Virginia Gun Owners Forum - VGOF

VACoastie wrote:I was actually thinking of getting mine. Our primary function as an OS in the CG is radio Comms so I figured it'd be a cool thing to get and set up a base at my house as a hobby.

Having comms gear that doesn't use any infrastructure you don't control is a nice plus. Also learning how to use it, and keeping in practice before you need it is a good skill to build up too.

The tech license should take the average person < 20 hours of studying. If you've got some basic electronics in your background... even less. If you know the difference between a capacitor and a resistor, and an switch, and can recognize them on a schematic probably just need to learn the FCC rules, and some basic operating guidelines.

Find a local ham club, and someone probably has a tech study manual on the shelf they will loan you.

That's everything that we do (rules wise) and the schematics are pretty easy for me since our Electronics Technicians use them a bit and I'm a curious cat and ask "what's that?" Haha.

I figured if my job revolves around Emergency/Distresses, Radio Communications and responding to National Emergencies, a HAM base at my house would help further impact those around me in a positive light. I don't know how yet, but I'll figure something out.

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Three things:

YEP ON THE PRIMITIVE CAMPING! IN LIKE FLYNN! I'll pop the BOB, and give it a test.

Sorghum...Mmmmm, yeah, that may be the way to go...

And Coastie, keep us up to date on the Ham license thing. I have done precursory research, didn't seem bad, or difficult, but I never progressed to pricing gear, but agreed. NON-grid communications just FEEL better in disasters!

I like the Chicken Band in my truck, but the Ham bands would be awesome at home. My cousin has decided to get back into ham. He had gotten out of it, but is redeveloping interest.

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Do they have a bacon band yet? Or does that qualify as a ham?

If they come out with Bacon Band, I'm all over it. Probably irritate GF, though. She already is not very happy with my hot rodded radio. Unless the weather is severe or there seems to be an accident. .. then she likes the updates that come over the thing.

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We got good news! We are now free to sell our property whenever we please! We had gotten the 2009 homebuyers tax credit...which considering I will never ever see SS or anything else of the $$ we bring home I did not feel bad about getting....but we thought that meant we could not move for 5 years. We found out last week that it was 3 not 5 years. Woot woot! So our timetable just went into overdrive.

Chris did not like Dinwiddie county....whatever...so we are looking at several properties in Amelia and Powhatan. All over 10 acres, some as much as 50. WOOT WOOT!

That's awesome, MamaBear. Congratulations on that, and good luck to you.

I've got a friend in Powhatan; he's right happy, there. Plus, he's owned property there since he was 20; as frugal as he is, I'm guessing that the property taxes are fairly reasonable.

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That's great News....Keep us posted of your progress !

Homesteading as prepping? I think the answer is a big yes. When people ask me if I'm prepping, I always reply "you've confused prepping with homesteading". No one needs to know if you're prepping.