Ham radio?

[crumpet19]

I am completely ignorant in the field of ham radio.. but the concept intrigues me. Anyone know anything about it?
licensing required? equipment needed? cost? difficulty?

know of any good websites for someone who knows nothing about it?

 

[wnied]

Look here

~wnied~

 

[KC5AV]

A good place to start is at ARRL. It is the website of the American Radio Relay League. They are the ones who represent hams. You can find just about anything you need to there. If you have an specific question, PM me. I'll be more than happy to help.

A good place to look on that site for specifics about licensing requirement is licensing. It isn't very difficult to get started. I've been doing if for about 5 1/2 years now, and it's a lot of fun. As far as expense, it's just a matter of how much you want to spend.

 

[SuperSix]

An extremely slow, useless form of an Internet chatroom.. Kinda cool collecting cards from various locations, but a LOT to invest to just make a few long-distance contacts.

 

[OZEE]

It's a great hobby. And I've learned way more about geography from ham radio than I ever learned in school!

I've been licensed since about '84. Licensing IS required - the hardest part will be learning the morse code well enough to pass a 5-word per minute test, which is quite doable.

Beyond that -- equipment??? You can spend as much or as little as you want. I know people who literally have 10's of thousands of dollars wrapped up in equipment. I've got hundreds of dollars in it. It just depends on what you want to do and how many $$ you want to spend.

KC5AV has already listed the best site about ham radio in the US. wnied has listed the second best site

Good luck

OZEE (Amateur Radio license AB0ND)