which also operate at 2.4Ghz as well as other frequencies.  The next band of frequencies after UHF would be SHF (Super High Frequency) starting at 3300Mhz (3.3Ghz) and ending at 24250Mhz or 24.25Ghz. SHF frequencies are primarily for Commercial and Government use, however Amateur Radio still gets secondary privileges.  Currently there is very little equipment for the SHF band available to the Amateur Radio Operator as this is what Ham's refer to as an experimental band. Experimental meaning that any Licensed Operator has full privilege to operate any mode (Phone, Data, or CW) within the SHF band, however, you must have equipment made specifically for this band of frequencies.  Many Hams are also knowledgeable in electronics and components, as this is apart of the Ham Radio hobby. Those Hams that are most knowledgeable in electronics, often build their own equipment, some even build and sell it online as a second job - making the hobby even more productive than it is already!  With this said, if you wanted to operate CW (morse code) at 12Ghz, you would have to build a transverter to do so. More info on transverters and other Ham Radio Equipment will be available later. The last band available is EHF (Extremely High Frequency) and is even more rare than SHF.  EHF and SHF frequencies are often referred to as Microwave Frequencies (as this is what they are). Microwave Frequencies have specific uses within Ham Radio, mainly for Packet and other Data transmissions but this is an entirely different topic altogether.  Modern Ham Radio Transceivers only operate (transmit or receive) on the allocated Amateur Radio Frequencies, all other frequencies are typically blocked from transmit or receive, but some are only blocked from transmitting.  Imagine, if Cellular Phone frequencies weren't blocked from Transmit/Receive, anyone with a Ham Radio could listen to Cell Phones within range of their Radio Station.
how you look at it) of the Band Scale - the bands that fall within HF range from 160 meters (1.8Mhz) to 10 meters (29.7Mhz). An example of reserved frequencies are the frequencies that make up the 11 Meter band.  11 Meters is an HF band but it is not used by HAM Radio, but by CB (Citizen Band) Radio. Most Ham Radios allow the operator to listen to the CB frequencies but do not allow transmitting. However, some Ham Radios, and those that have been modified allow both transmit and receive on the CB Frequencies.  These type of modifications are not possible on all reserved frequencies however.
Reserved frequencies within the UHF bands include but are not limited to local UHF TV Channels, Cellular Phones, Landline Cordless Phones operating at 900Mhz or 2.4Ghz (2400Mhz), as well as WiFi equipped devices (routers, laptops, access points, and cell phones) which also operate at 2.4Ghz as well as other frequencies.  The next band of frequencies after UHF would be

Ham Radio vs. Police and Military Radios

A Harris HF Radio made for the US Military

Radios are Radios are Radios! Ham Radio, Police Radios, Fire/EMS Radios, Boating Radios, Airplane Radios, and Space Shuttle Radios all work on similar frequencies. I wanted to clear this up pretty quickly as many people that no nothing about Radio Communications, think of Ham Radio as a bunch of Nerds on Walkie Talkies talking across the neighborhood, when in reality it's far from that.  Now that you are aware of the different frequencies you will understand the rest of the article better.  Military Radios, those used by our boys and girls overseas in the field, in the barracks, and on the move from inside a Humvee, operate on the HF frequencies, as the HF band has much wider coverage than any other band.  Many Ham's that collect Vintage Radios often have a couple MilSurp Radios in their Ham Shack. MilSurp Radios also make great hill-topping and portable HF radios as most were made with portability and ruggedness in mind and nothing is more rugged and durable than equipment made for the Military.  Police, Fire/EMS, Coast Guard, and other Stateside Law Enforcement use VHF or UHF radios that operate on frequencies just outside those allocated to Ham Operators, however, they share the same bands as Ham's allowing the knowledgeable Ham Radio Operator the ability to monitor their transmissions.  Local Police and Fire/EMS have started implementing even more sophisticated Digital Trunking Radios over the past few years, requiring those that wish to monitor their transmissions to invest in more sophisticated devices. However, most modern digital Ham Radios have the ability to monitor these frequencies.  Besides being able to listen to local Law Enforcement and having the ability to communicate with our troops, if a Ham's Station is in the vicinity of an Airport, the Ham can monitor Air Traffic Control and incoming and outgoing flights on VHF or UHF Frequencies. In Houston, I live between two Airports, George W. Bush Intercontinental and Houston Hobby, I often monitor incoming flights and Air Traffic Control just to listen to the lingo and get to hear the style of communication.  One of the other advantages of living in Houston is my distance from the Port of Houston, and Port of Galveston.  Not only do I get to listen to Coast Guard Operations, I can also monitor incoming ships and smaller boats, requesting docking access, or just ragchewing with other boaters on VHF frequencies, and if I want to I too can ragchew with a Shrimp Boat or Cruise Boat Captain all from my QTH (Q-Code for: location).

