Advice from the HAM Radio Community

If anyone says the HAM radio community is a bunch of old guys playing around with out-dated toys, stop them right there! 

There's nothing "OLD" about HAM technology; and, there were a few young women at the HAM fest put on by the Massillon (OH) Amateur Radio Club as well.

In fact, an enterprising fellow named Daniel Estévez just recently landed the first amateur radio on the Moon, with the help of The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). You can check out his blog, here.

Unfortunately, I was not able to connect to his signal, even after running out of my Mother's house with my big antenna. The broadcast lasted only for a few days on 437.41 MHz, and I missed it. But, I think Daniel and JAXA, paved the way for more space exploration, specific to the radio field. 

Another thing I wanted to message was just how helpful the HAM community can be. 

A new set-up with the appropriate SWR meter

I needed an SWR meter for my new rig, I got an extremely in-expensive Astatic PDC1. I won't get into more details, but for those of you who don't know, SWR stands for Standing Wave Ratio. HAM operators need to know they have a low SWR ratio to make sure the output of their radio does not cause damage to their radios. 

Well, this inexperienced blogger used the Astatic PDC1. And, I did not know at-the-time that my particular model was designed ONLY for CB Radio, also known as Citizens Band Radio... And, my new SWR meter started to SMOKE. This is not to suggest that the Astatic is a bad product. It was just the wrong one for my set-up. 

Where did I go for better advice? Reddit of all places. (I know, the home of neck-bearded dorks who live in their moms' basements). However, it turns out this community is not-all bad. They were the ones who suggested the appropriate model for my set-up! 

What I ended up going with was the MFJ-862 UHF/VHF meter, which was a little more expensive and did not burn out. So, in the end, I got good advice from a Reddit user whose username was very NSFW ;)