Amateur radio on a C-Dory 22 Cruiser

[al and judy]

I am considering obtaining an amateur radio license for the purpose of having another source of communication while towing on the road and underway. Most use would be lakes, inland waters and an occasional coastal cruise (San Diego to Mexico). What would be the biggest bang for the buck to meet all these req's

[edwardf]

I'm not quite clear on your question. Do you mean the best ham radio to buy?

Ed KD7QL

[ORCA]

Hi

I think a good used Kenwood TS-50s or an ICOM IC-706 is the best for the buck.
100 watt is all you need anyway...
The unit is very nice and small, and as good as the newer units...
Maybe a extra DSP Filter would be a good idea..

Regards Chris

[journey on]

Let's see, you need an amateur radio license to operate one of those things, which I assume everyone knows. My question, however, is have they or when are they going to get rid of the code requirement?

Boris

[thataway]

No more code. I have the 7000 Icom--but the 706 does the same things--just a few more filters on the newer radios.

I like the Ham Sticks--they hold up well to the marine environment--used them for many years at sea. The Hustlers have pot metal in the bottom and top of the coil--it corrodes badly. You can use an extension, you can use a 2 or 3 way splitter--I ran 4 antennas on one extension--works fine.
If you tune the Ham sticks for the part of the band you are working, you don't really need a tuner. I have an auto tuner for the 7000. I also have a small manual tuner.

I mount the antenna on the hand rail of the cabin top, aft --as far back from the VHF antennas as possiable--I put the 2 meter/440 antenna on one side the HF on the other side.

Gound: I haven't finished mine yet. The radio is on the shelf. The ground will go from the radio to the tuner to the inner bolt on the railing. I will take another piece of the 3" wide foil from the aft hand rail to the railing along the cockpit aft (on the Tom Cat), and then under the deck to the railing around the cockpit to the Armstrong bracket. For the C D 22, most folks I know of are running the foil to the engine bolt and using the engine leg in the water as ground. I would not use a gas fuel tank as ground plane. I have not had good luck with braid--and stopped using it 30 years ago--too much RF.

I would not use a ground plate--but you could just take a strap to a plate in the water when you are anchored. You will have a hard time getting enough surface area ground without some water connection....I guess you could put copper screen over the interior of the cabin top--or the V berth--but that seems like more work than running the foil.

Interested to see what others have done for ground.

[journey on]

Hold on, Bob. You're right that there's no more code requirement, and I didn't know when that happened.

So, as of Feb 23, 2007, all of us who had No-Code Tech licenses, have been upgraded to "Tech Plus." Also we can upgrade to General by taking the Element 3 written exam, and Amateur Extra by taking Element 4. I understand the theory, but I could never get enough interest to do code. These exams are available on-line (for a small cost.)

Liberty at last, and we don't have to finesse things. Gordon West is gonna lose a lot of business.

Boris

[edwardf]

al and judy,

Lets slow down a bit here. The last I heard, the technician license doesn't grant you "voice" privileges on what is known as "HF" or high frequency bands below 30 mhz. You would have voice privileges only on VHF and UHF (Very and Ultra) high frequencies, above 30 mhz, as a tech.

The Icom 706 is an "all band" radio (HF/VHF/UHF) and it costs close to a thousand bucks. You couldn't use the HF capability to communicate with others by voice.

You'd be using short range VHF, FM, typically 2 meter, communication on inland lakes and rivers (and while towing on the highway). The range would be extended using land based repeaters. Your VHF marine radio is very close in frequency to the 2 meter ham radios by the way.

Off shore ocean voyages would use HF SSB (Single Side Band) radios for long distance boat to land calls. The technician license would not allow this privilege.

I vote for an inexpensive 2 meter rig (maybe a handheld). In addition a marine grade antenna may be useful to reach repeaters when on those lakes and rivers but not necessary boat to boat. Another nice thing is these 2 meter radios will scan both the ham and marine bands (transmit on ham only).

The "grounding" and "tuning" issues get quite complex and are not a problem with the 2 meter radio and a tuned antenna. A good non-reactive ground below 30 mhz on a boat is a whole other issue!

Ed
KD7QL

[K7MXE]

Your local radio club in Anchorage will be able to set you up with
ham radio classes for getting your first "ticket". Normal entry
level license is the Technician. It does have some below 30mhz
bandwidth. Voice operation is in the 28.3 to 28.5 band plus
several morse code bands. This is addition to the six and two
meter bands most Technicians put to use. There are others as well.
ARRL, the American Radio Relay League has a website with more
information and sells study guides. Fairly easy these days to
get into Amateur Radio with the code requirement being dropped.
For those in the Northwest area interested, several clubs offer
radio classes including the Radio Club of Tacoma and information
can be found at w7dk.org.

Good Sailing Bob Heselberg, Eatonville Wa

[journey on]

The Report and Order in WT Docket 05-235:

All Technician licensees -- whether or not they have passed a Morse code examination -- will have "Tech Plus" operating privileges:

All of your current VHF/UHF and above frequencies and also will have access to the Novice/Technician Plus frequencies on HF.

These include:
3525-3600 kHz CW only
7025-7125 kHz CW only
21,025-21,200 kHz CW only
28,000-28,300 kHz CW, RTTY and Data
28,300-28,500 kHz CW, SSB
The power limit is 200 W PEP output for Technician operators.

Boris

[thataway]

Although 2 meter will have a extraordinary range when there are linked repeaters--there are many remote areas--including Lake Powell, the Yukon, parts of the Inland Passage, most of Mexico, the Bahamas etc, where you need ham SSB. I can say that running the East Coast ICW--there are 2 meter (and 440) repeaters with good coverage. But the time you cannot get 2 meter may be when you need help--and there are plenty of ham nets to get you that help. There are also a number of boating specific nets--4 at least for Baja and Sea of Cortez, at least one Central America. Several for West Coast, and Pacific Boater's Net (Port Ludlow YC) for Washington and BC--one up to Alaska Boating nets. If you want to communicate with the other C Dories that are cruising Alaska, the best bet is to get on an Alaskian boaters net with SSB.

So you get the general license--all of the questions are on the internet--you just have to learn them--but I really recommend a junior college course in ham radio and really learn the fundimentals, rather than learning to a quiz.

The ground as I noted is the most difficult issue--but certainly not at all impossiable. I have rigged a number of both power and sailboats, which have world wide communications with marine SSB.