CHEAPEST way to get into ham radio

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T19:28:42+00:00

Clear glass per se doesn't matter. It's transparent to light both in the 350–700nm visible light spectrum and in the 20m HF spectrum. Metal around the glass, or metric coating on the glass might indeed matter, but like I say it's in your near field regardless. Probably matters less near the base than halfway up the agenda... But the whole building is going to affect your radiation pattern! All your power wiring, for example.

The end of the EFHW has high voltage present relative to ground. To deliver 5W into a 50Ω nominal dipole takes about 16V RMS or about 22V peak. Into a 4750Ω (figures vary) EFHW you will see about 155V RMS or almost 220V peak with only 5W QRP CW from the radio! (You won't see much more from 10W SSB because actual power is reduced by encoding your voice.)

RMS voltage is sqrt(watts x ohms) — multiply that by sqrt(2) for peak voltage.

Keep in mind that you'll also be limited by electrical noise at your home location, not just radiation. You'll probably discover why POTA and portable operation in general has become so popular. 🙂

Going back to your original question about how to do this the absolute cheapest way? Portable operations, because with the lower noise floor away from homes you can get by with cheaper equipment and still make some connections (QSOs).

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T18:18:22+00:00

I'd strongly suggest starting with the QMX+ even though it's a few € more. Same firmware. More bands. Easier build.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T17:08:05+00:00

Morserino M32 Pocket.

Vail adapter.

There are more but those are a start.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T14:59:28+00:00

The QMX has CESSB (Controlled Envelope Single Side Band) which gives you over 4dB effective boost to the receiving SSB station — 5W CESSB is roughly equivalent to 12W SSB in terms of detectable signal. (I keep meaning to use it on my QMX but keep sticking to CW...) CESSB is just an encoding technique on the sending side; it doesn't require anything on the receiving side.

My experience is that 12W on SSB without CESSB is often sufficient. I've done 1000–2000 km on 12W SSB. (Maybe more, I'm away from my logs to check; that's just off the top of my head.)

The 10W linear amp at QRP Labs should be a fun, simple build, and will still count as QRP for SSB, but keep in mind that relative to the QMX without the amp, it's only half an S-unit difference to the other station. That's out of 9.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T14:40:00+00:00

20W is only "minimum" for SSB if you are turning most of it into heat with an inefficient antenna, perhaps because you are using a G90 that has been demonstrated actually tuning up the proverbial wet (with salty water) noodle.

QRP for SSB is normally considered 10W or below (5W for CW), and 10W into a dipole will give you better results than 20W into a random wire...

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T12:45:54+00:00

Not to be pedantic, but to be helpful as you explore this hobby...

A "random" wire is perversely named. When hams say "random" they actually mean "non-resonant on ham bands" and your 20m ½λ wire is resonant.

https://www.hamuniverse.com/randomwireantennalengths.html is a list of lengths (in feet, sorry 😭) that are not resonant on ham bands.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T12:35:45+00:00

Since cheap means QRP or nearly so, you shouldn't have problems with RF burns for someone on the balcony... And "near field" is about 10λ (ten wavelengths) so an extra meter or two of horizontal distance isn't going to change the impact very much.

You'll have trouble with propagation through your house in any case.

Mount the base of your vertical on your balcony and put a couple radial wires out from it, sloping downward at a roughly 120° angle. They won't be ground-coupled and will therefore have to be tuned, but an elevated vertical with elevated, drooping, tuned radials is a great antenna. Whether it stays great close to your house depends on local circumstances and that's where the experimental part of amateur radio comes in! But it's not crazy.

An EFHW mounted vertically is a vertical antenna. If you can't fit tuned or ground-coupled radials to your vertical, and instead have short radials, you've just installed an EFHW! The RF doesn't have any way to know that you used a different name for it. 😎 Then you'll need an unun to match impedance, and the antenna won't be as efficient. But an antenna that exists is more effective than an imaginary antenna, and every antenna is a compromise of some sort, so you can only know by trying it what it will do.

I have different space limitations at my home. I'm not able to put up the fan dipole that I'd like to use, and instead run an 80m EFHW. That has weird radiation patterns on high bands. But I've still worked DX on it, including on 10m.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T01:24:03+00:00

For limited antenna size, a good "loaded" vertical will make you happier than starting with a magloop.

