WHAT IS AMATEUR RADIO ?

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Amateur Radio is a fascinating technical hobby that is enjoyed by millions of people in almost every country of the world, including many countries where you might expect their totalitarian regimes to forbid, or at least discourage, such a hobby.   There are over 60,000 licensed Radio Amateurs in the United Kingdom alone.

Amateur Radio must not be confused with Citizens Band Radio, which is a totally separate and different activity.   CB operators are not required to have the same qualifications as Amateur Radio operators and do not, therefore, enjoy the range of facilities, operating modes or frequencies available to the Amateur Radio Service.

Newcomers to the hobby, especially those without a formal technical background, who are interested in the technical side and in building their own equipment, may find the technical section of this web-site interesting.

Potential Radio Amateurs have to pass a technical examination and, until July 2003, a Morse proficiency test, if they wished to operate on the HF bands, (Class A licence).   Morse was not necessary for the VHF only, Class B licence.   There were two grades of A and B Class licences.    These grades were designated Intermediate (formerly Novice) and Full.   There was, and still is, a further type of licence, designated the Foundation Class.   Each class of licence had different regulations relating to permitted bands and transmitter power output.   No licence is required in the UK to be a "short wave listener", but SWLs should be aware that they may accidentally hear some non-amateur transmissions that are subject to the Official Secrets Act, or are subject to other prohibitions relating to the reception, recording, or use of any received information.

Licensing arrangements in the UK have recently been radically changed, such that all new applicants must start at the Foundation Class level.   Proficiency in the Morse Code is no longer a requirement, following the decision taken at the World Radio Conference (WRC-03, held in Geneva from 9 June to 4 July, 2003) to abolish the mandatory Morse requirements for the Amateur Radio Service relating to operation on frequencies below 30MHz.   The Radiocommunications Agency therefore decided to merge existing UK Full Class A and Full Class B licence grades to form a single Full Licence having all the privileges of the old Class A grade.   It is possible that the Full licence will be called the Advanced licence in the future.   (Note that the functions and powers of the RA were transferred to the Office of Communications (OFCOM) at the end of December 2003).   The A and B grades of the Novice licence have also been merged to become a single Intermediate Licence.   These changes took effect on 26 July 2003, following publication of the appropriate notice in the London, Edinburgh and Belfast Gazettes.   The regulations relating to the Foundation Class licence, which include a rudimentary knowledge of the Morse Code, remain unchanged.

Every licensed Radio Amateur is issued with a callsign, which indicates the country issuing the licence and, in some countries, the class of licence and/or the region of the country where the station is located.   There are over eight hundred different, internationally agreed, callsign "prefixes", some representing very small, and often uninhabited, areas of the world.

England uses the prefixes G, M and 2E. Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey are regarded as separate countries and use the prefixes GM, GW, GI, GD, GJ and GU respectively, with the same additional letters being used in the M and 2 series.   Different callsign suffices are used to indicate the class of a licence.   Callsigns in the United Kingdom are issued by the Office of Communications (OFCOM).   Up to April 2000, callsigns were issued in strict alphabetical order within the various callsign series.   Hence it was possible to determine the approximate date of issue of a given callsign.   However, since April 2000, it has been possible to request an out-of-sequence callsign.

Radio Amateurs operate only within internationally agreed frequency bands, which, in many cases are for their exclusive use, although some are shared with other services.   Radio Amateurs do not share frequencies with the emergency services, the military, public broadcasting, aircraft, in-shore shipping, etc.   There have been instances of Press reports implying that Amateur Radio operators have been in direct communication with, or have deliberately interfered with, such services.   Licensed Radio Amateurs do not indulge in such illegal activities, even if their equipment is capable of operating on the appropriate frequencies, which, normally, it is not.

The one exception to this was the four year experiment set up by the UK Ministry of Defence, the Radiocommunications Agency and the RSGB, during which certain UK Radio Amateurs were granted Notices of Variation to the terms and conditions of their licences, enabling them to carry out propagation studies on spot frequencies in the 5MHz band in conjunction with UK military and military cadet stations.   Only holders of Full Licences were eligible to apply for these NoVs, which ceased to be valid at 23.59 GMT on 31 July 2006, although the experiment has subsequently been extended until 23.59 GMT on 30 June 2010.   However, new NoVs must be obtained by both holders of existing NoVs and other holders of Full Licences using OFCOM form OfW285 if they wish to use this band.   Further details of this experiment may be obtained from the RSGB.

