Live Show - What we think is in store for Ham Radio in 2025?

We always appreciate uh folks jumping in and just uh hanging out with us during our live streams and and so , uh , you know , appreciate you , I had nothing to do tonight .

I know it's a Monday night , so little people are a little slow on the wheel there to realize that they're live streams out there . It's a short week though it's a short week . Yeah , it is , but you figure everybody's on vacation at this point . If you're not already getting into vacation , so yeah , maybe hey whatever it's Monday , yeah , true .

You know , paul , how , how is your , uh , monday morning or monday afternoon or whatever day of the week you might think it is going ?

Then we got a major project when she leaves in the spring and I'm like all of a sudden I had to leaves in the spring and I'm like all of a sudden I had to go back to work . I'm like , wait a minute , I was supposed to have like four to five hours at the very least . Just give me three , just give me , just give me two .

Let me just go to my closest park to my house and let me just bang out , you know , 30 , 40 , whatever . And I and it feels weird , it really , really feels weird .

And when paul just said a few moments ago about a project , so I took my fit , my ft 891 I was running it in a backpack bought a 50 caliber or a plastic ammo can that the top comes off and I threw the 891 inside there , did a quick drill here , heavy duty Velcro , this Velcro that Drilled the holes for the SO239 port Power poles , port .

I did it and then I started looking at it and it works . Don't get me wrong . A beggar is not going to complain . But you know what happens when it comes to us in projects .

I said , let me go get the separation kit and now maybe I'll either use the same can or go to a different carrying thing , but use the set , use the separation head , because I want to do something kind of kind of see where this is going . You see , it went down a whole rabbit hole .

But once again there's not enough time in the week and it gets frustrating . And like I was telling the guys the other night , I was telling a tank , I was on tank show here and I said , man , I gotta just retire . This is just getting to be ridiculous .

I should have been born independently wealthy or I should have had some kind of estate money coming in or or a lotto ticket . Because this is a rich family . A rich family , because if somebody wants to adopt me , I you know , hey , listen , I'll , you know . But I want to play radio and it's getting involved . This the w thing . Work just gets involved .

The family stuff will always be there . We all know that , let's not kid ourselves , but it's the work thing that , hey . But you need it though , because if you don't do it , you can't find your hobby right , wow , I got a counter a countdown timer to December 1st 2031 .

Really , yes , so if I could buy five years back , that would make me two more years to go , so well , I was hoping you guys ever hear the term the golden handshake yeah , I've heard golden parachutes , but yeah , the golden .

People just drove because they met the criteria and they're like , hey , I'm going to get up every morning and just water the grass and feed the birds , or I'm going to go get another chapter two and go do something else , whatever it is , I'm going to go get another chapter two and go do something else . What , whatever it is .

Um matter of fact , over dinner tonight we were just saying you know , it would be nice to keep this house , buy something in New Hampshire and bounce back and forth . That would be the ultimate goal that I would like for and to come up to New Hampshire is . There's a lot of benefits that I see .

That's all . That's all I really need . I really don't need a lot . I'm not asking for a lot you know , but you could .

It's not like you just run down and get it , but it's getting more populated up there so there are more things like walmart's and stuff like I think when I went up there there was only an ames like that was it ?

If you want to deal with this , like if you want to go do a trip to Boston , you know you had to plan it out and you're probably staying over and you don't have to be bothered by it .

And if you want to deal with this like if you wanted to go do a trip to Boston , you know you had to plan it out and you're probably staying over and it wasn't like you can just like for us , like if we want to hit the box , go to Boston , we just hop in the car and go there .

You got to like plan it out or trips like to the airport , you know .

Okay , but because I've lived here all my life , I know all the ins and the outs . I know the exorbitant rich areas that just don't appeal to me . They just don't appeal to me and I stay away . You don't want to live in Greenwich ?

No , there really are some nice people down there , but they get overshadowed by the please pass the Grey Poupon and all the Poupon mustard and all this other stuff . That's just not me . I don't play polo . I don't play polo , I don't do rugby . I just want to sit and have a good cigar and I want to play radio . Leave me alone .

You know in my mansion , you know what I mean . But I like where I live in Connecticut . But there are pockets . There are pockets of connecticut a lot of people don't even know . Yes , the government , I don't like the government rules and some in taxes are things .

But as far as the actual living , the your , your media environment , there's some really nice areas that you can really be close , but not close . And I'm sure all the other states have these things . You know all 49 states have the same thing that I am discussing . It's just you just got to find it . Find your peace , find your happiness .

And the property tax varies depending on your town , and so there are some towns that have really low property tax rates , and then there are other towns , like mine , they're not so much , so yep , that bill hurt man , I don't want to tell you let me tell you something .

Where , in my same town , just north of there of there , there's this imaginary line that they have you automatically , are zoned at two and a half acres and your taxes are automatically cheaper . It's just how it is . But you know what I do , paul , and I've done this in New Hampshire , vermont and parts of Maine .

I'll go to the individual town's websites and I'll read their minutes to see what they're talking about . And you know something the scuttlebutt is the same as it is in my town . It's oh , my god , we need a new plow truck , but we don't have the money . We want to pave some roads .

We're going to do it this year , or should we kick the can a few more years because we don't have them ? Oh , we got covid money , let's pay for here it is . It is amazing . Who needs a new fire truck to a police car ? So a street switch , whatever ?

It's funny , and so really is the grass greener , maybe a little bit a different shade , that's all it is depending on if you like it .

Man , you know , in essence we'll , we'll show you the town , for sure any one of us will happily , uh , grab our radios and , you know , head to the mountains or head to the coast and play some poda , for sure , thanks . But you , you should do .

You actually do poda when you had the day off , because I know we were trying to coordinate on discord a while back and I was like trying to see if I could get down there to the day , but nothing ever materialized . Did you end up going out and doing activation ?

And now , with the time change , when I get out of work , at 4 o'clock Eastern , by 4.15 , 4.30 , at four o'clock Eastern , by four , 15 , four 30 , it's pitch black and some parks I can go to , it's not a problem , it's just a safety issue . It's just a safety issue of where do I want to be . And you know it just gets a little bit different now .

I know how to work radios , I go , no problem .

has even made it even easier for me for logging podicon . But it's just amazing . Uh , todd , I think our hobby , if you're into nts , if you're into any type of um , again multitasking , I think any job outside of our hobby that has the multitasking , all of a sudden , man , you fit , you fit , it just goes .

And he says , yeah , he goes well in our town it's like you're going to get real busy for a period of time and then it's going to be dead and you got to stay like awake and and be ready for it to pick up again . So I said I said , well , listen .

I said I'll go take a course whatever you need me to do , but if you need me to start picking up a shift here and there or come in or at least get me trained , if someone doesn't come up , just call me . I said I'd love to do it , just for some extra money .

And you know , who knows , maybe it'll be like my uh , my retirement gig well and heck , it's , it's , it's total content material .

But I'll tell you , the multitasking aspect of it is fantastic because , yes , 100% , you learn to do a whole lot all at once .

But the stress of having you know somebody on the phone who's in distress and you're trying to coordinate and get the information from them that you need to relay on , and you get , you know , police rolling and a fire ambulance rolling all at , you know , fast time , you'll , you'll .

You'll find that sometimes , no matter how fast you are , no matter how good you are , they just don't get there in time and you and you lose a person and that kind of stuff .

So it's because it's no longer recording us . Okay , just because it goes off , hook the recorder . Still we have to wait 20 seconds . And same thing with the microphone . When we key up , although that's instantaneously , we vent . Oh , we'll say that , we'll say , and people will be like , how can you say that ?

Well , I'll tell you what you do , my job for about a year or so . And all of a sudden you start to vent at your friends in the field . You call them four-letter words , you call them nice words , you call them that , then two seconds . It's just amazing . And they know it and they do it too . They're doing it .

They're doing the same thing to us in the field as what we're doing to them . And I feel that's that's one with the venting . Number two my hobby , my hobby of ham radio , is a true natural balance release .

And when people , and when I'm in poda parks and people say to me , oh my god , you know what do you do for a living and I'll tell them just briefly well , why do you want to play radio on your day off or whatever ? It's a whole different type of radio and this is fun stuff .

This is fun to chase the guy , whether he's in Maine , to Morocco , to anywhere , and just make a contact , whether it's for what ? 10 seconds through poda , yeah , or a rag chew . It's such a balance . It's a balance , yeah , plus a good old cigar helps too .

He used to be our prosecutor , um in the town , so I've known him for years and uh , yeah , he was just venting to me saying that he was , uh , you know he was having a hard time finding dispatchers because they were , they were like kind of as needed and then they would decide not to show up and then he'd be like you know , he'd have one of his patrol

guys down there until he could find . And I said I said dude , I said get me involved . I said I live down the road , I go , you get short , I'll come down there and you know cover you or you know pick up a shift here and there . So he's looking into it . He'll see how it goes , but at least he knows it's available . I threw it out there .

Excellent , very cool .

But we can't call them an idiot because that's our job . We can't say it .

