What is the range of a handheld ham radio?

How far can you talk about it? That's the question I get most often when people see me operating my ham

radio

s like this Bao Fang or this Kenwood and the answer, like many things in ham

radio

, is complicated in this video. to do three things, I'm going to talk about

range

, you can connect radio to radio using a small

handheld

like this with only five watts and

what

affects that

range

, then I'm going to talk about all the infrastructure that the ham radio community has . has been developed to extend that reach, such as repeaters, satellites and internet digital voice, eventually I'm going to set up and try to make a simplex contact that is radio to radio, see how far I can go and then make a contact using my local. repeater club I hope you find this interesting, let's start first, let me give you a specific answer.

The furthest I have talked to anyone from radio to radio using this Kenwood THD 74 and this diamond antenna is 64 miles. I was on top of a mountain and so were the people I was talking to, but 64 miles radius 2 radius, that's cool. I made a video of this contact. If you want to watch it, there is a link in the description of this video. I will focus on using portable transceivers like this one. Kenwood and my Bow Fang use FM voice modulation on the 2 meter band. Now in the US, the 2 meter band goes from 144 to 148 megahertz and you need some kind of licensed technician to use those frequencies, people who are really serious about long distance work. the 2 meter band, well, they will use higher power radios, they will use multi-element directional antennas, and they will use single sideband, which is a voice modulation that uses less bandwidth than FM, so it can reach further.

Let's talk about that today we are going to do portable FM. The most important factor in range with a radio like this is line of sight. Radio waves travel practically in a straight line until they pass the horizon and that's it. Your antenna has a clear path to the antenna of the person you want to talk to, that will be the most important factor in determining range. If there's a hill between you and your friend, you won't even be able to go a mile if there's a giant building or a bunch of trees which will also really limit the range you have with a radio like this, but if you're on a dry lake bed , now there is nothing blocking those radio signals and you will be able to receive dozens. of miles, the next most important factor in determining the range of a radio like this Kenwood is the antenna.

The original rubber duck antennas that come with many of today's two meter radios are fine at best, upgrading the antenna will make a difference. It won't extend the range if there's a mountain between you and your friend and it won't extend the range if you're in the middle of a bunch of buildings, but if you're on a dry lake bed, having a good antenna will certainly extend your range. range of several, perhaps even a dozen miles, a good 2 meter antenna will be mounted outside, high up and free of obstructions. Here is an economical solution for you.

If you are looking for one you can get one of these Meg mount antennas that are designed to go up to the top of your car and if you have metal flashing around your chimney or around your roof somewhere high you can just attach it there and make it work for you, just be careful how long you use the coax because with 2 Meter radio signals the longer the coaxial cable, the greater the power loss during transmission and if you don't have a roof metal or a shed roof, you can place it fine, just get a pie plate like this, place it in the middle.

You can place this on a 5-10 foot tree or so and use it, it works great. However, you need a metal base for these Magma antennas because it acts as a ground plane, this is how antennas work, the last factor in determining the range of a portable radio is powerful. People like to advertise that they're eight or 10 watts, but honestly the difference between five and eight or even five and 10 is a very small difference if you're on a dry lake bed, yeah, it might give you more power. and it will give you a couple of extra miles, but in most cases the line of sight and antenna you are using will play a much bigger role than the amount of power you are emitting.

There are some rare atmospheric conditions that can extend the range. of its transmission from 2 meters to hundreds or perhaps even over a thousand miles away the first is called sporadic II is called sporadic because it does not happen very often and e because it takes place in the e layer of the atmosphere

what

happens is a small amount of cloud sized gas becomes highly ionized and suddenly 2 meter radio signals will bounce back to earth from that cloud of ionized gas. It doesn't happen very often, but when it does, it can last a couple. minutes to a couple of hours and it's great because it will reflect those signals and you can go back hundreds of miles or even a thousand miles with your 2 meter signal.

It can happen any time of the year, but it is definitely most common from late June to July. In August, the other rare atmospheric condition that can extend the range of your communications by 2 meters is called tropospheric ducts or tropospheric ducts. It occurs in the troposphere, which is closer to the Earth and when it has different conditions, such as different masses, temperatures or humidity in the air masses. It can be created as a conduit where the 2 meter signal will simply pass through the conduit and go hundreds or even thousands of miles away again. This is quite rare, but occurs in late summer and fall more frequently than in other parts of the year with troposphere.

Conduit people can talk from California to Hawaii and have talked from the northeastern United States, like New York to Florida, now let's talk about all the infrastructure that radio amateurs around the world have built to expand the reach of communications by 2 meter radius and the first and most repeaters are common, repeaters are practically everywhere, you should almost always, at least in the continental US, be within range of a repeater, perhaps the device is somewhere pretty far away, but in most cases, in most places, you will be in range of at least one repeater. Repeaters do exactly what they sound like, they listen on one frequency for incoming signals and retransmit them on a different frequency.

You can now program these frequencies into your radio. It is quite easy to transmit on one frequency and receive on the other. so you can operate with these repeaters, repeaters tend to be in great locations on mountain tops, on buildings and on towers, it extends your range, so if you have line of sight to the repeater it will extend your range. Range With your typical repeater, your range can be dozens of miles. If you're on the other side of the repeater and you're talking to someone on the other side, you can talk dozens of miles, maybe even a hundred miles or more, depending on where you're talking and the location. repeater among you, repeaters are set up and maintained by individual radio amateurs or amateur radio clubs and should be free to use, although if you have a premises that you are going to use all the time, it is a great idea to go ahead and join that club or offer your help to the owner and operator of the repeater.

