Ham Radio License

[pkveazey]

Back around 1973, I had a Tunable hand held scanner. I was playing around with the tuner and hit upon a 2 meter ham radio conversation. There were several guys talking about meeting up at the local Pizza shop. I decide to trot on down there and introduce myself and ask about Ham Radio. Everybody except one ASSHOLE was very polite and helpful. Thanks to the ASSHOLE, I went home and learned CW code and studied for the General class test. At that time the Technician test was the General Class  Written test. TEN days later, I drove down to Norfolk, Va. to the FCC office and took the Novice test and 5 WPM code and then took the General class written test and passed. By the time my Technician license showed up in the mail I had gone out and bought a Yaesu 2 meter radio and was ready to get on the air and tell that ASSHOLE that I had my license. The point I'm trying to make is that getting a Ham License is not all that difficult. Now that they dumbed down the test and done away with the code, it should be a piece of cake for anyone to get on board. Having a Ham license is going to be a very valuable thing when it all goes bad. Now, if that isn't enough incentive to get you to at least look into it, I tried to get my wife to get her Tech License for a long time because I hated to have to keep in touch by CB radio. I bought her a Technician study book and she would read a little here and little there and when she got about halfway through it, Field Day showed up and I made a deal with her. You go with me to Field Day and take the test, if you fail it, I will pay the testing fee, if you pass it, you pay your own testing fee. She passed it. My point is, the tests have been dumbed down enough that nobody should be nervous about passing the tests.

[Felix]

"Dumbed down enough..."  -  gee thanks, pv    :-)    Maybe there's hope even for the likes of me?
Sadly, even if _could_ pass, I have no time or money for that in current prioritized (and pinched) budget.    But I would like to be able to listen in on my CCrane skywave .  (still need to get best antennae rig in place)
Question though...
Other prep/civil defense/tactical advice I've seen is that neighbors/team members should have radio links, ie "walkie-talkies" - with performance and flexibility, NOT toys.
One of the radios I've seen suggested is the BaoFeng UV-5R Ham, a "six pack" of these (for distributing here) running a "mere" $210.
I can't suppose to demand the mutual defense support neighbors would trouble to get licensed even if I did.   So any chit chat, never mind possibly grave circumstances, would be illegal.   Yes?
Is this a concern?    During times of civil breakdown when they might be needed most?

[Jackalope]

   The UV-5R is flexible, and they are cheap, both in price and build.  That being said, I have several that I loan out to neighbors and members of our MAG.  The Baofengs have had the ability to be programmed to transceive not only the 2 meter and 70 cm. amateur bands, but also on the FRS, MURS, and GMRS bands.  The FRS and MURS bands do not require licenses, but technically the UV-5R's are not FCC legal on those frequencies, even through they're capable of working on those bands.  I've read that some recently purchased UV-5R's will no longer transmit outside the amateur bands, so buyer beware, you might need to purchase radios from vendors outside the U.S.  The UV-5R's are disposable radios, they work, but from my experience with literally hundreds of them, we experienced about a 10% failure rate with them annually.  They are an adequate loaner radio, but personally I wouldn't depend on them if my life in danger, unless there was absolutely no other choice. 

[pkveazey]

Jackalope has pretty much answered the UV5R question but I'll add my 2 cents. Over the years, I've bought at least 20 of them and programmed them for all sorts of bands. All my family members have them ready to go and that will be our form of communication. I personally have have never had a failure with any of my UV5R's but a friend gave me one that quit transmitting but would still receive. The most versatile band is the 5 channel MURS(Multi-Use-Radio-Service) You are only allowed to operate at 2 watts on that band but you can put outdoor mobile or base station antennas on them and really reach out. To actually be legal you have to run in low power and not run the full 5 watts. Now as to the way I understand TYPE ACCEPTANCE. Type acceptance has to do with the selling of radios and nothing to do with the operation of radios. For instance, I can build my own transceiver and as long as it operates within the bandwidth, spurious image, power levels, etc. in the rules, then I'm good to go.  A home brew radio is not type accepted. There are a bunch of preppers near me and they have UV5R's and they will use MURS because they don't have Ham licenses. My wife is a Ham also and she and I always carry a UV5R with us everywhere we go and we communicate using Simplex(Direct one on one without the use of repeaters) Ham Frequencies. If I have to got too far away for Simplex, she yields and we monitor one of the repeaters. If you go with UV5Rs, make sure to buy extra battery packs. I have lost count of how many extra batteries that I have. If I ever have any of my UV5R's crap out on me, I'll use them for scavenger parts.

[Jackalope]

   Here's the discussion regarding new UV-5R's only transmitting in the amateur radio frequencies, the consensus more or less was the firmware has been updated to limit frequencies: https://www.ar15.com/forums/Outdoors/Baofeng-Troubleshooting/22-700760/

And Radiooddity, a Chinese vendor has a 5 pack of UV-5R's for under $120 with free shipping: https://www.radioddity.com/collections/consumer-radios-amateur-radios/products/baofeng-uv-5r-5-pack-cable   The Radioddity radios probably do not have the limited firmware.

[Felix]

Thank you jackalope & pkveazey for the info.   I pulled the trigger on jackalope's link, radios to arrive 5-7 days.
Then the fun begins, I get to learn radio programming - have seen recommendation to upgrade cable and download/use free software "CHIRP".
We shall see what we shall see...

[FeedingFreedom]

The cables are sometimes hit and miss. There are some easily-added features that I wish the UV-5 series had, like being able to edit scan list on the radio instead of having to do it on the PC. First order of business should be to get an upgraded antenna, all HT antennas are a compromise, but the Nagoya are really good, as are the bigger names like Diamond and Comet. If you want to be tacti-cool, you can get the Abree folding antenna. Just be sure to buy from a legit source, lots of fakes out there. And the audio from the speaker is pretty bad, but if you use a speaker mic or headset that's a non-issue. They're great and inexpensive backup/loaner/giveaway radios for what they cost.

Comsec can be a huge issue, depending on the threat you face. But that's a horse of a different feather.

I tell people that it's very easy to get your license now, and be able to familiarize with the radio and its use. Effective communication is a learned skill, and you don't want to be improvising or fumbling when you need to call for help. I point people at hamexam.org , it's free and structured to help you learn fast. Wish I had it when I took my Extra!