So I can always I don't always remember and thank god , like yesterday we were recording a one of the shows and he's like oh , don't remember , don't forget . Tomorrow we have a live stream , like we do for what we know you . We know you well , buddy it's a guarantee , so they're like my backup . So I'm like , oh shit , I gotta work tomorrow night .

Uh , oh yeah , what time is it ? He's like eight . I'm like , oh yeah , that's no problem , I'll be out of there by 6 30 . So I came home , grabbed a quick bite to eat and got on the air or got on this , so it's all good there , man , yeah as well . But you know , yeah , so today was no big deal . It was , uh , I got a lot of .

I had a court tomorrow , so I had to prepare for that . And uh , yeah , that was about it had this dumb training that I didn't need to go to .

week . We'll pick it up regularly .

I'm like , all right , poda's happening , I'm doing it . No , well , wednesday hasn't come yet . But then they say , oh , by the way , uh , dan will be , dan is the administrator , will be in the office on wednesday . I'm like , are you freaking , kidding me ? Like it's like me and like one other person I go and he's coming for the whole day .

Like , how am I gonna sneak out and do my poda activation ? Uh , you're not . I might , I might have a , I might have to do a home visit and there's no school . So I can't use the excuse . Like , oh , I gotta go to the schools because they're all out .

I think they said tomorrow afternoon they'll have a better idea what's going on , but they've been talking about this for like the last . There's a guy on social media he does like northeast weather and he's been predicting this for like two weeks now and like the first map he saw it was like 19 to 20 inches . I'm like what ?

Call in , even if you use your iPhone at Face facetime and say look , oh my god , it's freaking bad out here at my house .

So he was , he was in a zoom meeting , but that was like his background without him being there . So it looked like he was in there and he'd be moving and talking . And and then , like one minute , like the boss is like hey , eric , uh , what's going on ?

And then he pops back in and then you see him , instead of what he was wearing before , he's wearing like a different shirt . She goes did you just change shirts ? Like what's going on ? He goes oh , I got back . It was pretty , it was pretty ingenious . So , like he , he probably had like good three weeks . I just not be .

If you want us to run through that x , that that little section , if not , uh , we'll uh put a pin in it and hold off for , uh , you know , a regular show or next live stream . But with that , we've got some really cool , exciting stuff that I kind of want to get out of the way because we've been teasing it for a little bit .

But , uh , before we actually get into some of the hardcore stuff we're going to talk about tonight because you know , I think that's going to be some good topic uh to talk about we're talking about 2025 predictions and , uh , you know we're taking the , the chains off and and everything goes .

So looking forward to seeing what you guys bring to the table that you'd love to see change in ham radio or getting , you know , improved on . But with that , you know one thing obviously we want to announce to all of our uh live free and ham listeners is starting in january . You're going to get more live free and ham .

We are changing from a bi-weekly show to now a weekly show . So you're going to get us every week and a live show once a month , and probably something else in between . You never know At least the bare minimum . You're going to have us five times a month . That's bare minimum . Load up your podcast there . It's going to be some fun stuff .

We're looking forward to it .

So that might be something you want to look at if you want to see all the stuff that happens in the underbelly of Live Free and Ham and all the weird stuff and crazy stuff . And we actually even have a you know , an unscheduled uh therapy session with you know todd every week .

I mean , literally he goes into about 45 minutes of work is and you know , here are the details I'm taking is those events , be able to vent to your friends .

And there's a lot of great cool stuff that we're releasing to them kind of pre-release and so kind of . With some of that , we've also announced in some of our pre-shows before January , our 800 number I was going to say 900 number , they're both wrong . We've got a voicemail number that you know . If you ever want to just call and leave a message .

You want to talk about an episode we've , you know , talked about . You want to chime in to say hello ? You want to leave a do good , whatever . You can head over and use our 978-233-1142 , which is down below there , and thank you , paul , for triggering that . You can leave a voicemail to us 24 hours , 7 days a week .

We'll pick it up and we'll play it on the next episode . If you want to be a smart ass , then feel free to be a smart ass because we're going to return it back and have some fun with it .

So yeah , so anyway , all good , we're looking forward to hangs up and it's like , well , then we'll never know if it was really you or not . So , yeah , so anyway , all good , we're looking forward to it .

So you got that number down below um and all of the usual stuff still applies , uh , that we talk about with our win link and and such uh , so you can always use our sms , uh , as , uh , it's always there and available but hey , eric , does anybody , eric , does anybody ever pick up the telephone , or does it automatically go into a voice ?

We don't get paid enough , izzo , so it's not going into a call center yet .

We want to connect with you guys more , so please bring it on . We encourage it and are looking forward to it now . So you guys are the first . We've got 18 there in the chat now and I'm sure a bunch of other people are listening after . But we are going to actually let the cat out of the bag .

We've been planning , we've been scheming and doing a little plotting and trying to figure out how we can create something for our listeners that was typically unique , to Live Free and Ham , but still honored the tried and true tradition of a lot of our listeners . Now , our demographic , our listeners , are obviously ham radio operators .

They're usually male in some form fashion , but you know , we we encourage to have more females on the show and they're all drinkers in some form of fashion . You know whether they're whiskey drinkers , where they're bourbon drinkers where they're , they're , you know , beer , whatever . So we were like what can we do ? What ?

How can we put something together that you know honors that diehard side of stuff ? So we came up with let me bring it on the here . We have come up with our own um , lip free and ham branded . Uh , if I can get the page here , there we go branded whiskey .

Now this is on a limited run , so what you're seeing here is you're going to get a custom etched whiskey glass with the live free and ham logo on it . We only have a small amount available for sale , so once they're gone , they're gone , but you can pick that up on the store and we're going to be doing a lot more promotion .

We get a couple of cool things Paul and I are working on to promote it commercial-wise , so we're looking forward to doing that . It's going to allow our humor to come out in it , which will be really cool to see in the future . But right now we're doing an early release on this live stream .

You can head over to our website , head over to livefreeandhamcom , forward slash shop and in there you can pick up the whiskey glass and you can order your whiskey glass and , in essence , shipping is included in that price .

So anywhere in the continental United States 50 states that is included in the price for that shipping If you want to and you're an overseas person and you want to actually get a copy of this glass or you want to get one for your own shack itself or to be able to put it in your arsenal , then email us at livefreeandham at gmailcom and we'll work out a deal

there so we can get you in on the loops there . But it's one of those glasses that's only run for a limited time . We've got about 40 or 40-so of them that we've got ready to go , and so if you want to be one of those guys that owns a very special token of Liffrey Ham that probably will never come back , this is what you want to go for .

I'm super excited with it . I know Paul has been heavily testing his out and I've been doing the same with mine and been doing really , really good with it so far . I haven't spilled myself or done anything stupid with it yet , but all good either way , I just got to go to the liquor store true that ?

And my question is what are they going to pay for that glass that better hold its value ? That's all I know . That's vintage man .

Well , so those are all available in the store now , and so you can definitely run over there and pick one up , and when they're gone , they're gone and that's a bummer , but yeah , those who are going to get them in their grubby little hands are going to have a token that will last forever and hopefully , like I said , keep their value Alright .

Okay , so our last thing here , and I'm just going to bring this up here , so I have it already . Let me kill this here . We have been working on , or I've been working on , a little project here that I'm very excited to announce to folks .

We've already had a few people kind of test run these a little bit , but let me kind of give you a little backstory here . And so have you ever just been out driving and all of us go out and drive at some level and been driving , and you find yourself , or catch yourself , looking around at other vehicles for antennas ?

You're looking to identify that other ham that flew by you at 60 miles an hour on the highway in the opposite direction . Or you're in the mall parking lot and you're like , where , where are all the hams ? You know , you're looking for those antennas .

And so I you know I find myself doing that lot more often now , just because you know , I've got a bunch on my truck and and , uh , you know , I'm always looking to see where I can find the license plates or find , you know , know , those ham radio antennas .

So I was thinking , you know how can I reach out to those guys or gals and say , you know , hey , I see your antennas . I think it's pretty cool . And so I started kind of leaving a little notes there on their windshield saying , hey , yeah , you know , I saw your antennas . You know , here's my call sign blah , blah , blah .

And I thought , you know , that's not , you know that's not cool enough . And then I'm like , oh well , throw my qsl card on there . And of of course , if everybody knows me , I can't figure out how to get my QSL card the way I want it . So I don't have a QSL card right now , so I'm not doing that at all .

So that left me to fall into this a little bit . My daughter's got a Jeep and she's a big duck fan , and those that have Jeeps know that when you find somebody that has a really cool Jeep or something like that , you end up getting ducked . It's a way to say , hey , I respect you , I love what you did with your car , keep it up .

It's a real cool sign of appreciation .

And so I was kind of thinking and processing and you know , a long , long while ago Jason , on HR2O's episode , mentioned hey , wouldn't it be cool if we could do pigs as like a way to show you know , kind of a way of status ? I was like , all right , cool . So I found a company .

Long story short , we put it together and we finally have a little project that we're calling Get Hammed . So if you head on over to GetHammedcom you can head over and pick up a set of little hams . We've got them in a three pack , which is our bacon set . We've got a spiral ham , which is 10 pack , and then we get a country ham , which is the 25 pack .