Okay, so I'm going to turn on the local repeater. I don't know how far it is. I think it's maybe nine or ten miles away, but I have no problem getting in. I'm just going to use my Kenwood THD 74 and this diamond antenna. I'm going to call and see if there's anyone who wants a quick chat. k4b BL Is there anyone around for a quick chat? That's the repeater indicating that it received my signal and is only transmitting its ID Hi Fred, yes your 592 this is Brian here how are you today okay Fred well I'll say 7/3.

I'm sure I'll catch you again soon with a repeater. This has been Brian k4 bbl of course. the last seven three repeaters of it may also require a subsonic meaning that you can hear in the tone to activate the repeater. These are often called PL tones. There are a couple different names for them, but they are also easy to program into your radio and are like an underlying. The low tone of your voice when the repeater answers and says: Oh, this person, this transmission must be repeated. Amateur radio operators don't just put repeaters on tall buildings and towers, they have actually sent repeaters into low Earth orbit, there are small cube satellites. which act just like repeaters on Earth, but now from low Earth orbit, because they operate at low power and because they are quite far away, you will probably want something like an arrow or build your own Yagi antenna to focus your energy from RF to make sure you can reach those repeaters in orbit.

What does this do to your reach? It will usually cover at least half the continent, but if you have the right equipment, the right setup and you coordinate with someone. The former club president actually made contact from Georgia in the southeastern United States to Alaska using a satellite. Now they had to coordinate this very carefully to find the correct satellite pass that went between them and for each one was right on the horizon, but they managed. completing a two meter contact using a satellite from opposite sides of the continent is really interesting because the typical pass of an amateur radio satellite lasts between two and 10 minutes, there is not much talk about these repeaters, the exchange usually happens very quickly of people call signs and grids and recognize each other's transmission and everything happens very quickly finally let's talk about digital voice on the Internet.

Radio amateurs have multiple platforms to digitize broadcasts or use the Internet to extend the reach of a radio like this Kenwood to basically anywhere. For the first time in the world, we will talk about Echo Link. Echo Link has software clients and mobile apps that allow you to connect to repeaters around the world and when you transmit using your phone or PC headset, your voice will come out on the repeater. just like you are standing right below with a portable radio like this and can make contacts all over the world, not all repeaters are connected by echo link but many are, you can also use your portable radio like this Kenwood or a Bow Fang to connect. to an echo link repeater, so if you have an echo link repeater in your neighborhood, you can jump to that repeater, you can send it some codes and you can link your repeater with a repeater on the other side of the country or in the other. side of the world and your voice will appear on both your local repeater and that distant repeater you linked.

I have a video where I did this. I'll put a link in the description and you can see how I use it. echo link and a

handheld

to talk to people on the other side of the country, next let's talk about digital voice. Unfortunately, radio amateurs haven't figured out which format they want to use, so there are three main digital vocoders: d-star, DMR, and System fusion. this Kenwood THD 74 has d-star built in what it does is instead of modulating your voice using FM it modulates it digitally now you can use digital voice radio - simplex radio if you and your friend have Addy Star or DMR radio you can talk . using digital voice modulation radio - radio there are also some digital repeaters which will have D star or DMR or both and you can use that repeater with digital voice, it sounds better and finally you can have a small repeater in your house which will be directly connected to the internet for allow you to use digital voice Internet functionality.

All three major digital voice platforms connect to the Internet and you can use that connection to date specific Peter's anywhere in the world or join virtual chat rooms if you'll see our server-based chat rooms, where you know you'll join several people, it's like an amateur conference call, where several people will join and you will be able to talk to people from all over and there will be local conferences, state level conferences, national and world level conferences. you can join 24 hours a day and these digital voice systems, especially the conference ones, tend to be more chat-oriented, people talk about their lives there, whether it's what they're doing, you know that day, for which is talked about a lot about digital voice, but I think it's great, it gives technical class license holders a way to talk to people, they use their ham radios to talk to people on the other side of the planet and it also allows Radio hams who are stuck in homeowners associations, condos or apartments a way to talk to long distance contacts. without having to set up an HF station, a lot of people will say yes, it's like Skype or whatever, actually no, yes, it's the same technology, it's voice over IP, but you have to be licensed and a lot of the conversations revolve around around amateur radio. make a radio to radio contact simplex.

I moved to a different location, a little higher up, a little further from a building, and instead of a rubber duck antenna,I'm using these roll-up Jay Pole, some people call them Slim Jims. about a meter long and I have it hanging from a tree kilo four bravo Bravo Lima k4 bbl calling CQ CQ CQ in 146 - five - simplex k4 bbl calling CQ CQ CQ from Milton Georgia I'm also going to turn off the silencer in case let a low signal arrive if the signal is not strong enough to break the squelch, I still want to be able to hear it CQ CQ CQ k4 bbl kilo 4 bravo Bravo Lima from Milton Georgia at 146 52 I didn't make contact but that's okay, usually , a simple contact that would be a couple of miles to maybe 10 depending on where they were, if you catch someone who is on top of a mountain it can be a lot more, but just normal people driving around in their cars, you could get a couple of miles.

The best thing is that, that's the video we made, the three things we talked about about the range you can get with a portable ham radio and what affects that range. We talked about all the different infrastructure that amateur radio operators have developed to extend that range and I made contact with at least one club member with a repeater. No luck with simplex, but that's okay, I still tried again another time. I hope you enjoyed the video if you left. Like it, leave a comment, share it with maybe other radio amateurs. You know, I'd appreciate it.

This is k4 BB l7 three unclear.