> I want to want Ham radio. But for normal people, it's just too complex.

To plagarize a phrase: "if you are smarter than a 6 year old", you can get your amateur radio license.

Here are some six year olds (and one 5-yr old) who did so:

5 Year old girl, 1991
https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-07-21-hl-502-story.html

6 Year old girl, 2002
https://www.deseret.com/2002/4/4/19647162/utah-girl-talks-her-way-to-ham-radio-license

6 Year old girl, 2003 - made first and second level (Technician, General ham licences, as a 7-yr old, she made Extra (highest level)
https://web.archive.org/web/20030211011541/http://www.arrl.org/news/stories/2003/01/31/4/
https://www.eham.net/article/7566

6 yr old boy (K2CLH) (2nd level when he as a 7-yr old)
https://forums.qrz.com/index.php?threads/youngest-ham.324518/

Admittedly, in my case, I was a lot older (and had a Ph.D in Engineering ),
when I got my Technician (lowest level, no Morse Code) license,
and have not progressed beyond that.

But really, a Ph.D. in Engineering is not a requirement for an Amateur radio license.

Passing the current license test requires only rote memorization to a list of questions,
and both the questions and the answers are provided for your study.

There are lots of websites and apps that will drill
you on the questions, too - flashcard style.

Kids at that age are information sponges. They learn quick and easy. You just need to spark interest.
With that out of the way, it´s really not that hard to get an entry level license. The range of complexity is huge. You can go with a simple hand held tranceiver or all the way up to developing your own transceiver with a spectrum in between. Everyone can find the level that suites the own interest.
Apart from that the ham community has great people who like to help. The social contacts alone are worth the effort. It got me an invitation on board of a mine sweeper boat. Those hams also man a ham station dedicated to a vintage U boat (the U boat is driven by hand cranks and on exhibition in a museum).

Thanks for the video Blast. I studied the hamexam.org technician practice tests for a few weeks and passed the real test this last weekend. I'm now KO4PHQ. If anyone is on the fence about this the FCC is about to start charging $ for the license, right now it's still free and at most $15 to take the test.

Welcome to the hobby RayW!


73 de chaosmagnet

No, but I am looking into VHF for the boat and hand held ham units ( Baofeng)

Congratulations! I really find it's a useful way of gathering local intelligence.
-Blast

I like Baofeng radios enough to now have four of them. The Baofeng UV-5R is a great radio to accessorize and experiment with. The Radioddity versions are perhaps a step up (barely) in quality but they have fewer accessories available.
My two cents,
-Blast

I have two ham radio handhelds: a Baofeng UV-5R (about $25) and a Yaesu FT-60R (about $150)

While the Baofeng is cheap, that's about the only thing it has going for it. It would probably make for a reasonable communications device for very short range simplex work. Or it would probably work if you have unobstructed line of sight to a close repeater.

In my case, my club's repeaters are 18 miles from my house. The Baofeng cannot hear them or trigger them, even when hooked up to a nice outdoor J-Pole antenna. The Yaesu can easily converse both ways with great signal reports using only a small whip antenna. Also, the Baofeng's audio output is very low - I have to leave mine on full volume and even then it's very hard to hear anything, even in a quiet environment. Not so with the Yaesu.

The Baofeng's do have their place though. Because of their price, they make good "just in case I ever need one" radios, as long as you remember their limitations. You may not get far (range-wise) on a Baofeng compared to other higher end radios. A lot of this may have to do with quality of manufacture. If you buy a second identical Baofeng, it's performance may be quite different than your first Baofeng. I'm assuming that my particular Baofeng was plucked off the bottom of the quality stack of radios built by new trainee employees on a Friday before a 3 day holiday weekend, after a beer drinking lunch.