Who are amateur shortwave hams

And why would you (not) want to be one of us

HAM radio operators are a separate caste in the world of electronics enthusiasts (electronics), about whose secret life to the average soldering iron and arduinostroitelu little is known. Further in the text, the words "radio amateur", "radio" will be called amateur radio operators.



Under the cut is an inexpressibly tedious article without a single picture for those who want to learn a little more, but do not yet know where to start asking questions, as well as for those who, contrary to logic and common sense, still want to join this Brownian movement.
And also - about ultrashort waves

The history of radio amateur begins with the invention of radio communication as such, when it began to experiment with an increasing number of enthusiasts who used the opportunity to establish radio communication with their hobby colleagues exclusively in the form of a hobby, without kl. benefits. Since professional telecoms workers from the very beginning were interested in the possibility of increasing reliable communication range, commercial communication, bilateral and broadcasting, concentrated in areas of long and superlong waves, which more easily skirted the obstacle in the form of a horizon and provided decent ranges. Radio amateurs, on the other hand, identified useless short waves that practically did not look beyond the horizon and were of no interest. Therefore, it is radio amateurs who are credited with discovering the ionospheric passage of radio waves, reflecting them from Heaviside layers, which purely practically discovered the possibility of communicating on short waves with any point of the earth, including the long path, and even the possibility of the existence of a round-the-world radio echo when the radiated energy skirted the earth several times . As soon as this was discovered and experimentally confirmed, commercial, service and military radio stations of broadcasting and two-way communication rushed into the area of ​​short waves, and radio amateurs were identified with several narrow bands, which almost invariably survived to the present day. Plus, as other users switched to ultrashort waves, to satellite communications, and the like, they managed to free up several more ranges, plus the historical ones, on which all shortwave activity occurs.

Although the term “short waves” rather unambiguously refers to the frequency range of 3 ~ 30MHz, in everyday life it’s radio waves that are called short waves, rather than the entire shortwave region of the spectrum, and the shortwave also includes the medium wavelength band 160m (1.8MHz) and sometimes the longwave bands. Much less often to the short waves include the VHF band 6m (50MHz). This is not a mistake, but a tradition to associate the use of bands with shortwave.

A bit of biology. Today, there are three types of radio amateurs:

• Sibishniki, operators of Citizen Band stations (aka 27MHz), for which in many countries obtaining a license (permit for a radio station) is extremely simplified, while in many other countries a license is not required at all, equipment is sold and used freely. The CB range was originally intended for solving purely practical tasks by citizens; before universal cellular telephony, it was often the only expedient way of communicating with remote objects like a summer house or a roadside store. Today, conventionally, all the trucks in the world have radio stations of this range, so that drivers are in constant contact with each other, despite all of your Internet networks. Naturally, among the abundance of users were those who were interested to carry out radio communications "down the aisle" - with abnormally distant correspondents, solely for the sake of entertainment or a kind of sport, to establish the farthest connection or to establish a connection with a region from which no one is heard.
• Free broadcasters (aka radio bullets, radio pirates). This category fundamentally refuses to legalize its activities, is censured by the authorities and is ambivalently perceived by licensed radio observers. The maximum popularity of free broadcasting fell on the former Soviet Union, where it was both a form of protest, and often the only opportunity to come to the radio in circumvention of the prohibitions and restrictions of the then official amateurism. Lovers collected barrel-organs, played music and shouted to the distance. Fragments of this activity are easy to hear in the region of a hundred meters today. In the world, the movement of free broadcasters is not particularly popular due to the initially greater availability of legal types of communication for everyday needs or for hobbies.
• Licensed radio transmitters that have received the appropriate licenses from the communications administrations of their countries. About them will be discussed.

To become a radio, you need to get a radio license. Usually it looks like this: you apply to the national radio organization or directly to the communications administration of your country, you pass the qualification exam - yes, you need to prove that you are sufficiently prepared to be entrusted with the right to use the radio station as a hobby (and not as a commercial user for money), and on the basis of the exam you get a license and assigned call sign. The call sign is the first and only name of a radio transmitter, by which it identifies itself and other radio transmitters; duplicate, identical call signs do not exist, all are unique.