And with every little pig you get this little token , and the token itself says at the top that you've been hammed , and there's a little section you could write your call , sign in , and then there's the web address and that's it .

They're glued to the pig itself and so all you have to do is just sneak up on the car that has the antennas , place it on the windshield , their mirror , their door , handle , whatever , and walk away and to tell you how cool it is , I was witness to three of them . I did it over the past weekend .

I had a bunch of my truck , I had them in my hand and I saw three different hams in the parking lot and I put one on the windshield , literally right in front of the driver's side . I put another one on a mirror and I happened to .

It was another Jeep I saw and it happened to have the door handle , so I placed it on the door handle and I didn't get to see two of the cars , but I got to see one who was basically just coming back to his car and I was walking back at the same time and I saw the pig on the dash or on the windshield that I placed there and I was watching from

a distance , thinking hey , he's got to be able to see that small little pig , he's got to see this pink thing in his windshield .

And yeah , no , he got in his car closed door , started the car and drove off and the little pig , as I'm watching him drive down the back of the parking lot on the main drag , goes whipping into the cowl corner of the windshield and is like lodged in there . So I'm hoping maybe his wife will be like what the hell is this little plastic pink thing ?

And you know he'll be able to get a little kick out of it . But overall , you know , I think it's kind of fun , I'm enjoying promoting the hobby and I think it's a cool way to kind of do it . So , you know , we're just starting out . We've got them on our website . You want to buy them ? You know you can head over there and do that .

If you want to do it on your own , email me and I'm happy to send you . Uh , you know , come to some of the steps I did .

Um , but you know , let's spread the ham love , let's have some fun , let's recognize other hams and , just like , have some fun with it cool I love it I can't wait to get some hams in my mailbox so that I can start putting them on people's cars .

You can head over to the gethammedcom website to find out more about it , pick them up , you know , and share some of the photos . You might be doing , uh , when you actually place some of these pigs . So looking forward to it , all right , cool .

So those are some of the cool things we've been working on , and you know we got a lot more on the , you know , in the pipeline , but we haven't finished finalizing it at all . But let's kind of get into tonight's conversation . So , as we alluded to , we wanted to talk a little bit about predictions for 2025 .

And we were originally thinking Black Friday , but then we were like , well , we've already kind of talked about it . We know other tubers are going to start kind of mentioning the Black Friday deal .

So we were thinking , hey , why don't we do a little bit something along the lines of like , let's talk about predictions of what we would like to see in the hobby , what we'd like to have changed , what would be really cool in 2025 if they fixed whatever and you can fill in the blank for that .

And so all these guys did a little preparation for that discussion . And so those in the chat , if you want to participate , if you got some of those predictions that you think you'd want to put APRS on its ear and prove that , or whatever the case , throw it in the chat and we'll make sure we highlight it . But at the same time , who wants to start out ?

Let's talk predictions . I figure each of us got three of them . Maybe we can come up with and talk , but it sounds like we should start somewhere . So who wants to pick it up ?

It's just hard to get through those menus and I don't know it's old we need a new one .

When I first got into the hobby it was a loner for about a year . When the icon first came out , 705 came out . Of course I got intrigued . But I was also looking at the g90 . I was looking at the lab 500 . I wanted something light and portable to go just to have .

I didn't care about that . Use a resonant antenna , right , you have options . Use a resonant antenna , get the mat tuner,5 , get the 8705 tuner , it's , it's . Those are your options . Stop complaining and go play radio , for price sakes .

But here's the thing okay , for a guy like me who has a very good d star network here in connecticut which I use in the summertime , I may want to throw on am AM broadcast and go listen to a ball game . Even though I'm not a big baseball fanatic , I want to just sit and relax and listen to a baseball game , okay .

Or throw on some FM and listen to some rock and roll or some country or whatever . You know what I mean . This radio , this ICOM 705 , does so much and it's hard . It's hard to start as a manufacturer and I get this for all of them . Okay , where are you going to get your biggest buck ? Because what do they want to do at the end of the day ?

They want to sell radios , right , and they don't want to sell a little radio , they want to sell thousands and thousands and thousands of rate . They want to keep it overturning , overturning , overturning . Yes , poda has helped in a big way and soda , but they want to sell radios . I got lucky .

So when I sold my my l and it killed me to sell my l craft but a local guy wanted my package . He liked what I would , my accessories , and gave me , put a dollar on a napkin . We were at the diner and he put a dollar on a napkin and I and I almost fell over because I'm like , oh my god , for 200 more I can get my and all my accessories .

That I already written down what I wanted for my 705 and it was a no-brainer . So but I love the elecraft . I love that elecraft kx3 . It is an incredible receiver on there and I had the two meter uh a board in there .

It's hard , paul , I agree it's a hard thing when it comes to what do we want for a radio , because everyone's going to do it differently , but what I do think the manufacturers are not listening to us , but I think they're not here to provide us with the reasons and maybe they never will tell us .

Are they going to get the turn of like , what do they have to make ? Do they have to sell 50,000 of these to show a profit , or 30 ? I have no idea what that , what that number is , but we all know , at the end of the day , this is a business for them , it's a hobby for us . Sure , it's hard , isn't it ?

It because , like I said , I have an extensive d-star network . Okay , I have a d-star repeater a mile away from me . I can . I use my 705 all the time for that , along with my ht and everything else . Other guys don't , so to them the d-star may mean absolutely nothing . I haven't tried . I've had this radio now for almost three years .

I haven't even D-Star on HF , and there's a whole bunch of guys using it on HF . I just haven't gone down that rabbit hole . So what do you do ? What do you do when it comes to a radio ? It's hard . But I agree with you . I don't think whatever radio comes out or doesn't come out , we're still not going to be happy .

Some have 10 watts , 5 to 10 watts , some have 20 watts , right , so they've narrowed it down to there . But what else can you really do for them , for it to be a profit for them ? Eric ?

That was a big qrp base and they very much wanted those radios , both for satellite and they wanted those radios for being able to do qrp . You know , portable that was a big thing for them and so yezu had to fix that .

And as we all know , if we watch these track record , at least on the vhf uhf side they always do this , they , they iterate and then they realize that if they're going to start to standardize across the platform , they're going to have to get rid of radios and then use some bullshit excuse about why they had to get rid of it so they can just standardize the

line . If you haven't noticed , all their VHF UHF line is all the same body . Their faceplate just changes , and so now it becomes this a little bit of a different faceplate and firmware . That's unique to whatever features they're trying to use .

But I guarantee probably more than likely , if you look at the toe-to-toe radios where they have APRS and all the extra bells and whistles , probably the guts are the same and it's just a matter of just what the face looks like .

But my point is this If you have a radio the size of the 705 , right , and you do like what they did the two bands so you could do the satellite why not try to get 100 watts in there ? If you want to do qrp , you have that option . No one says on 100 watt you can't . You can do qrp on an 891 .

But for those of you don't , then you would get both ranges , you would get the qrp guys , and you would get the .

So we might see something maybe not 2025 , but maybe 2026 with a full 100 watt replacement for the 891 . And it's going to be all of the things that we see in the 891 , but with all of the new guts and features that we see , like now in the 1f and and the dx10 and the 7 so I'm brand new to yezu and that and the and the 891 and I've had it .

I think I would be happier and I like my , my 891 . The only thing I don't like is the menu system . I , like you know , I put that , I put I put the where I can kind of go to it fast and certain things I can go like quick keys , that kind of thing .

But I think if they just change the software to it , the cosmetic , what I see as the end user to get into the menus I'm not saying , do it like ICOM , I'm not saying that . And I don't know how the g90 does it . But if they just did it more appealing as well as more with ease , I would be using that 891 a lot .

It would encourage me when I go out and I do pod , instead of pumping out 100 watts , drop it down to 10 watts or 20 watts well , it's a pain in the neck it's a pain in the neck to to keep bouncing back and forth . I hate it . I rather change my antenna hold on eric , I rather do , you know .

So I , if I have a link , dipole my soda beams by 2040 , I rather . Which doesn't make any sense , does it ? But it's just . I rather change my , my links to go to 20 to 40 , then spend the time in the menu of the radio and I don't know why .

Now you , someone can look up the actual date . So we're just still stuck with this old way of looking at menuing systems and I kind of think that if we get more towards , like you guys already have in the ICOM world , I know how to get into my menus Everything's visual .

One's a button , press two steps here and there to be able to turn things on and off , because I think Jesus , I mean Todd , you can commit to this , or you know , at least admit to it . The um , the DX 10 menu system is probably similar to the same seven 10 menu right If you're sat in front of a seven .

I guarantee the 1F is going to look like that .

I think you know like I look at some of the old radios some of the guys you know in our club that have like the older radio , and then I look at the newer stuff I was like and they're like this is the best radio . And then you look at all the things that we've got now and the luxuries we have .

I mean having a waterfall 10 years ago was unheard of Right . 10 years ago was unheard of right and now it's like if we don't have a waterfall , everyone's like there's no waterfall .

but it's not like you have all the electricity in your house and you're , you're getting these , you're just out there . So for me I love the radio . Like I said , my biggest thing is I just wish it would be we could get an upgrade where we could get , you know , a waterfall would be nice , but even um , you know , just being able to have an easier menu .