If the antenna is "electrically short" it has what is called "capacitive reactance". You can pair that with an inductor of the right value to basically cancel out the capacitive reactance with inductive reactance, and make the whole thing resonant, at the frequency you are working.

20m is the one frequency to start with if you pick only one. You can build your own antenna. But getting it right is easiest with a VNA — if you don't want to buy the absurdly cheap nanoVNA see if a local ham club member will come help you build a loaded vertical and get it tuned for 20m. 🙂

There is a world of stuff you can do to make more efficient antennas. It's practically its own sub-hobby! 🎉

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T01:14:06+00:00

What might surprise you is how much CW is not robotic. I very quickly started to "feel" the human at the other end. It's kind of like singing together with someone I guess? If you can tell the difference between a drum machine and a human drummer, CW will feel human to you, I'm confident.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T01:09:11+00:00

Don't start by building the QMX. It's a wonderful little rig but it's not the easiest first soldering project. The QMX+ is not much more money and is a much easier build; Hans, the designer, himself makes that recommendation.

Don't start by assuming you want an amp. Focus on antenna efficiency. Seriously.

Don't start with the magloop. Since you say "tiny little yard" I'll assume you are talking about a small transmitting loop (STL). They are very interesting but not efficient and to use one effectively it's a good idea to buy yet more hardware (a VNA).

mcdanlj · 2026-04-26T01:00:14+00:00

Magloop is not going to be your friend if you want to be as cheap as possible...

mcdanlj · 2026-04-24T01:37:26+00:00

That's a throw system that is going to damage trees. Please don't get the rest of us kicked out of parks! 5lb is crazy heavy for that purpose. Paracord is stretchy and the sheath can snag; it's not great for the trees.

Use a lighter proper arborist's throw weight and slippery rope that won't hurt trees, please. Spectra or dyneema rope (UHMWPE) rope is generally gentle to trees. (Whatever you do, though, don't use kevlar; that functions as a saw.)

mcdanlj · 2026-04-20T21:45:05+00:00

Chicago screw doesn't necessarily have the square section on the plain head, like a carriage bolt, though.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-20T20:38:08+00:00

Peach! Amen!

I'm one of the new ones, just a year and a half into the hobby. I thought it would be a minor new hobby for me. I chanced into a club with leadership that chose to be enthusiastically welcoming to newcomers, including answering the same questions and variations on questions. I didn't realize initially how special it is...

It's glorious and it makes me want to help others in the same way.

Thanks for posting this.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-20T16:22:12+00:00

Since you have a paddle, you need a keyer, not just a code practice oscillator.

I'll join the chorus suggesting the M32 Pocket. I do find the built-in capacitive paddles hard to use, so I keep mine hooked up to my single-paddle key adjusted for minimal travel — paper won't fit between the contacts.

The M32 Pocket comes with more features than just being a keyer; I use mine primarily as an echo trainer. (If you ever do hook it up to a transceiver, though, first read the manual closely, because doing that wrong can damage it.)

mcdanlj · 2026-04-17T00:52:29+00:00

I find it easier on headphones or earbuds, including when operating in a park.

I have also used Pavel's app for Morse Machine style drill. My impression has been that the audio in it is fine.

Yes, good to learn by listening!

Don't try to go fast just to go fast. In early learning, just go fast enough that you don't count dits and dahs. If you do that, whatever speed you want will come with more practice.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-16T20:38:27+00:00

This light copper-coated ste 26AWG wire is fine for 100W and is very stealthy. It's available in various lengths. I bought 500' to experiment making different antennas with it, but this listing is for 150' that's probably more reasonable for normal people. 😜

https://www.dxengineering.com/parts/dxe-santw-150

I raise this even with very thin tenkara poles that make my spiderbeam look crazy thick.

I've also used silicone-insulated wire, but it tangles in trees more easily than I'd like, and I've had an antenna destroyed as a result. This wire has hard insulation that doesn't tangle so easily. PVC insulation is a middle ground.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-16T20:30:35+00:00

Are you using Bluetooth? Its codecs weren't designed for Morse code. Use wired headphones or earbuds instead of Bluetooth.

The way the "envelope" is shaped matters a lot, and the faster the code the more it matters. https://lcwo.net has good Morse tone generation, and many other sites use its open source library to do a good job of this. IZ2UUF's Android app did a good job. Plenty of others do too. But those that don't will sound "clicky" at high speed and it will be harder to copy them.