The structure of amateur callsigns is simple and logical, but not without rare exceptions, which we will not focus on.

A typical call sign looks like AB1CDE .

AB is a prefix by which a territory is uniquely identified (a country or a specific region of a country, if such a division is provided). Most often consists of two letters, sometimes from one letter, sometimes from letters and numbers. Minimally interested in aviation, it is easy to find that the radio prefixes are equal to ICAO prefixes.

1 - one digit. This is a mandatory element of the amateur call sign, including distinguishing it from the call sign of the aircraft. The digit separates the prefix of the callsign from the suffix. However, if the prefix consists of a letter-digit, then the digit after the prefix is ​​sometimes omitted and only in exceptional cases (the memorial call sign RAEM) is the digit absent altogether. In some cases, there are more than one numbers, almost always it is a temporary call sign in honor of some event, some kind of round date. In some countries, the figure does not mean anything and is given in order of increasing numbers or just by chance. In some countries, the figure indicates a specific geographic region within a country. In some countries, the number means a class of license or carries any other information.

CDE is a suffix consisting of one to four letters, usually prominent in order of increasing numbers. Sometimes the first or even the second letter may matter, for example to indicate the geographic region of the country or the class of the license.

There is no need to memorize all this, you just need to understand the principles, frequently encountered call signs will be remembered by themselves, and unusual, obviously new ones for you, will cause an irresistible desire to “work” the station with a new call sign as soon as possible. Take, for example, the call sign W5UN - this is a real-life operator, very famous in his circles. W means the continental part of the United States, there could be one letter or two, specifically this operator has one. 5 indicates a conditional region (AR, LA, MS, NM, OK, TX), and the letters UN are obtained simply in turn or selected from those unoccupied at that time. A conditional region is not guaranteed, since in the United States it is allowed to keep your call sign when moving, and you can also receive a call sign of your choice (free), including the number of a foreign region. We can also assume from only four characters in the call sign, although it is a special case for the United States that the operator has the highest license class, i.e. maximum tolerance. The fact is that in most countries (but not, say, in Japan), when upgrading a license class, the right to choose a shorter call sign is given, but not everyone uses this right, so a long call sign does not necessarily mean a low license class, but a short one almost always means high class license.

Take another example - P3X, also a real-life operator. By the prefix P3, we define Cyprus, the digit is generally omitted, and the suffix consists of just one letter X. This is a special callsign for competitions, it was given to the radio daily 5B4AMM radio receiver exclusively for use during radio sport competitions (we will return to the competitions), where 5B is the prefix, 4 is the separating prefix number and AMM is the call sign suffix received in turn.

What, in fact, do radio transmitters? The main areas are:

• Design and manufacture of equipment and antennas. A modern radio station is a very complex instrument in the design and manufacture, so the industry offers a variety of sets of varying degrees of difficulty, making it possible for amateur radio engineers to build different levels of training, rather than leaving it to individual engineers. Many owners of finished industrial radio stations solder equipment simpler simply because they like the process, and not at all because they cannot afford factory devices. The same applies to antennas and auxiliary equipment, the manufacture of which for many is not a way to save money, but a way to realize oneself in this hobby. But it’s actually a pleasure to establish a link on your home-made product, even if it is inferior by an order of magnitude to the existing factory apparatus!
• Sport. There are various competitions in radio sport, the general principle of which is to conduct as many radio communications as possible in a fixed time, and each radio communication is evaluated by conditional points the higher it is technically more complex. There is no time for talking, just to fix the very fact of establishing a connection - the exchange of callsigns, reports on the strength of the received signal and, as a rule, sequence numbers, according to which the refereeing takes place. There are also various degree programs in which the operator is not limited by time at all, or the time frame is very wide - it is necessary to establish a certain number of radio communications according to the rules of a particular degree program in order to receive a commemorative certificate or sign confirming achievement. An example of one of the most popular graduate programs in the world is DXCC. To fulfill the minimum conditions of the diploma, it is necessary to have connections with at least one hundred “territories” on the DXCC list, today there are 340. Usually each administrative country is equal to one DXCC territory, but some countries are divided into separate “territories” if there are geographical prerequisites. For example, Spain consists of a semi-mainland, while the Balearic Islands are considered a separate "territory", Ceuta and Melia are also considered one separate "territory", as well as the Canary Islands are also considered separately, which gives a total of four territories per administrative one country. Despite this number of territories, it’s not easy to establish connection with just a hundred of them, as it seems - many populated areas are far away and it’s not easy to technically communicate with them, and even more territories are not very populated with radio transmitters and, although technically they are easily accessible, there is no one who will answer your call.
• Just idle talk about radio, antennas and the like. Since the subject of the radio is obviously common to all radio receivers, free conversations, one way or another, revolve around the radio. In some countries there is a direct restriction on the subject of negotiations - radio equipment and antennas, radio sports and radio wave propagation, weather. In other countries, there are no explicit prohibitions, but the unwritten rule is the same. Also in some countries there is a direct prohibition to transmit information from / to third parties, even if they are also radio transmitters. If you are not interested in such a topic - you have nothing to do among radio cameras, because you will not find other topics for conversation. Politics, religion, commerce, abusive behavior - under the strictest prohibition. For everything that is not within the scope permitted for radio cameras, there is a CB range for which you do not need to take a qualifying exam and, even if your country requires a license, getting it will be a strictly formal matter.

How, in fact, conducted communication. First, there are several types of signal modulation. Usually they coincide, but it is possible to carry out communications in different forms. Communication is usually carried out on the same frequency, but often use a small separation of frequencies and even different bands. No one has his own frequency. Frequency unoccupied at a given time is temporarily occupied by an operator who makes a general or directed call. Who hears and wants to answer - is responsible. Then, when the calling operator finishes work or changes the frequency, the previously occupied frequency will be released and any other interested person can immediately take it. The calling operator first calls the call sign of the one whom he calls, or gives a general call, after which he calls his call sign. The operator answering him also first calls someone else's call sign - the one to whom he answers, and then his own. Or, as is usually the case in practice, the respondent calls only his call sign and, if the caller hears him and wants to communicate with him, he will call him targeted, by call sign - as it usually happens in competitions when there is no time (you need to have time to spend as many connections as possible for the allotted period), and also when a relatively rare station calls, with which many people want to “work out” (to make a connection) and simply have no time to waste time and keep waiting.

In terms of signal modulation, use the following options:

• Telegraph, Morse code. Radio transmitters traditionally call it CW, whereas it would be more accurate to say A1A. Why did the radio operators, at the dawn of their inception, the advanced detachment of telecommunications workers, who owned many achievements in mastering the practice of radio communications, hit retrograde and still use an obsolete type of modulation, which professional communicators long ago refused, and in many countries the ability to transmit by hand and receive is the telegraph by ear still part of the qualifying exam? The answer from the point of view of communications administrations in many countries would have sounded something like this: since amateur communication can be used in emergency conditions instead of for some reason crashed commercial / state channels, it is necessary that operators can conduct communications including on homemade equipment from literally one transistor, after all life can depend on it. But among the radios themselves opinions differ. Someone argues that the telegraph - the most "long-range" view that is wrong (the "figure" "long-range"). Someone is simply far from the technology and operates with concepts like "we have been taught - even if they (beginners) are taught." And for adequate amateurs, the telegraph is simply a sport, because any sport has conditional limitations, called rules. Here are the radio sportsmen who like to play by such rules. The obvious complexity of the telegraph is the need to master the transfer (not very difficult) and reception (more difficult, but also not impossible). Also, the telegraph has a low data transfer rate, but for sports purposes it is a great view, despite retrograde.
• Telephony. An extensive section in which the vast majority belongs to SSB (J3E). It should be noted that the equipment intended for SSB is relatively difficult to design and configure, so the transition to SSB was resisted for a long time, remaining true to AM (A3E). But with the advent of commercial equipment and the publication of relatively amateurish developments for repetition, the transition to SSB successfully ended with an unconditional victory for SSB, which gives roughly half the occupied bandwidth with equal transmitted information, and this saves a scarce radio frequency resource and the potential for improving the signal-to-noise ratio. Today AM is almost never used. The second most popular with a catastrophic gap is FM (F3E), which is much more common on the amateur VHF bands or on the non-radio CB band. There are also various types of digital telephony, when the voice of the operator is digitized and transmitted as a data stream. These options so far can be considered more experimental, although in the foreseeable future their role may significantly increase. Despite the seeming simplicity of making connections in telephony — which is easier, take a microphone and shout, this is the most complicated way in the sense that it requires a larger signal-to-noise ratio than the telegraph and, moreover, some types of “numbers”. This means that the telephone operator needs better antennas in order to better receive the weak signals of his correspondents, as well as to be better audible himself. Also, the operator-telephonist should pay attention to the quality of his modulation - use high-quality microphones, use channel stripes to receive and pre-process the signal from the microphone, unless such functionality is built into the radio station itself. After all, the better prepared a signal is, the easier it is to receive it at a weak level, which means that the more likely it is to make radio contact with someone who is hard to hear because of a long distance or weak equipment, and this is the luck of the territories with which to communicate interesting. And with sufficiently high signal levels, when correspondents are able to hear the subtle nuances, it is nice to receive compliments to your signal. In general, telephony is somewhere near broadcasting and pro-audio, which allows enthusiasts to get double pleasure from several hobbies at the same time.
• Typography or "number." There is a huge number of completely different types of modulation, which is common for the station transmitter using a specialized device (in ~ 100% of cases it is a general-purpose computer with a sound card with which the specialized device is emulated), which accepts typed text with keyboard, modulates it in a known manner and sends to the air. From the receiving side, a similar device decodes the received signal and displays the text on the screen. There are relatively high-speed modes, spitting out a lot of information per unit of time, and there are relatively slow ones, which, thanks to repeated redundancy of coding, make it possible to obtain stable reception of signals much weaker than an experienced telegraph operator could accept. Since most of the work is performed by a computer, rather than an operator, these are relatively simple types of communication, requiring neither operator's high qualifications nor high-end equipment, therefore, attractive for beginners and for those who for organizational reasons cannot use the equipment better. Separately, it is necessary to single out, perhaps, RTTY (radioteletype), the oldest of the most common types of "numbers" and the least perfect - it does not provide for any redundancy, so there is no way to detect and correct an error. But precisely because of this, RTTY is used in competitions - to increase the role of the operator, and not to turn radio competitions into competitions for autonomous computer programs.

The old tradition of radioamination is the exchange of postcards, called QSL cards, confirming the fact of establishing a connection and often giving additional information about the station, which may be interesting in itself or necessary to complete diploma programs. Some radio collectors collect QSL cards, so for their sake they want their own card besides the utilitarian function to have some hint of artistic design, some are needed only as evidence of radio communications for diplomas, and some do not exchange cards at all, and this is a problem for all those who need a card for a collection or for diplomas. Fortunately, there are electronic exchange systems that are instant and free for users of these systems, but the number of those who register and regularly report their connections is still relatively far from total.

What will you get from joining a radio radio? Loss of money for equipment, loss of time to work on the air, conflicts with family and neighbors due to unintentionally created radio interference. Will radio broadcasting make you better? Of course not. But then why? Well, imagine what you saw in these Hi-Res images of your Internet, say, Saturn. Now remember what it was like to see him in a children's telescope, where, shaking in convective currents, a dim fat point was visible with something in which only a visionary could see the ring, and if he was lucky, Cassini’s crack. So here: you can connect with any point of the earth without getting up from the sofa, simply via the Internet, and if the sofa is too far, then through satellites. But still, it is exciting - to communicate directly, without the Internet, only at the expense of its equipment and cameramanship.