That if you did have to pull someone out of the noise , like I've heard guys , like I've had weak signals on bad days where the propagation is bad that I'm sure if I had my dx10 with me I could have pulled them out and worked them , but with the 891 it was just .

I mean I could have sat there and tried to figure out how to get and push all those buttons and try to get , but by the time I did that , he'd probably be gone , or or you know the the , the signal would have been lost . So that's all I'm saying , you know , like I .

And then for the guys that want to do the QRP , and if they're like , oh , you don't need it , I mean , look at , any radio can be do qrp and I , I think that it just makes sense to have have both . You know , if you can keep the same size and you can add the higher wattage just to get you through .

I mean , right now everyone's loving life , everyone's doing qrp because the bands are so good . But you know , I've been out there where I spent three hours to make 10 contacts , like it was that struggle right because I was like I'm not right like I was in . I was in rhode island . I'm like I'm not . I was in like , like at the edge of this .

I'm like I am not not getting my first park activation . I'm not gonna fail on this . And I just sat there so I said come on , people like I need two more like just , you're absolutely right about that .

Uh , ft8 q low power will still be great . Voice , voice is a whole different thing , right ?

And so if the 891 was just the , you know , even a pound less , that's huge , you know it is a heavy radio it is .

It's take it out of the truck , open it up on the tailgate , open it up on the front seat of the pickup truck , go to a picnic bench or a park bench , whatever . There is a difference . You're absolutely right . There is a difference , yep .

Now , the features and functionality , I'm hoping you know they all , they all say that they're going to deliver on having be able to satellite , having to be able to see , you know , full band , all mode . Those features are going to be awesome because I would love to be able to do some two meter sideband .

I would love to be able to do , you know , 70 meter sideband , and I don't have radios for that . I'm not going to go buy an icon . You know what ? 90 , is it 9500 ? What ? What's the ? The uh ? Two meter , yeah , um , I think it's 9700 . Yeah , that's right , 9700 .

Yeah , and you know that's another 1500 for me to be able to play a little bit in the two meter space , you know , but to have it portable , that's a bonus for me . That's the one thing .

Back in the day , when TV was broadcasting the analog uh signal for audio , you could still listen to your favorite TV station and I use that for a lot of emergencies , anytime power went out . It was a great . It was again . It was almost like my 705 that did it all and then icon just stopped . They stopped right , paul , and I don't know why .

Why would you again ? I would love for them just to come , just come out and tell us and you know , do you need us to ? You know I also know price point . Guys am right or wrong . Price point is a big thing , even when we have more money available to us . It's been tough years . Listen , we've seen bacon over $10 , $12 , $15 a pound . That's crazy .

That's a good thing , right , but it's a very interesting thing of we want it , we all want it in our list of wants . But what are we going to pay for what for ?

I mean you can go zygoo , you can go g90 .

Those are decent radios but their receivers aren't always that great like in terms of , say , sitting in front of a dx10 or sitting in front of a 705 , um and all of those types of radios , because they're built well for the purpose of you know receiving signals and processing them the right way , and those are good , but like .

But even then , like you look at price points between , uh , you know , a 705 and a dx10 , I mean it's like a couple hundred bucks , and at that point you're like , which way do I go ? Do I want to stay more at home or do I want to be more portable ? That really is where your money is going to kind of decide .

And I was like , well , I'm going to spend that kind of money . And then my friends eric , paul , you know , they said , why don't you look at a flex ? You know , ryan , he was like , hey , why don't you look at a flex ? You know , this is , this would be good . And you know , I did some research and stuff . And then I , I couldn't be happier with it .

I mean , the flex is an amazing radio and when I I like to , like , if I'm listening to something , I hear noise . Like Flex , you can take everything out if you want . Like , if you got you go on both sides as many times as you want to get all the noise out .

If I'm going to go sit at a park for a day and I know I'm not going to be moving around , I'd definitely bring the DX10 . Does that ?

So you're telling me that radio actually makes it fun now , compared to where we were 20 , 30 years ago , where you had just deal with it yeah , I wasn't around maybe not filter .

One of the guys outside our club was like hey , you really don't , I have the 991a and you're gonna outgrow and you're gonna wish you got the dx10 . The dx10 had just gotten , that came out and there was a sale on it and I just pulled the trigger and I I loved it . I was like this thing is really good .

Yeah , then you , eric , came over and he was hanging out in my shack and you were using it for a while and then he bought one . So it's like I think it's , I mean it's a great radio . I mean I have nothing negative to say about it . I mean it's just I wouldn't .

But I know tim used a dx10 I think he used yours , right , eric , and he was doing cw on it and I think that's the biggest thing of why he didn't get the 7300 was because of that , because he's really into CW and I think it was just a better radio for that . So that's just kind of my thoughts on it . Everyone's got their own preferences .

My biggest thing right now is I'm more of a poda guy . I do a lot of my ham radio outside the shack doing the portable stuff and I really would like to have just a small , better radio that I can use the filters very easily or easy accessible .

Easily or easy accessible and I can do quickly , you know , especially when I'm trying to work someone and like I've had times where I've been trying to work and they're coming in and out of noise and I'm getting noise on one end and I'm trying to , I can't get it out , and I know if I had my DX 10 , I could have just got it out .

I would have heard the guy so I'm thinking .

I'm not climbing the mountains with , but still I like the idea of that 705 , the look where everything . Just give me a little bit more horsepower . That's all I want . Icom , that's all . I want , but I don't know if that's a wish that can be granted .

So like is a qrp , like qrp , like , I think one of the things we get lost a lot of times . I , this qrp stuff is really kind of really geared for podaA .

That's the market that it's going to fit in , because you want something a little smaller than bringing a 710 or a DX10 to plop on a picnic bench because you're worried that you're going to break it or you're worried it's going to fall off and get damaged , like a certain 7300 we all know and love . It's kind of like all of those things it's like .

So if you have something like a 705 , that's a good compromise because you're getting lightness but you're also getting a good functionality . But I know when I do Soda and we're going to be doing Soda in December I'm not bringing my 891 . My FX4CR is going to be in my bag . Like Paul said , everything's light , man , as light as you could possibly make it .

That FXCR is a radio that has to be so intrigued because of Kevin K0 , klb is using it and so many other people and I'm like again , I'm no backpacker , but man do I want , like I feel like I'm turning into , like the Jay Leno who has the warehouse of vehicles and I'm turning my house into a warehouse of radios , and what am I going to do today and which

one do I want to take out ?

well , this is where I to say none of the new radios , because of their price points , can beat what the 706 Mark II G can do . You can pick them up used between $400 and $500 . They're fantastic radios and for somebody just getting started out it's tough to shell out $1 , thousand to $1,500 for a freaking radio .

I started out with just the old frequency counter on the front and a bunch of filters , and one thing that I learned very well is to have the understanding and be able to have the ability to be able to understand how to use a contour , how to use a notch , how to use a shift , how to use a contour , how to use a notch , how to use a shift , how to be

able to tune the frequency , to be able to listen to the signal that I want and then be able to knock out the noise left or right of it . Every new ham that I've run into I'm like oh , I want to go buy the 7300 with a pretty waterfall and everything . I'm like , okay , dude , great .

But you're going to be in the same spot that you are frustrated with the radio because you don't know how to use those features in the radio , because you're so enamored with the display , and so I always recommend any new ham like go the 706 , go an FT450D , yaesu radio , you know a 905 , I can't remember what Kenwoods were .

There's a couple of Kenwood models that are just the frequency HF6 .

The , uh , the tailgating section may or may not have the filter in it , and I don't know , and I'm not , and I'm not well versed if those can still be . Unscrew the thing , plug and play , pop it in , put it back in , turn it on . It's there . I don't know , maybe they can be if the filters are still available for on a 30 year old rig .

I didn't know what I was doing , I just liked again that big VFO right there , right there , and you just kind of , and then all of a sudden they started changing the meter . Remember when they started changing the meters around ?

Someone went digital , someone went more , but that's , I think , before you're going to plop a thousand fifteen hundred dollars , you get into all your accessories . You know , my grandfather taught me put your money into feed line and antennas . That's where you want to do , he says .

He says , yes , some receivers on these radios are going to be better and I have done it . I have taken I mean this is no disrespect because it was just how when it came out . I took my 706 one day and I wound the antenna switch . I was going , bopping back and forth between the 705 , listening to a station , versus the 706 .

Much better clarity on the 705 . And I was running it apples to apples . There was no . You know none of this crazy filtering . And not just there was no . You know none of this crazy filtering , and not just I wanted to .

I picked out a bunch of guys in the morning on 40 meters , the e-cars , and I was just going back and forth , but still , it doesn't stop you from making contacts , it doesn't stop you from . So save a few over here , but put it over here . I'm a firm believer .

I happened to be on a frequency for an hour when I was in north carolina and some of you guys have heard this story , but you know I got a guy who was basically like get the hell off my thing , we're doing a net and totally disrespectful .