Holders of Full UK Amateur Radio licences are permitted to operate on twenty five specific frequency bands, ranging from 136KHz to 250GHz, with some stations possessing the necessary NoV to operate on additional frequencies around 5.300MHz.   Each of these bands is sub-divided into sections where only specific types of emission or radiated power levels are permitted.   The details are too numerous to list here.   Full details were contained in booklet BR68 but they are now included in the new licence, which came into force on 1 December 2006.   However, holders of Intermediate and Foundation Licences are only allowed to operate with reduced power and only on some of these bands.   Full details were given in Booklets BR68/I and BR68/F respectively, but are now included in the new licence document.   A sample of this new licence document is available from OFCOM.

Most of these bands are available world-wide, with various minor variations in some countries.   However, the 70MHz band is only available in the UK and in a few other European countries.   Also, the USA has amateur allocations between 219.00MHz and 225.00MHz and between 902.00MHz and 928.00MHz.

The administrations of many countries allow visiting Radio Amateurs to operate under reciprocal arrangements.   Where this is permitted, some countries issue visitors with special callsigns indicating that they are operating with reciprocal licences, whereas other countries require visitors to use their own callsigns preceded by the prefix of the country being visited.

The main communication bands in the UK are shown below:-

                HF BANDS                                VHF BANDS
  1.81MHz to 2.00MHz     (160 metres)      50.00MHz to 52.00MHz   (6 metres)
  3.50MHz to 3.80MHz     (80 metres)       70.00MHz to 70.50MHz   (4 metres)
  5MHz spot frequencies  (60 metres)       144.00MHz to 146.00MHz (2 metres)
  (See note below)                         430.00MHz to 440.00MHz (70 centimetres)
  7.00MHz to 7.20MHz     (40 metres)
  10.10MHz to 10.15MHz   (30 metres)                  MICROWAVE BANDS
  14.00MHz to 14.35MHz   (20 metres)       1.240GHz to 1.325GHz   (23 centimetres)
  18.068MHz to 18.168MHz (17 metres)       2.310GHz to 2.450GHz   (12 centimetres)
  21.00MHz to 21.45MHz   (15 metres)       3.400GHz to 4.475GHz   (10 centimetres)
  24.89MHz to 24.99MHz   (12 metres)       5.650GHz to 5.850GHz   (6 centimetres)
  28.00MHz to 29.70MHz   (10 metres)       10.000GHz to 10.500GHz (3 centimetres)

   135.70kHz to 137.80kHz     501.00kHz to 504.00kHz (See note below)
   24.00GHz to 24.25GHz       47.00GHz to 47.20GHz     75.50GHz to 81.00GHz
   122.25GHz to 123.00GHz     134.00GHz to 141.00GHz   241.00GHz to 250.00GHz

 Channel Name     FA        FB        FC        FK        FL        FE        FM
 Frequency     5.260MHz  5.280MHz  5.290MHz  5.368MHz  5.373MHz  5.400MHz  5.405MHz

When using SSB, upper sideband with carrier frequencies set to 5.2585MHz, 5.2785MHz, 5.2885MHz, 5.3665MHz, 5.3715MHz, 5.3985MHz or 5.4035MHz, have to be used in order to remain within the limits of the specified channels.   Existing NoVs for operation on the four original frequencies expired at 23.59 GMT on 31 July 2006, although new NoVs extending the experiment until 23.59 GMT on 30 June 2010 are available.   These new NoVs permit operation on two extra channels (FK, 5.368MHz and FL, 5.373MHz).

OFCOM has decided to issue NoVs incorporating "Special Research Permits" to a very limited number of Full Licence holders allowing operation between 501kHz and 504kHz.   These permits are for genuine scientific research and were initially valid for twelve months starting on 1 March 2007 but the permits have now been extended until 28 February 2009.

Some years ago, NoVs were issued to several hundred UK Radio Amateurs, allowing operation on frequencies between 71.6kHz and 74.4kHz.   This band was allocated to the Amateur Radio Service in the UK on a temporary basis, until an international VLF allocation was agreed.   Now that the 136kHz band has been allocated to the Amateur Radio Service in many countries, including the UK, amateur use of the 73kHz band has been discontinued.   The issue of NoVs for this band ceased at the end of June 1998 and those issued prior to that date ceased to be valid at midnight on 30th June 2003.

There are a huge number of different facets to the hobby.   Some operators only wish to communicate with other operators and usually buy their equipment from one of the many specialist suppliers.   The first picture shows a typical modern transceiver for the short wave amateur bands.   On the other hand, some radio amateurs are only really interested in building equipment and often lose interest in using it once correct operation has been achieved.   In either case there are basically two modes of communication, excluding the more specialised modes which are mentioned later.   These two modes are Morse code and the various types of telephony.   Each has its dedicated group of followers.   It is worth noting that the Amateur Radio Service is the only officially recognised international radio service that still uses Morse code as one of its regular operating modes, although Morse is still used for identifying navigation beacons, frequency and time standards, fax and data transmitters and similar devices.