Two guys operating a portable Ham Radio alongside a road.

As you can see Ham Radio isn't just for talking to your friend across town, it also allows the Ham Radio Operator to stay informed as to what the local emergency services have going on. This is obviously important in times of Natural Disaster or during Terrorists Attacks, domestic or foreign terrorists. I would like to point out at this point that when Tornado's struck Oklahoma City and it's Suburbs earlier this year, Ham Radio is what kept me informed.  I found out about the Tornado's the
morning after while listening to a local Ham Radio Net (a Net is a group talk show of sorts hosted on a certain frequency at a certain time during the day, it is typically open to anyone with a Ham Radio).  When the Net ended I switched over to one of the local repeaters here in Houston, 145.17.  A couple guys were having a conversation about the OKC Tornado's when one of them decided that they should connect the 145.17 Repeater to a Repeater in OKC and see what kind of activity was going on in the OKC area.  I heard live reports from OKC locals as to the condition of the area, death toll, and repair efforts. This is where I would like to transition into the different types of technologies available to an Amateur Radio Operator.

Basic Ham Radio Technologies

Repeaters 

One of the most common pieces of equipment used in Ham Radio on the VHF/UHF Frequencies is the Repeater.  A Repeater does exactly what it's name suggests.  Since Ham Radio's are limited in range as to how far they can transmit or receive, a Repeater helps expand this range.  There are two basic forms (there are several different ways actually, but here we are discussing the basics) of communicating with other Radio Stations on VHF/UHF Frequencies, Simplex and through Repeaters.  Repeaters are setup and maintained typically by a local Amateur Radio Group or Club, depending on the area in which you reside there could be as many as a hundred repeaters in your city or as few as one. In the Houston Metro Area there are about 70 different repeaters spanning from Conroe to Galveston (N to S) and from Katy to Baytown (W to E).  The vast majority of them are located in Downtown Houston in some of Houston's tallest buildings.  A repeater is nothing more than a fancy radio, a controller, an antenna, and some sort of battery backup or other emergency power source.  Here is a view of the top of the building in downtown that is home to many of Houston's Repeaters, including my favorite, 145.17.

Wayne, the Owner of 145.17, is making some adjustments to the Repeaters Antenna

Housed inside this building is the actual radio equipment that makes up the repeater. This particular repeater, 145.17, covers the entire city of Houston in a giant circle that spans about 10 miles outside the Beltway. As anyone who is familiar with Houston knows, the Beltway is the outermost loop Highway/Toll Road that circles the city.  This repeater is particularly useful for those working from the vehicles or on handhelds where the coverage area is limited to only a few miles.  The repeater works like so: Radio Operator Alan, who is working on the SW side of Houston in Alief, turns his handheld radio to 145.17, the transmit range of his handheld is typically 2 to 3 miles, but he wants to talk to Radio Operator Bill who is at his house in Pasadena, which is located more than 20 miles to East of Alan.  Without the Repeater, Alan and Bill would be unable to talk, but since the repeater has a transmit/receive range covering the entire city, Alan can transmit from his handheld, where the signal is then picked up by the repeater.  The repeater then re-transmits Alan's transmission in Real-time across the entire city, this allows Bill to hear it loud and clear (or "5 by 9").  The two can now communicate as if they were actually just across the street from eachother.  At this point in time, the repeater network in the Untied States, is more dense than the Cell Tower Network, thus allowing anyone with a Ham Radio to be able to communicate with other Ham's across almost every single square inch of the country!  Most repeaters are not only powered by the electric company buy also have some sort of battery backup and solar powered system installed. This allows the repeater to remain fully operational when the power goes out. Ham's can simply turn their handheld or other battery powered Radio on, dial up the local repeater frequency, and start transmitting, even if the entire city was without power.  You can see how this can be especially useful during a Natural Disaster or other catastrophic event.