And then he thought I left and he's sitting there on the radio trashing poda and trashing new hams and we shouldn't be allowed to do that . And and I know that there's been a lot of talk about that I've seen some of the stuff on some of the YouTube stuff and you know ham radio is about .

Well , we all have our things and if you don't like poda , that's fine . But you know , I would hope that people would just be a little bit more people who are against it at least get to know it . Don't knock it until you've tried it right . Don't knock it till you've tried it Right .

And uh , you know and I've seen it now like we've done our ham um outings right . What do we call them , eric ? The poda meetups , poda meetups , and you know we've gotten a lot of guys have never done it before , who are now really getting into it and they're talking about it on the local repeaters about oh , I'm doing a poda , this is great .

You know I got this many contacts . I did that and , like I said , it's if you don't like something , don't trash until you , until you try this . I'm just hoping that when I'm doing potas and I happen to be on a on a frequency and there's a net on that frequency , which I had no idea , you know , just to be hey , man , we normally do a net on here .

Do you mind leaving instead of , like you know , get off the air ? This is , this is what our , our , our nets on and I , it's my frequency . yeah , and you know , get off the air this is what our net's on .

You're really maybe a little DX here and there . You really didn't hear stuff and then you shut off the radio and you went . You go , did something else . I think that was the life of a lot of us . Now that poda has become part of this hobby , there is plenty of , there is plenty of frequency for everybody .

But some people are still claiming get off my lawn . I've been here first . I think that's , that's going to happen , no matter what . It's all how you deal with it , right and like . Like paul's saying sad hams . He's absolutely right , sad hams are the worst .

But if it wasn't for poda , they would find another topic right to be , you know , doing their battle cry . But it's nice to hear the POTA activators when I'm sitting home and I'm a weird one I'll go activate , even if it's just one part .

Come home , put everything away , see what's going on , grab a cigar and next thing , I know I'm sitting in front of a radio and I'm hunting . That's the kind of junkie I am , but I like it . I like just taking that VFO , especially on the waterfalls . Now , we didn't mention that before when we were talking radios . Who has waterfalls or who doesn't ?

Right you know ? But it's nice to hear stations , it's nice for us to learn . Now , propagation , you want to try a different antenna on your property . You know , I think poda gives so many opportunities , not only for from the , and we could spend hours and hours talking about what it's like to be an activator .

And so I'll have the little , the little window with all the POTUS bots Right , and I'll just click on each one and I'll go from the bottom of the band to the top of the band and I'll just keep going and getting them . I don't need the waterfall , no that too .

And I wasn't using the waterfall for the longest freaking time until I saw , until I started seeing the guys on saturday night crash course , you know , josh and a whole bunch of other guys using these waterfalls . I'm like why ? And then all of a sudden it kind of got a little addicting .

But there are times when I shut that menu off and I just go back to the traditional screen . I do that too . Um , I like to use the .

A lot of times you'll hear people having good conversations or you might only get one half of it . You know , when I was new to hf I couldn't understand why I couldn't hear the other guy . I only hear the one guy , but I couldn't get . So that's kind of . And then I've done some hf nets where you know they do the relay .

Oh , by the way , can I have your call sign ? Sure , he gives me his call sign . I put him in . I lock him as a contact , obviously , but I move . It's so easy for me to move .

I like to respect the nets because one day a lot of them have a long legacy of being there and maybe someday when I'm in my 80s and my 90s and I want to hang out on the potato net and this and that and that , I don't care what your net is , okay if , if there are two people enjoying and words , that's fun . That's what this hobby is . It's fun .

It's easier for me to move . Just don't come in and become demanding that . And that's one thing that I don't understand why some hams do that . They must do it for everything else when they go into the grocery store , and it's you know .

I don't think any of us , as POTA , don't mind moving because we have an opportunity to do what Move ? We just re-spot ourselves . It's just like if you're in the middle Todd , if Todd's in the middle of something and he knows he's got , hey guys , I'm moving , give me a few minutes . You know what we're going to do .

We're waiting , we are salivating , waiting for Todd to re-show up on that spotting page . And what are we going to do ? We're going to follow Todd . It's so easy .

He goes , you got to record it would have gone viral . Yeah , you got to record it . Send it to Jason Relax . Yeah , it was , it was . You know , like I said , it was an experience .

But I mean , I've heard it before , I've listened , I've heard guys , you know , when I've been hunting or whatever , I've heard people getting up there and getting all mad because you know , know that frequency happens to be like they're doing the net or or something , or it's where they rag chew with their buddy every day at this .

Then you know , again , a little respect goes a long way because I don't think there's anyone who's a who's a poda activator is going to really care too much about leaving . And the other thing with podas , I wish people wouldn't . Wouldn't tune up on my pile-ups , drives me nuts .

A , 14 degrees with the voltage lagging the current . B 68.2 degrees with the voltage lagging the current . C , 68.2 degrees with the voltage leading the current . Or is it D , 14 degrees with the voltage leading the current ? Or is it D , 14 degrees with the voltage leading the current ?

Or D , the voltage and current are in phase .

But I tried something different and I forget the app that I was using . It was one of the online stuff . It was a great app , but I was doing . It might have been ham study and there's another one , but I was going back . It was definitely ham study , but I was going back .

It was definitely a ham study , but I was doing it at night and I said I am going to dedicate myself 45 minutes every single night before I go to sleep , because there was something that I read and I don't know how true it is . Guys , help me out . If you retain knowledge at night , it stays with you .

So the next day and I would hit that same area Again I'd grab it in the morning and , believe it or not , at work , I'd go downstairs Into the bathroom , I'd take 15-20 minutes and real quickly , boom , boom , boom , boom , go back and I started getting good . There are certain topics in that extra I get . I really get it , I comprehend it , I get it .

But then it comes to that electrical stuff . I'm like it's like hitting the wall and I don't want to memorize it . And a lot of guys were telling me hey , listen , memorize this , you'll just who cares if you pass . We don't ask the brain surgeon whether how many right or wrong . We don't ask the lawyer . But it was just more of a thing of .

I kind of wanted to learn why it like like for that answer . Why was d correct ? Why is it ? Can someone just put it in in layman's terms ? And nobody has been able to give it to me in layman's terms . So that's my keep hitting the wall thing well and again .

So I just get on my phone ham , you know the ham study app and I just go , just keep going through the questions and the thing works great . If you don't know the answer , you hit that info button , it tells you , or the question mark it'll tell you what the answer is . I mean , it's just really .

And then what I do is after I get like , when I get to 80 or above on section five , which I'm there now , I'm going to do study 1 through 4 . I mean 1 through 5 . Get all of them Right . And then when I get up to 80 and I stay at 80 or 90 and I'm getting those random questions , I'll move on to 6 . I'll focus on 6 .

Once I get that to 80 or 90 , I'll go back and I'll do 1 through 6 . And that's how I've been doing it and the stuff is retaining in and I found that once I got my general and then practicing radio , I understand the extra stuff a lot better than I think I would have if I just went , like from technician right to extra . You know what I mean .

Like maybe I should have studied right away to get my x-ray because the general stuff would have been in . But I know that some of the questions when I hear them for the first time and I have no idea at least I I'm in the general area like oh yeah , it's got to be that one because of something else I knew . So it's been an experience , but it is .

I mean I know I don't know where . You know , my background is absolutely nothing to do with radio , math , electronics , nothing . I mean I took my technician . I knew green was ground . That was it Right .

You still can't get , you can't get your extra . No , it doesn't interest me , even though , yes , would it be nice to have , because when paul was mentioning the dx cluster , there have been times when I'm looking at stuff on 40 and 20 and there's some dx in there and I'm hearing and I can hear them , but I can't transmit .

Like people who just get in front of something , press a couple buttons and play radio like hello . Exactly like me .

He's like how can you not understand how a motor or a car works ? He goes , I don't know , he goes . I just drive them . They put me in the car and they told me to drive . That's the way I am with ham radio . Just put me in front of the radio and I'll operate .

I haven't deeped up , but I love it's very fascinating it's . I love watching that stuff I get and I feel like I think that's a natural progression I , I feel like I get smarter by watching those guys . I'm like , oh my god . And then and a few other shows that also do that . The guys do it right at you know , mind you you know radio stuff is different .

Though right eric isn't there , let me let me throw the caveat to that .

However , I know and this is kind of more towards , we'll say , the older ham generation that you guys have an opportunity to introduce the stuff you were just talking about , iso , so like how to understand what a toroid does in an antenna and how to eventually get to the point of you know , winding one , you know , or how to build , you know , a simple , you

know , project , and like there are a bunch of other podcasts out there that all get their feathers ruffled about like , oh well , you don't build the radio , so you have no idea what it really means to be a radio ham operator . I'm like , yeah , I do . I mean literally , open my eyes a little bit more , show me a little bit more .

And that's what I'm trying to say to most people on our chat and in general you know , you know , be that mentor . But more so , be open to someone who might not have a desire who's more of the appliance operator . Don't shun them . Make them feel integrated and then show them the rest of the world .