The first picture shows an FT-1000, made by the Japanese manufacturer Yaesu.   This rig (transmitter/receiver) is capable of operating on CW, single sideband using upper or lower sideband, amplitude or frequency modulation and two frequency shift keying modes, which are used for RTTY and packet.   The maximum power output from the transmitter section is 200W, with operation on all of the nine HF amateur bands between 1.8MHz and 30MHz.   The receiver section has continuous coverage over the range 100kHz to 30MHz.

The second picture shows an FT-726R, a rig also made by Yaesu, which is a multi-mode transceiver operating on the 50MHz, 144MHz and 432MHz VHF amateur bands.   The maximum power output from this rig is 15W on each band and it too is capable of operation using upper or lower sideband, CW, AM or FM.

Amateur Radio really started at the beginning of the "wireless" era, about 100 years ago.   Things were obviously very different then with all equipment being home constructed by a few very dedicated enthusiasts.   Amateur Radio, as we know it today, really started half a century later, following World War II, in the late '40s and '50s.   Tony, G3NPF, was first licensed in 1959.

Even then, most equipment was either converted ex-government equipment, which was cheap and easily available after the Second World War, or was entirely home built.   The third picture shows a typical home built station of around 1960.   The receiver is on the bench on the left and is an ex-government AR88 with a home built 144MHz converter above it, with the loudspeaker above that.   The microphone is a crystal microphone insert mounted in a home made metal stand.   It is standing on the bench in front of the receiver and has a white circular surround to the insert itself.

The rack contains a linear amplifier at the bottom, with the transmitter's power supply above and the mains control panel above that.   Next comes the HF transmitter, designed by G2DAF and built by G3NPF.   Above that is a 160m transmitter, designed and built by G3NPF.   The unit at the top of the rack is the aerial tuning unit.

In the mid '60s, a second rack was added which contained VFO controlled VHF transmitters for the 144MHz and 432MHz bands.   Both transmitters produced 150W of amplitude modulated RF output.   High powered, VFO controlled transmitters were very unusual on VHF at the time.   The transmitters were later modified to use frequency modulation when this became a popular mode of operation.   Amplitude modulation is hardly ever used now, except for some activity on 4 metres, although AM can still be heard on 160 metres and sometimes on 80 metres.

The station also included a radio teletype (RTTY) capability, using Creed type 3A and 7A mechanical teleprinters and a large quantity of ancillary equipment.

All this equipment used valves, took up a considerable space and was very heavy and cumbersome.   Nowadays, everything except very high power amplifiers, is transistorised and is very much smaller and more sophisticated.   Things have certainly changed over the last 40 years, except for the Morse key.   The key on the bench next to the microphone in the above picture is the same key that is next to the FT-1000 in the first picture.   For interest, it is an ex-government, Air Ministry "Key, Morse, Type D".   There is a photograph of the G3NPF/M1AIM shack (operating room), as it is today, in the "Pictures" section of this web site.   Anne, M1AIM, missed all the enjoyment and interest of these earlier years, as she did not become involved with Amateur Radio until 1991 and did not obtain her licence until 1996.

Although the majority of stations now use commercially made rigs, there are still a considerable number of amateurs who build their own ancillary equipment.   There are some who build all their equipment, much of it being "state of the art", with specifications that exceed those of commercially designed and built rigs.   This activity is known as "home brewing" and is a very important and interesting side of the hobby.   Indeed, Clause 1(1) of the Conditions of Use of the Amateur Radio Licence, as set out in BR68, stated that "The Licensee shall use the Station for the purpose of self-training in communication by radio telecommunications, which use (without limiting the generality of the foregoing) includes technical investigations".   The new licence states that the Station shall be used "for the purpose of self-training in radio communications, including conducting technical investigations and as a leisure activity and not for commercial purposes of any kind".   There can be no better method of achieving these ends than by designing, building and operating one's own equipment although, admittedly, it does not appeal to everybody.

In order to send and receive signals, it is also necessary to have a good antenna (aerial) system.   There are photographs of the antennas installed at the QTH of G3NPF/M1AIM in the "Pictures" section of this web site.   By some standards, these represent a very modest installation, with some operators using huge beam antennas mounted on very tall masts and towers.

