I've actually seen my young amateur radio communities die off during this new solar minimum, and a lot of my friends sold their expensive equipment. You really need money and space right now unless you want to sit at your desk and do some of the new low SNR "can talk to the mars rover with a wet sock as an antenna" modes that a lot of people don't like because it's too easy and poses no challenge. There's also VHF/UHF, but that's mostly older clique's.

It's definitely a slowly dying hobby.

You should be able to talk to anyone in the USA with 100W and a wire antenna.

I think the bigger issue is noise in urban areas. The FCC does a shit job of regulating noisy equipment. I had to go through my house and dispose of certain Ethernet switches, an audio device, notebook power supply, etc.

Is there a good description of what those $100 in parts for satellite work are? Or better yet, something purchasable that's likely to work? I've been wanting to get into it, but I've never found a really accessible guide to getting started in satellite communication.

Sure! To talk to a satellite you need an antenna, a receiver, a transmitter, and maybe a computer—not for voice, but for text modes.

Arrow will sell you a great antenna: http://www.arrowantennas.com/arrowii/146-437.html , or you can google "tape measure yagi" and build an okay antenna.

Then you can get the transmitter and receiver together, in a package like the regrettable BaoFeng UV-5R: https://www.amazon.com/BaoFeng-UV-5R-Dual-Radio-Black/dp/B00... . This is a terrible radio. Their quality control is so bad that you sometimes commit a federal offense by pressing the transmit button—and for $100, you can't afford the test equipment to tell! So maybe use it as the receiver in a two-radio setup, and transmit with something like a Wouxun KG-UV9D.

A Kenwood TH-D72A is an excellent choice to do the transmitter and receiver jobs, but hundreds of dollars. A Yaesu FT-60 is a great choice too, but it won't have full duplex—so you can't be sure your signal is getting out without help.

To listen to a satellite you need even less: a crappy antenna and an RTL2832 USB software-designed radio: https://www.adafruit.com/product/1497

For all of these, you'll end up wanting miscellaneous coaxial cable and a bunch of ends. Hams tend to build up a library of crimpers and spare ends and such, so look to borrow from a friend or a club as you get started. The 75 Ω cable that's ubiquitous for television signals will totally work, but you'll have much less loss and much much less stress on components if you buy 50 Ω cable.

Why not try the tutorial at https://www.rtl-sdr.com/rtl-sdr-tutorial-receiving-noaa-weat... ? If that works, you can expand from there: the tutorial teaches you a huge amount about aiming at satellites and the physical work necessary to capture signals from space.

Thank you! This really comprehensive. I'll probably start with the NOAA weather tutorial, and go from there.

In addition to the resources others have posted, I recommend picking up a copy of the AMSAT Getting Started book: https://www.amsat.org/product/2018-edition-of-getting-starte...

I haven't looked into satellite work in fifteen years or so, but back then it was definitely possible to work the LEO FM repeater satellites using a handheld and a small yagi - typically two elements 144MHz, five on 432MHz if memory serves.

With handhelds being dirt cheap and a yagi cut from a measuring tape being an option, I don't think getting on satellite for $100 sounds undoable.

You could make a good tape measure yagi and use it with a cheap radio like the UV-5R. It needs to be dual-band (440mhz and 2m); AMSATs are usually duplex.

http://theleggios.net/wb2hol/projects/rdf/tape_bm.htm

> There are more hams in the US, and more active hams, than ever before

I apologize for repeating the doom and gloom then, because I know it can be self-fulfilling.

The AARL has optimism but it also tells us net licenses are up <1% per year and "the large number of Baby Boomers will soon be aging off the licensee rolls", predicting "a significant decline in the number of hams, unless we take steps to reverse it." Source: http://www.arrl.org/news/more-than-30-000-new-ham-licensees-...

A decentralized, no-carrier/ISP, disaster-tolerant medium for private communication would be amazing.

I am not a licensed ham so this question is naive: If the major concern of allowing private communication over amateur bands is an influx of private commercial communication, then could bandwidth limits, protocols, signatures (amateur-vs-commercial), and enforcement be worth at least a trial? Perhaps on a new or limited existing band?

A government-run experiment to address demand for this limited public resource seems reasonable.

If you want that, there are plenty of ISM bands and loads of cheap equipment you can use to build such "decentralized, no-carrier/ISP, disaster-tolerant medium for private communication" (aka internet ...)

HAM radio bands are meant for R&D work, learning and basically hobby stuff, not to replace internet or phone services - in fact, the regulations explicitly forbid such use.

Then why is it the hams from whom we hear about such feats as "ionosphere skipping", and not any makers of 2.4GHz equipment?

Well, in part because the maximum usable frequency of the ionosphere tops out around 30-60 MHz?

Got it, so a meshnet using ISM bands is limited by the radio horizon, meaning that unless the equipment is produced in very high numbers, the links won't be close enough to connect at all, outside urban areas or perhaps a few towns.

> A decentralized, no-carrier/ISP, disaster-tolerant medium for private communication would be amazing.

That can be done without encryption, though.

Take a look at Broadband-HamNet. It's exactly all these things.

Anyone else get a certificate error on the princeton website?