If there was a way to teach people like me how to , how antennas work , how the radio in like layman's terms or terms that I can relate to , it would be more interesting for me . And the way I do it is like I'm a hands-on learner . So , like when I put my DX Commander together , it's like I'm going to physically be cutting wires and doing it together .

It worked , but it didn't work for me . So then , so then I had to stop and figure it out . And then , when I did , and I just changed my ground radios not the number but just the length of them yeah , it worked .

And I went , I was dancing around in the backyard here the neighbors were getting ready to say , hey , bring this guy to the hospital and lock him up and put him in the rubber room they didn't understand they didn't . It wouldn't be the first time they said that , but yes , it was such uh , uh and uh .

I felt like a ham radio operator because the last time I did that was back in the 90s and I built a g5 rv and and it was so funny so don the easiest extra math to ever remember .

But when you have this , that stuff was resonating inside me much easier than oh .

there by 20 years and I come back and my , my wife's like so how was it ? And I'm like , yeah , just a bunch of old guys talking about shit . I don't understand . She goes , are you going to go back ? I'm like , yeah , I think I'll get smarter if I hang out with them a little bit .

So then I started going back and still didn't know anything and just like , nod my head and , believe it or not , you start , you just me hearing this stuff and talking about . I start to understand now , over the what four years that I've been going , that I start to understand what they're talking about . At least I'm in the same . You know .

Know , before I was like kind of like out in the , the bleacher seats . Now at least I'm , I'm in the front row and I'm .

But that's okay though , Cause hey , listen , you might as well learn , you might as well have fun learning something without getting a headache , and you know , driving your truck off the road . You just , you know have fun with this hobby .

And we went out and did my first poda and I screwed it up big time and he didn't say , well , I'm never going out with this guy again . He goes . So when are we going out again ?

We all have our poisons .

It is going to be a while and even if I will not put money on this one , I wish it would I wish it would clarify , like in the ham community or in the CB community and the CB community . I don't , I don't , I don't think and I mean that as no disrespect , because I still use my CB all the time I don't even have one .

I think the manufacturers , I don't know why I , I don't know I and I had nothing to base it . It's just a gut , gut feeling . I don't see a whole bunch of guys migrating up to a different mode for that band and maybe it will , maybe it won't . I guess time will tell . That's . That's number one . I'll start off .

I'll start off wide and then I'm gonna go deep into it . Real fast follow Overlanding will continue to grow . The overlanding groups will continue to grow . We won't see it here in Connecticut . We're not an overlanding state . There's really not a lot . I'm not sure what you guys have up there in North , not up there really . There is .

They may know an old guy down the street with the big antenna . You know how that go , how that story goes right . But some of them will gravitate and I don't think we're going to see the influx immediately in 2025 . But you will see an influx of ham radio operators coming out of the gmrs world and I'll tell you where they're going to find that or what .

What they're going to find , similar to what we were talking about earlier tonight shortfalls . Gmrs is great if you have the big repeater next to you , if you've got the portable , portable repeater box that gives you what , what ? Maybe three to five miles , depending on where the antenna is .

It's not going to give them what they really want and , just like when you guys drink your whiskey and your brandy or when I have a good smoke , they're going to want more and I think that's going to put them into ham radio . It may not put them all into poda .

Some of them will go to poda , but I think you will start to see that um graduating in in 2025 , 2026 .

And I think there's a lot of trucks driving now are they got the CB and they got the ham radio antennas going , and I think there's a lot of guys on More and more of it . Right that they figured out that , huh , we can talk farther and clearer and better , and so if the truckers are doing it , why wouldn't the overlanders do it too ?

They could be driving along or sitting there , resting at the rest stop or wherever they are , and if the bands are up , if you know again , propagation is up , they're going to have fun and that's what they're going to want the past time to relax , etc . You're going to spot the gmrs group .

I think you will see gmr sales continue , but I think it's going to flatten after a while because there's going to be the shortfall .

These guys are going to get hungry for those who like to play radio I just for those overland guys who like to play radio and then you're going to have guys like Kyle and Jason and our buddy Steve 741 , and TO another one , so many other guys who are also doing some RV and slash overlanding .

They're going to introduce them through the YouTube medium and through others other ways and they're going to find out what this ham radio stuff is , what this post . Oh , oh , you're already in the park . Oh , I guess I can do this already , and I think it's going to be some interesting times .

So , which means ham radio stuff is going to continue to do well , antennas . But now we're going to loop back to what radio are you going to buy ?

I've heard them out in Keene . I heard them in Portland , maine , and this guy is getting two more repeaters and he's going to put them on the same frequency so they'll be up north no-transcript around , especially like up here in New Hampshire . It's hard because we have all the mountains and stuff , you lose repeaters quickly .

But if you spread them out and you can do that and what this guy's going to do , I've always said I said I wish we had like a whole new Englandland repeater system , like the whole all of new england was on , like one repeater system where we could just and instead of having different repeaters in different areas , keep the same frequency and you know wherever

you're driving you know .

Now , I don't know if he was at the top or at the base or somewhere in between , but he was at Mount Washington and I could hear him hitting the repeater . And again , this repeater is like near the coast , in Epsom , I mean , it's not , it's far away from and there's a lot of mountains .

And I , anthony , who is , uh , who I figured it was call sentence , but he's like he's , he found this repeater . Basically , peter basically had made it famous because he would be on it all the time You'd call and he'd answer right all the time . So he does a 5 o'clock . I don't know what they call it , it's like a commuter round table .

But I've I've driven from , uh , plymouth , new Hampshire , which is basically the center , all the way down talking to Anthony and seeing where it comes in and where it comes out , and the only times I would get blocked is if I was driving down 93 and there'd be like the two hills would be like right next to me , and as soon as that broke out , it picked

right back up again . And I've talked to him in Campton , which is even farther North . I know Lincoln works . So I mean , basically , up to 93 corridor , the Epson repeater in Epson will work and he's going to use I'm sorry , no , no , no , I mean he's just going to make it that much better .

And I think that it's going to be really cool that we might actually have a repeater system that will you'll be able to log into and be able to talk to anyone in the state .

I could be in connecticut and and and I can talk all over connecticut , you know , on the network , and then if I go north , I go over to the there's like a New Hampshire statewide , then there's you know , local there's , then there's you know , various talk groups and I know DMR is probably , you know , maybe we save it for another show , eric , but it's just

one of those .

But like the dmr stuff , ds , d , star stuff , I love it , I get it and I , but some people just don't want to deep dive into it well and again , like you probably very much had someone who could help you through the process , and I think that's a strength to you .

You know both that person who you know was walking you or at least encouraging you to do it , and then you , on the other hand , being able to be willing to you know , learn and grow and accept you know some new information or new ways of doing things .

That's you kind of knit the nail on the head , like most people just get stuck in a rut because they feel like they can't ask and then because they're very fearful that you know , the elmer that they go talk to in the club that's like you know , 20 years older than them is just going to give them hell uh for , like you know , saying , well , why didn't you

consult the arl antenna book manual for that ?

One of the things we do is FPV first person view where you got to put these goggles on and you have a camera on the aircraft and you actually see through the goggles of video feed . That video feed is transmitted on a technician band . Now , legally , to do this you're supposed to have a technician license .

There's one question on the technician test that brings this up , and no one that I know , except myself and a couple of the guys that don't do FPV , that are hams , fly , do this and don't have their technician license . So I always joke about it saying you know what is ham radio ? Now , the two meter stuff ? Yeah , they don't do any of that stuff anyway .

It's all now 2.4 gigs and 900 megahertz is what we use . The technology you know is growing so fast in that hobby it's even . You know , I kind of took a little break from it , not that I quit doing it , but I wasn't going as much as I was and when I came back the technology had jumped .

It took me a while to get all caught up to what they were doing . But there is a big connection and you'd be surprised on how many guys are flying the model airplanes that are also hams . And I've met a couple of guys in the clubs and they see my antenna . They go you a ham . I'm like , yeah , you , you a ham . Yeah , so we get , so we start talking .

But yeah , that's the , that's my story and that's how it all started .

So if you get on the Phantom repeater you will hear guys talking about flying and flying RC stuff and ham radio all day long .

That was uh , from weck , uh , cb640 . There was a waltham machine that I loved growing up as a kid because I lived in westford and so I was always on that repeater because I was no code tech and I loved hearing those guys talk about all electronics and everything I had no like .

Like iso said , I had no idea what the heck they were talking about , but it was always fascinating to hear on the car ride home . So , yeah , that jogged memory there , and so thanks for sharing that . I appreciate it . But all right back to you .

I think some of the groups are doing things and I'm only talking Connecticut and I love these guys . I got a lot of respect , but I don't sometimes agree with the path they're going down .

I still support them , but I don't agree with the path , the stuff that we got to do , everything still on 75 meters , and I don't want to hear that you're doing it with an NVSI antenna . Myself and five other guys there were six of us we went on this is actually right before the 706 Mark II came out .

Gee , it came out , oh my God , and we proved that you can use two-meter sidebands to cover the state of Connecticut . There was a couple areas where we needed some relays , mike . Maybe there was a couple areas where we needed some relays , mike .