Below are a couple coverage maps I feel are important to give everyone an idea of what kind of area a typical Ham Radio can communicate with. Keep in mind that as you go down in the Radio Bands, the coverage area gets much larger, some frequencies cover entire states or regions depending on the Propagation Conditions and Tropospheric Ducting.

This is a coverage map showing the coverage area my Ham radio has running through my Homebuilt 2 Meter Yagi Antenna. The pushpin represents my QTH. The pink shaded areas show the strongest signal coverage and the purple shaded areas show the weak signal coverage. Notice how it is not a perfect circle, this has to do with the lay of the land, land elevation, elevation of my antenna, and the amount of power going into the antenna.

This is a coverage map showing the coverage area my Ham radio has when running through a simple 6 Meter Vertical antenna that I also built. Unlike the Yagi, this vertical antenna has an Omni-Directional coverage pattern. This ability of the antenna to radiate in an Omni-Directional fashion along with the lower frequencies of the 6 Meter Band make for a much larger coverage area when compared to the 2 Meter Yagi's coverage map above but is still a VHF frequency band, allowing for digital communications with little noise or QRM (Q-Code for: interference).

 

This coverage map shows the area covered by the only 10 Meter Band Repeater in Houston. As the 10 Meter Band is an HF Band, operating FM (the mode that repeaters operate in) stops at 10 Meters, notice how far out the shaded areas cover.  As we keep stepping down to the next lower band, the coverage area gets much larger, allowing the Ham Operator to communicate over farther distances. However, noise and interference also become more prevalent at the lower bands as the frequencies that make up these HF bands are not digital in nature, but analog.

IRLP, D-Star, & Echolink
Another form or Ham Radio technology, and my all time favorite, is the integration of the internet with radios and repeaters across the country.  There are different names for this technology as there are different manufacturers implementing it into their repeaters and radios. The two most popular however are D-Star and Echolink which I will refer to as IRLP from this point forward. IRLP stands for the Internet Radio Linking Project (or Protocol depending on who you are talking to). IRLP allows Ham Radio operators to break the barriers and limits of the transmit/receive range of the equipment being used.  Using the example with Alan and Bill above, now imagine that the same repeater they are communicating on, 145.17, is plugged into the internet (like so many repeaters are) via an ethernet cable. Bill proposes to Alan that they call up their friend and fellow Ham, Charlie who lives in Seattle, Washington. Alan agrees, that they should get Charlie on the Radio, so he then dials the Seattle, Washington repeater's node number (typically a 4 to 6 digit number) on the keypad of his handheld radio.  The 145.17 repeater then notifies everyone who is currently listening that it has established a link with this other repeater in Seattle.  These two repeaters are now connected via the internet, anyone who transmits from Houston, will be heard by the locals in Seattle who are listening to their local Seattle repeater and Visa-Versa! Alan then calls out Charlie's callsign, and Charlie responds. Now Alan, Bill, and Charlie are all communicating with eachother from across the country on their radios. Alan is at work on his handheld, Bill is sitting at home in his Radio Shack, and Charlie is driving across Seattle on his way to pick his son up from school.   This form of technology is not only being used with repeaters but also with Radios.  Several new transceivers come with an Ethernet jack standard on the back of them for plugging into the internet.  This allows the Ham Radio Operator to connect their radio via the internet directly to a repeater that is out of range, without having to go through another repeater like Alan and Bill did in the above example. It also allows two radios to connect via the internet from across the world among many other things.

