Looking for something to do this fine Saturday morning? For the US and Canadian readers out there, the fourth weekend in June is amateur radio field day, a day when all the amateur radio and ham geeks get together, string up a few antennas, and do their yearly community outreach/contact as many other radio heads as possible.
This weekend, there are more than 1600 field day events taking place all across the US and Canada. Odds are, you’re not more than a half hour drive from a field day event; you can find the closest one with the AARL’s handy Google Map of field day locations.
Since last year, we’ve seen a whole host of cool stuff to do with radio including a $20 software defined radio. If getting your license is too big of a step for you right now, you could at least plug a USB TV tuner dongle into your computer and see what is possible with radio. As a neat little bonus, you don’t even need a license for SDR. You might need a better antenna, and the ham guys at field day will be more than happy to point you into the right direction.
I remember going to these kind of things in the UK as a child, fantastic places to learn about radio and electronics in general, the ham guys really know their beans, they are the original hackers in the truest sense of the word!!
Awesome, I didn’t know they did this.
I think you meant “odds are”
I’ll be testing my broadband RFI generator today, sorry hammies!
Very fun and enjoyable if you want to see hams in action find a local field day and check it out will be going to one neer by later today !!
KJ4VYI
Chad
Hopefully amateurs in the KC area had the foresight to have a field day operation set up at the makere faire. I see the group I’m getting ready to go to didn’t have the foresight to map their location. A newly organised group in general, so sill learning the ropes. @ dielectric have you ever scan the bands during field day? Pretty much broad band, but exchanges get through No one us going to notice your efforts, save your money you’ll spend on power :) Enjoy the event everyone
Hams are often their own worst enemies at promoting the hobby – they could learn a bit from the maker faires. I’ve yet to find one that’s been well advertised or well organized. However, I must say that if there’s a swap meet, it’s definitely worth going to. And the ARRL handbooks are always interesting reading. CQCQCQDX
As a neat little bonus, you don’t even need a license for SDR
Umm… If you want to transmit on a frequency, you need to be licensed to broadcast on that frequency.
I assume the author means recieving only.
Would have been nice to know about this BEFORE the event.
if i had known earlier…
i coulda built something for the occasion…
coulda, woulda, shoulda
the pleas of a busy person,
or just someone working on an existing project ;)
fyi it’s ARRL not AARL