Maybe there's always exceptions to the rule , but I don't foresee that changing , Especially when the 706 Mark IIG came out and other rigs started coming out with portability , 50 watts or more on two meters , 100 watts , small , you know , four element Yagi In my state , you know you put four or five guys strategically around the state and you're going to get the

message through on two meter sideband . And who cares what really the band conditions are ? We don't care if the solar storm well , maybe a solar storm is extreme , but you , but you guys know where I'm going and the group , the groups don't want . I don't understand why we gotta hang , why we're .

Why are we going to climb a mountain to get to do our job , for our a served agency , when we can do it a lot easier and concentrate on things and also make it fun ? And I also think it would be a win-win for the POTA group , because if more guys were using two meter sideband and I am one of them , I should be , but I am not .

I don't bring out my two meter sideband antenna and I should . It's a very , very old , old antenna , it's a box antenna and I can , and I can make it go vertical , I can make it go horizontal . It looks like a box kite . It works great . You pump 100 watts in that thing and I'm talking , and I could talk all over .

So my prediction is is we're going to , we're still going to get stuck in these ruts of this .

Is how we've always done it , and I don't understand why , because in so many other areas we have done , we have stepped outside of the box and had fun and learned , in which now equipment came out homebrew or whatever and in youtube , shows were create or had content and we , we learned another , we started fooling around .

So this is one topic and please I hope I'm wrong and I would love to revisit this topic . Anybody in Connecticut wants to challenge me ? Absolutely , you know how to get a hold of me and we can make this work . I'm a believer because it's about the served agencies , the last one is Back to survey .

And so I think since they've been knocked down a few notches from a lot of the statewide stuff that's kind of gone into play and a lot of agencies saying , hey , we'll just do it on our own and we don't need you any longer , that no one ever said , well , okay , well then how can we reinvent ourselves ?

And just like you were saying , you should get back to some of the basic stuff that you were playing around with and learning and growing in , but with the idea that you're reinventing a different way to do it , because I mean , obviously you look at like milton , you look at , uh , helene and all of those areas , there are people that were just reinventing

themselves . They weren't waiting for the , the , the aries or any of the other agencies , that kind of partner with the . You know the government , you know folks to do something . They just stepped in and started doing something and then adjusting as they , you know , needed to , based off of conditions and stuff .

And a lot of awesome stuff came out of that , because I think a lot of people opened up their eyes and went , oh well , maybe this needs to be changed and we have to do something different , because what we're doing now is just most people are just getting bored of it .

I'm not an Aries guy , but I know we're making some strides in our region to improve on that and you know it's kind of exciting me to see and so , you know , maybe I make make the leap in 2025 , but yeah , I agree with that .

We bought four or five of these ourselves and we were fooling around and we were depicting you know what if the creek rises , and this and that , and we showed some people . We showed some hot , some people around in our area and they were amazed . They said I want you part of our team , but I couldn't get . I couldn't get people to buy it , buy into it .

And I'm like , oh , my God , you want to play , here's your opportunity . They wanted to do it the old style way . Yeah Right , and and and that and that and that radio never sold . I would love to find two or three of them , at least two now , maybe on eBay or whatever . Someone knows where they are , but I would love to get something like that .

The other topic and Mike N2MAK brought up regarding the preppers my prediction is you will see more preppers buying ham radio equipment , but I don't know if they're going to cross over and actually use the equipment .

And I feel and I have a couple of guys locally who talk a lot , who talk , you know , and they've spent hundreds , if not thousands of dollars just in the ham rate , the communication topic but these radios are not getting used , these batteries are not getting used , they're not taking them out every 30 days . You know what I'm saying .

They're not taking them out every 30 days . You know what I'm saying . They're not taking them out every 30 days in charge . They think that they're going to build a Faraday cage and everything . That battery is not going to work . It's so and I feel bad .

So I try to just I'm not the Einstein here , but I just give them something to think about saying why don't you just play more ? And , by the way , we got this great repeater in town that covers all of us and all you got to do is just get on it . You know , for $200 , $300 , get yourself a radio and they won't make because they're not .

Where I am with the love for this hobby , where I live and breathe ham radio . They live and breathe prepping , but in multiple areas .

got .

And when I say join our group , we have cigars and we try to solve the world's problem , just like everywhere else . Right , but I know , if it was to ever hit the fan , my role would be communications . Another guy over here he's got the root cellar , he's got the food . You know what I mean .

So we're all going to contribute like a mini community for the betterment of ourselves , to sustain until some level of calm and normalcy starts to grow again . Um , maybe it'll never happen in my lifetime , maybe it will , but it's just nice to know and I'm happy to be welcomed .

And as well as I love learning from them I know I'm not going to be learning how to can food , but it's fun to watch them , it's fun to hear what they do .

And you know whether , like and I always look at ham radio it's like I'm only planting seeds a lot of times .

So like , whether I , you know , see that person later on in my life or they come into the fold in the ham radio family or whatever , I will never know , but you know , and maybe our paths will cross in the future , but like , I'm just like just putting little ideas in people's minds and getting them more focused or getting them back to something that they might

have done when they were younger or whatever , and just really just opening that atmosphere for them to the eventually .

You know they may eventually have some time later down their life that they say , hey , I remember ham radio and I remember that one encounter and that's like I think what you're kind of doing there is , like you know , with the prepper community .

They're like hyper focused , like paul says , on very much doing the activities to get ready for whatever the end game is going to be .

And I said to him I don't want to say his name , but I said why do you have so much ? He turned to me . He says why do you have so many batteries and so many antennas ? touche you know why did I go buy a solar panel this year ? I don't need a solar panel , but I bought one .

Yes , I do , you know and I learned how to interface it with my batteries , and now , with all these black friday deals coming up for the 100 ampere hour batteries and jason put out a great uh video today regarding a battery box and modifying it and I've been struggling . What do I want to do ?

So , again , we're sharing ideas once again , so I think the prepping thing will will still sell equipment , but I don't know if the large masses will actually be using the airways . I wish they would , because there's some great , great people out there .

I'm moving back to my prepping stuff because it , you know , it fulfills the need that I have , and so I think POTUS killing ham radio .

If , uh , you know , paul , you got one , you guys got all one that we can kind of bang through quickly no , go ahead , throw yours out okay , all right . So this one's gonna be a tough one . It's a big nut to crack the gamification .

I am tired of dealing with submitting logs I know , izzo , you don't submit logs but those that submit logs to contests and waiting months for the result . This is the 21st century .

We should be thinking more along the lines of how can we produce a result for something that we participated in whether we participate two hours or 24 hours and be able to see how that standing works .

And I'm also port all in for support for people that want to start to improve that versus , like the contesting community , just blowing up and making a big stink that you know , people like that are ruining .

You know what , what , what really true ham radio and contesting is , and contesting is awesome , but you know , I would love to know how , and I know there's all the tools out there . Blah , blah , blah . Exactly , paul , but you know there's still something missing because we still keep revisiting this topic and we still keep revisiting .

You know this over and over again .

But he was basically saying it's really not hard to do , but just if someone just starts doing it and more start doing it , you will see it like dandelions growing . You're right , there's only one , uh , uh , winter field day , I submit , and 13 colonies I submit , as as a hunter , I guess you can call me uh , but yes , I would love for 13 colonies .

When I fill up my sheet , the old-fashioned way I fill out my sheet on that pdf , I send it in . Yeah , I throw the guys a donation , but would it be nice just to know ? See me somewhere On my QRZ page .

When you could see it , eric , when you could see it in real time within a day or less , that's awesome .

But that's kind of one of those things . It's like , you know , most people are tired of prescription kind of approaches , so that kind of just rubbed me the wrong way . But they've got some good ideas . They're really starting to like integrate into that type of stuff .

They're starting to build dashboards and and contest environments and stuff like that where people can get real-time feedback and commune you know , basically commune with one another and be able to , you know , you know , use chats and that type of stuff that everybody in the e-world gaming world uses today .

That they're just , you know , it's commonplace for them and and they love it .

Like I listen to my son yelling , you know , on top of his lungs at like 230 in the morning at his buddies that he's playing in , you know , fortnite or something like that , and it's like you know they're having fun because they're in a ranking type thing and they're all trying to like do something .

Can it be done ? And let's start seeing it ? And as far as I'm concerned , man , you want $25 , $5 for a donation , for that I don't give a shit , I don't care . Take it here , take it To me . It's worth the cigar that I smoked to give you that money for that , because that's going to bring me back next year for that . Well , listen , if you .

That was a blast so much fun dude that was kind of kicked it off for me and you know they started doing , they're doing with poker in a little bit , but yeah , I'd love to see the fta off again . Bring that , you know , kind of back as a classic , you know . Uh , you know event , but that was always nice because it was like a bunch of rag chewing .

Like tim right , he only had his technician and I think he didn't come in last . He had like 10 contacts . He wasn't the last guy . I'm like that's awesome .

And then they brought in the special events of the uk , the france very smart , very , very smart 13 colonies and but , like I said , I wish we can just get off the paper stuff and maybe the real time . And , trust me , if I had the knowledge , I would be calling them up . I would have called them up , you know , yesterday or a year ago .