Another very popular amateur radio activity is contest operating. In broad terms, this usually means contacting as many stations as possible within a specified time frame, often 24 or 48 hours.   There are scores of different contests throughout the year, each having their own set of specific requirements and rules.   Some are small contests sponsored by local radio clubs, whereas others are sponsored by the large national societies, such as the RSGB or the ARRL, and attract thousands of entries from all over the world.

Yet another facet of the hobby is the collection of certificates and other awards indicating achievements in various aspects of operating.   These include awards for working different countries, probably the most prestigious of which is DXCC, the starting point being proof of contacts (QSL cards) with 100 different countries.   There are awards for CW operating proficiency, contacting locator squares on VHF bands, "Worked all Britain" (WAB) squares, "Islands on the Air" (IOTA) and many others.   G3NPF and M1AIM, are not particularly interested in these activities, although G3NPF does enjoy collecting "locator squares" and countries worked on 50MHz.   A regularly updated map showing the current tally is posted on this web- site.

As mentioned above, there are many specialised operating modes, in addition to Morse code and telephony.   These include digital modes, such as Packet, RTTY, JT6M, JT44, PSK31, FSK441, AMTOR, PACTOR and analogue modes such as slow scan television.   These modes utilise software installed on the station computer used in conjunction with the main HF and VHF transceivers.   The software programmes used by G3NPF and M1AIM are WINPACK, in conjunction with a KAM All Mode TNC, for Packet and AMTOR, WinPSKse for PSK31, WSJT for FSK441, JT6M and JT44, MMTTY for RTTY and MMSSTV for slow scan TV.   Fast scan television is only used on the UHF and microwave bands and utilises converters to down-convert the received signal to a channel that is compatible with a normal TV receiver.   Specialised transmitting equipment is also required.   Also, the circuit techniques used on the higher frequencies are totally different to those used at much lower frequencies.

Although not strictly Amateur Radio, another interesting activity is the reception of weather pictures from satellites.   The easiest satellites to receive are those in low earth orbit such as the American NOAA series or the Russian Meteor series.   Sample images from NOAA and Meteor satellites are included in the Picture Gallery.   These satellites transmit on various frequencies between 137MHz and 138MHz and only simple antennas such as crossed dipoles are required.   The receiver used by G3NPF/M1AIM is a modified Pye Westminster, the audio output from which is fed into the station computer running the appropriate decoding software.

In our case, the preferred programme is called WXtoImg although we have used WXSAT.   These programmes, together with WinPSKse, WSJT, MMTTY and MMSSTV are freeware (for private use) and WINPACK is shareware requiring a nominal registration fee.   All these programmes may be downloaded via the Internet (see "Software Library" for the appropriate hyperlinks).

Many stations confirm contacts (QSOs) by exchanging QSL cards.   Normally, neither G3NPF nor M1AIM send or collect QSL cards but during June 2002 all United Kingdom Radio Amateurs were given the option of adding a "Q" to their callsign prefixes to celebrate the Queen's Golden Jubilee.   As this was a unique opportunity for stations to use the special prefixes, both G3NPF and M1AIM signed GQ3NPF and MQ1AIM during this period and all contacts and shortwave listener reports were confirmed with a special jubilee QSL Card.   QSL cards may be sent direct to the station concerned, if the address is known and one is prepared to pay the postage, or they may be sent in bulk to a QSL bureau.   The national amateur radio societies of most countries in the world operate QSL bureaux.

Like most specialised hobbies or activities, Amateur Radio has its own jargon, which is often meaningless to everybody else.   A couple of examples are "to work a station", which means to have a contact with the station and "after burner", which means an amplifier to boost the power output from a transmitter.   Codes and abbreviations are often used, particularly on CW. The full lists of Q-Codes and Z-Codes may be viewed by clicking the appropriate link, but only a few of the Q-Codes, and none of the Z-Codes, are used by the Amateur Service.

The best way of getting to know the meaning of all this jargon is to listen to stations on the air.   Short wave listening, as this activity is called, used to be the normal "apprenticeship" to getting a ticket (obtaining a licence).   Sadly, this is becoming less common, with more and more people coming into the hobby without knowing any of its history and many traditions.   A list of the more common abbreviations and expressions used in Amateur Radio contacts may be viewed by clicking this link.   Go to the "Sound" page to hear examples of some of the things to be heard on the amateur bands.

It is impossible to deal in depth with any of the branches of Amateur Radio in a quick résumé such as this.   Also, the above notes are intended to give an idea of what Amateur Radio is all about to people who have no previous knowledge of the subject.   If you are already familiar with the hobby, you will know all of this anyway.   If you want further information, please follow the appropriate links on the various pages of this web site, study some of the many magazines and books on the subject, and join a local Radio Club.

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