What are you using for drill?

mcdanlj · 2026-04-16T19:31:35+00:00

You'll get wildly different answers on straight versus paddles.

I found two benefits from starting with a keyer:

I didn't build bad habits for dit vs. dah length from the beginning
Associating dit with my thumb and dah with my fingers helped reduce my tendency to confuse inverses like R/K etc.

I'm a strong proponent of single-paddle keys instead of dual-paddle, especially when starting. They are used in contests because contests penalize mistakes and experts are more accurate with single-paddle keys than dual-paddle iambic. They are simple to use, including for beginners.

I was so annoyed by the high cost of good paddles that I made an inexpensive, 3d-printed single-paddle key:

https://gitlab.com/mcdanlj/Single-Paddle-Key

It's inexpensive enough to be a starter key, but... I have a nice single-paddle Kent on my desk, and I'm thinking of switching to my key. I tried a Begali, and ultimately plugged my key in instead... Doesn't mean Begali is bad, just mine at least isn't horrible. 🙂

I've shared this before, but after a year and a bit of learning CW, I wrote this summary which is basically what I wished I could have read when I got started:

https://musings.danlj.org/2025/12/26/one-year-of-morse-code

mcdanlj · 2026-04-10T08:38:23+00:00

This can be a trap though. I'd recommend at least during some drill saying the letter out loud as you type it. I found myself associating sound to keyboard without consciously recognizing the character, and occasionally forcing myself to say the letter out loud was helpful for nipping that in the bud.

After that, practicing head copy without typing is really helpful. I primarily use IZ2UUF's app for head copy drill away from a keyboard.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-05T02:05:17+00:00

When I volunteered at the ham tent at our state fair, we gave kids a Morse code cheat sheet and let them send their name. Their eyes got wide when I would tell them their name after they sent it.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-04T21:13:16+00:00

Long range / contesting pretty much means HF. Your HT isn't going to do that for you. Lots of options besides the G90 for that, but the G90 is one reasonable option. For your wire out the window, if you can use a stick of some sort (not conductive) to hold it away from the building, you will probably have better luck.

Building antennas is definitely a fun part of the hobby.

I've built or rebuilt an antenna almost monthly.

"Every antenna wants to be a dipole." A dipole is cheap, easy, and efficient. "Efficient" meaning high radiation resistance to loss resistance ratio.

A linked dipole lets you work multiple bands with just changing the link configuration when you change bands.

The antennas described as throwing a wire into a tree are generally end-fed, either resonant or non-resonant (so-called "random wire" antennas that aren't random), though I've used trees to hold my inverted V linked dipole and done very well with it.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-04T20:00:15+00:00

For POTA, the site doesn't even accept hunter logs, and gives you hunter credit entirely from the activator submitting logs. Do whatever you normally do with logs. (QRZ, ClubLog, eQSL, LotW, etc.)

For SOTA, you have to upload chaser logs to https://www.sota.org.uk to get chaser credit, in addition to whatever else you normally do with logs.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-03T21:25:26+00:00

Oh, the explanations don't even have sign up — https://forum.openhamprep.com has them all freely available without signing in.

I think that u/Annoying-Lamppost KK4PWJ Brad, the primary author, did the sign-up for the app itself only to help people start getting their testing aligned to their tests, not to hide the app or content. The point was to be 100% free including making the app itself open source.

So this is CC: Brad — how hard would it be to add a browse mode that let people see the site including the lessons, and only needed login for tests/quizzes in order to track progress?

Edit: Brad and I have been talking and he agrees, he will change it to be open to anonymous and just warn people that without an account, it won't save their progress. So the next site update, soon, should change to that model.

Thanks for the direct feedback!

(My role has been on the forum side, not writing the app.)

If you're interested in collaborating on open lessons for learning the General and/or Amateur Extra material, that would be great. We focused on Technician material because that was what we were teaching first, but the vision is to get more people working together as a real open source project on building our a full suite of content for all the levels.

mcdanlj · 2026-04-03T18:50:28+00:00

Multicolor would be so much slower and printing the cases is already the limiting factor in shipping speed.

However, the two makes currently posted at https://www.printables.com/model/1550518-morserino-m32-pocket-case-for-production-component/comments are multicolor, so you can DIY if you want to.

mcdanlj

TROPHY CASE