Say , listen , I got this idea , if you want it , what we would call , what real-time or whatever . Does that appeal to you guys ? Yeah , totally Go ahead .

Yeah , I think it's going to be like I'm sure the computer could just figure it out in a year or two . They'll probably be like hey , I run this . Uh , keep this data going live , and they'll probably just do it . But I think with the technology I mean , it's definitely can be done , but I think it could happen .

Uh , the question is is do people want to to go that route ? The people who are in charge of , say , 13 colonies or who are running that , are they willing to kind of take it to the next level , or are they just happy with the way it is ? Is my well , okay .

I'm in Not for ego , ego purposes , but because I don't believe in dropping more work on a volunteer . That is not fair . I've had that happen to me so many times . I people like that really despise me . I'm like go go , just go do your own thing , because I got enough on my plate .

You got to be part of the team here and I love surrounding myself with people who are at my intelligent level and even higher and even higher . It's fun . I even like like sometimes surrounding myself with people who are not as smart as me , but guess what ? I can still learn from them and we're still going to have fun either way .

So , either way , surround yourself with good , good , ethical people . And all of a sudden , man , this starts . It starts to grow like dandelions . We're all having fun here and all sorts of shit gets crazy .

So , um , I don't know if , uh , if if he's involved in in aries at all , or if there's an aries races , you know group , uh , locally for him . But uh , I mean , at least here you know the , the aries group . It wasn't doing what it should have done and so we saw a split and now we've got a separate .

So instead of being all hillsborough county , now there's a manchester aries and and then a nashua aries , I think , or lower , you know whatever .

Um , but the , the , the groups do different things and they're focused on different things , and so while it's super hard to find these groups that are practicing mcom related , you know , exercises , they're , they're , they're related exercises , they're getting out there and actually doing MCOM exercises . My only advice to the comment is just keep looking .

If you don't find something that's local to you , reach out to me personally and I'll see if I can't find somebody to hook you up with . I think MCOM is an important aspect of the hobby that often gets overlooked .

Okay , if you told me 30 years ago that we were going to have this thing called covid , I would have said , nah , you're wasting your time , go back to watching walking dead or some other fictitious star trek or whatever . Okay , but it happened , okay .

So when covid came , a lot of us had to kind of like rewrite the book or we had to use what we knew but kind of had to learn and be a little open . It was weird , it's hard , when you get a lot of guys in a lot of towns are bread . A friend gets a job .

Maybe he doesn't have the best credentials , he who cares , but he got the job is the job , is the bottom line . I was given a comment one day that was a very nice , heartfelt comment to me , saying you're one of the few emergency management directors who I know who are not only doing logistics but you're doing communications .

And I said it just comes easy to me , that's all I know . And I probably told him . I probably can't tell you the difference between a resistor and a capacitor and a picofarad , but I can tell you how to do . I can walk into a building and tell you how many cots we can put in there and what we're going to need for food and the generator .

It just comes naturally to me . Find people like that , jonathan , and get yourself involved with them . Like Paul said , there may not be somebody in your backyard , but just remember one thing You've got to decide . What do you want to do ? Do you want to prep yourself to leave your area to go to somewhere else to help out that group that might need help ?

Maybe not in the beginning , but maybe seven days later , 14 days later . We saw that in North Carolina , tennessee . All the time . We saw that because it's very hard to say I am going to do all of this . Then , all of a sudden , if you've got a family , how are you going to split ? And a job and a job , how are you going to split yourself ?

Three ways , like for me . Many , many times I had a struggle locally . You know , I worked 45 minutes away . They were not going to release me . Oh , I just lost the light , but gotta pay the bill . Gotta pay the bill . Um , I I could not participate because my job said I could not participate . So you kind of have to kind of do your homework .

I'm not saying don't get involved , but kind of figure out what you want to do , what meets your needs , your interests as well as your surrounding world . And if there is nothing , contact Paul up there and Eric and Todd See what's going on in their regions . There may be something . And Eric and Todd see what's going on in their regions .

There may be something . Or do something on a bigger basis to take your expertise and see how you can fit into this puzzle of . We have this disaster and I always teach . When I teach disaster courses , I tell everyone you know what a disaster is . Take a box of puzzles , take a box of puzzles , throw it up in the air and guess now what you got to do ?

You got to put all those pieces back together and sometimes puzzle pieces go faster and easier together and others take time and that's nothing . That's really what a disaster is . And where are you as far as being part of putting those , those puzzle ?

That experience gets you just a lot of practice and that if there ever was an emergency and you're the only guy that knows how to really run a radio or community , you're going to be more comfortable than , say , my next door neighbor that's never picked up the mic before and said anything . So I think it should be .

You are going to be handpicked first If you have a cool head . You know what I'm saying .

If you like to have a cigarette and have coffee , that's always a great way of getting in with that group and talking about stuff , because I wasn't that guy , but I would love to sit out there and BS with them with a cigar , and that's how you start talking and all of a sudden , but just like with Todd , you hit the nail on the head .

With that one too , the pull-up really helps .

They're technicians , they're getting into the hobby , like I was . They want to do it and they do an awesome job and they just get better and better , get smoother and smoother . And I think it's kind of like with anything you do , the more practice you do , the better you're going to get at it .

And and when you do hf and you're doing potosay and you get into a pile up , you know you're , you're managing your pile up and that's not an easy task to do .

And I didn't really think of it until I uh had a video I think it was one of eric's videos and I was working up , we were working a pile up , and my mother was like how did you learn to do all that ? Like that's pretty amazing that you go and what were those codes you were using ? But like for us , you know we do it every day .

It's just it's like you know we don't think about it , but I think people on the outside see it . It's a pretty impressive skill to work a radio , work a lot of people and log and get it all Like you said , multitask .

But it's also going to teach you how to , how to work from outside of the box in and bring some confidence . So if there is ever a failure somewhere , how are you not going to sweat and get the job done and and show that while you're still have have that radio control and taking check-ins ?

And then when someone jumps in , hey , standby , please stand by , I'm going to get to you , I'm going to get to you , you know . Hey , stand by , please stand by , I'm going to get to you , I'm going to get to you . You know that kind of stuff .

But take that script and just throw it away while still meeting the goals for what you have to do and want to do .

the net . To me that is a like a , you know it's not life or death , but it's a great experience of hey , we lost someone . You know we're going to continue on , we're going to get through this net . Everyone's going to get to hear what they wanted to say or whatever , and I've seen it done a few times .

And then if there's a new guy who's having trouble with it or doing it , another net control would hop in . But again , it's more practice and that's what our hobby is . I mean we get on the radio . What are we practicing for ? I mean we're hunting , we're , we're , we're making DX contacts , we're talking on the repeaters .

I mean I was very timid to get on the radio and get nervous . I remember making my first pushing the mic on the first repeater . I had like butterflies in my stomach because I didn't know what to expect and what were they going to think of me when they said it .

But , like you said , the more you do it , you know I'm , you know we throw our call signs out all the time and I'll talk to anyone who wants to talk to me . And I love it on the commute because if I can get someone to talk to me on the way in and the way back , it makes my commute fly by and it's uh , it's just good to catch up .

So I mean , I , anyone who's new , my , my biggest thing is you know it's great , you want to do and you'll find someone in a club or you know , on a YouTube you'll find your , your niche and you'll . You'll see what you want to do . And that's the way it worked for me and I really truly believe it will work with anyone that just starts dabbling into it .

And there's so many things to do in the copy it's crazy . I mean I haven't even touched , maybe I probably only touched like one percent of the hobby of a thousand hobbies yeah cool , all right , well , dude , awesome stuff .

We do , but that we're gonna have the podo power and ham radio duo , hopefully on power call two good groups , looking great people excellent . They were in the chat a little earlier ham radio duo so I don't know if they're still in there . But yeah , I love that we're to have both of those on . We're looking forward to that .

We had 35 in the chat there , so thank you guys for all hanging in there and participating in some awesome , good conversation . I think our numbers went up fast when we started doing something extra with Todd Paul's the star there as we know , that was fun to kind of mix things up there . Guys and Izzo , thank you again for coming and hanging out with us .

And whether you go to a club meeting or find somebody on social media or whatever , discord or whatever , next thing you know you're sharing ideas privately . Next thing you know you're having a cigar , you're going out for coffee , you know you're meeting up 50 miles . Again , the friendship builds Right 50 miles again .

You're going to get . You'd be very happy with all the great content over there . And , as always , if you're one of those guys that like , or gals that like to be on the end , the Patreon is a place to go .

So you can come , be a Patreon member and , don't forget , you can get right now on the store If I can hold the view here live free and ham Drams here . Those are a limited run , so get them while they're there and don't forget about the pigs man . Let's spread the love , let's show how much we love hammers and hamming out there .

If you don't know what I'm talking about , go back and watch the replay or just go to get hammedcom and check that stuff out and you know you'll learn a little bit more about that . So with that , guys , I appreciate you and thanks again for hanging out with us tonight , and with that I'm going to say seven , three , seven .