I learned that the local amateur radio club was having training on getting the license so I joined the club and started attending. The training was really boring and after just one session I decided to study on my own. There are several websites available with practice tests which have the exact same questions as the FCC exam so I studied that way. I took the basic test and passed and so was able to take the general test the same night and I passed it as well. I few days later I got my Ham License in the mail.
I bought a 50 watt mobile radio and a hi-gain antenna for the roof and started communicating with club members , mostly on the daily nets. The Nets are in the 2-Meter band which is in the VHF(very high frequency) range, and is primarily used for point-to-point local communications, though through a system of repeaters you can communicate throughout the intermountain region. The Breakfast Net meets on the Iron Mountain repeater (146.760 MHz) every day but Sunday at 7:00am and the Friendship Net meets daily at 9:00pm on the same repeater.
I got with Don Blanchard, whom I consider the father of Ham Radio in Southern Utah, and who was also my electronics instructor in college back in the 60's, and we worked with the BLM to get a repeater installed on Harmony Mountain which gives us coverage for the entire Harmony Valley and over the mountain to a majority of Iron County.
Harmony Mountain Repeater site My new HF radio, an ICOM 7300
I got into HF (High Frequency) communications when I purchased some used gear from Katherine Pons whose husband had been a HAM operator but died a while back. The HF radio was really old and hard to use but I did make a few contacts across the country. More recently I purchased a newer radio that is a lot easier to use and have started making more contacts. My HF antenna is a parallel dipole wire antenna about 60 feet long strung between trees in the back yard. I would like to find a used antenna tower, somewhere in the 40 foot range so that I can get my antenna up higher in the air and get better signals.
I am not a rebid radio fan but am enjoying the technical aspects of the hobby as well as making contacts far and wide. I think it is a hobby that I can continue to enjoy even when I am too old to do much else.
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