Autopatch
Autopatch is another one of my favorites.  This form of technology is older and is used a lot less nowadays due to the invention of the cell phone. Although, this is still a very handy form of communication and can be extremely helpful in emergency situations.  Autopatch, deals with repeaters and phone lines.  Just like a repeater can be connected to the internet, some can also be connected to a landline.  This allows traveling Ham's, those who may not have a cell phone or those that have a cell phone but it's battery is dead, to make phone calls directly from the Ham Radio.  Any Ham Radio with a keypad can take advantage of Autopatch. This means Autopatch can be used from the Home QTH, while on the move in the car, or when operating from a handheld radio.  Depending on who owns and maintains the repeater, the Autopatch function could be password protected so that only certain people can take advantage of this feature, however, if you are in need of using this technology, to access it on a repeater is pretty much the same anywhere you go.  Let's go back to our friends in the examples above.  Alan, Bill, and Charlie, have been talking for 30 minutes or so when Charlie picks his son up and signs off the radio. Alan, disconnects the Seattle Repeater from the Houston Repeater, 145.17, that him and Bill are currently on. He does so by typing a sequence of numbers on his Radio's keypad.  Bill has to run an errand so he signs off as well and leaves his Radio Station. Alan is just now getting off work when he realizes his Cell Phone is dead, he needs to call the wife to see if she needs him to stop by the grocery store on the way home. Taking advantage of the Autopatch feature on the 145.17 repeater, Alan presses # and then dials his home telephone number. He can then hear the phone line ringing, his wife picks up and reminds him to grab a loaf of Bread and a Gallon of Milk. Once she hangs up the phone the call is disconnected and the Autopatch function is inactive again until someone else reactivates it.  When I first discovered Autopatch technology I was amazed and could easily see many different uses for it.  As you can guess, Autopatch was used more frequently before Cellular Phones and is now rarely ever used. 

Ham Radio as a Public Service

Radio has many different uses, from moving troops on the battlefield, dispatching police to the scene of a robbery, giving airplanes the ability to communicate while in the sky, to allowing two friends the ability to communicate from across the street, across the state or across the world! One popular use for Amateur Radio amongst Hams is, EmComm (Ham abbreviation for Emergency Communications). There are a few different EmComm groups across the US with many groups or
clubs Regionally and Locally representing them.  The two most popular that I can think of are ARES (Amateur Radio Emergency Service) and SkyWarn. This info on ARES was taken directly from the ARRL's (American Radio Relay League) Website:

Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES)
The Amateur Radio Emergency Service® (ARES) consists of licensed amateurs who have voluntarily registered their qualifications and equipment, with their local ARES leadership, for communications duty in the public service when disaster strikes.

ARES Membership Requirements
Every licensed amateur, regardless of membership in ARRL or any other local or national organization is eligible to apply for membership in ARES.  Training may be required or desired to participate fully in ARES.  Please inquire at the local level for specific information.  Because ARES is an Amateur Radio program, only licensed radio amateurs are eligible for membership. The possession of emergency-powered equipment is desirable, but is not a requirement for membership.

If you are an Active Licensed Ham and are interested in becoming an ARES member you will need to fill out the ARES Membership Registration Form and submit it to your local Emergency Coordinator.  ARES Members help organize and operate Nets in times of emergencies, they help relay messages and information to those without Ham Radios, or to those government entities whose Radio Communications are down.  For example, during September 11th, 2001, Ham Radio Operators, through an organized system, helped communicate and relay information for local Police, Fire/EMS, up and down the NE Coast when the New York Law Enforcement Radio Network crashed shortly after the World Trade Center attacks. It was the local Ham Radio Operators who were dispatching Police and other Rescue Workers to where they needed to be. Thanks to groups like ARES and it's member's training the government was able to rely on the citizens Radio Communications for support.

The other group I mentioned previously is SkyWarn. As a National Weather Service program, SkyWarn deals strictly with weather. However, many SkyWarn members are also members of ARES.  SkyWarn helped out when the Gulf Coast was hit by Katrina, Rita, and Ike. SkyWarn consists of Hams, Storm Chasers, Meterologists, adventure seeking Survivalists, and many more who seek to investigate severe weather and storm systems while helping to get the word out as quickly as possible. More info about Skywarn can be found here at their website.