Amateur Radio Newbie
M7FEX - JAY - Wirral
Amateur Radio Newbie
My Radio's
Retevis RT95 (Base/mobile)
Retevis RT95 (Base/mobile)
Retevis RT95 (Base/mobile)
A brilliant mobile radio to use as a base station or to use mobile, I would highly recommend this radio to any beginners or amateurs that like to collect decent radio equipment.
Quansheng UV K5(8)
Retevis RT95 (Base/mobile)
Retevis RT95 (Base/mobile)
The Quansheng is an inexpensive radio that can be modified and Flashed at https://whosmatt.github.io/uvmod/
A video demonstrating how to mod this radio can be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m3zXH__BRPM&ab_channel=HamRadioDX
Quansheng UV K5
Anytone AT-D878UVII Plus
Anytone AT-D878UVII Plus
The Quansheng K5 and K5(8) are identical radios, but have a distinct design. Modifications can be performed at https://whosmatt.github.io/uvmod/
(Flash directly)
Anytone AT-D878UVII Plus
Anytone AT-D878UVII Plus
Anytone AT-D878UVII Plus
One of the most popular DMR Radios on the market is this one! Once you become familiar with the interface, it becomes easy to program, use, and navigate. Currently, I am utilizing mine with a MMDVM Hotspot.
Discover M7FEX's Story
So it all started with me buying a Baofeng UV-5RE When i was about 19 - 20 yrs old, I bought it off wish for around 20 pounds. I thought "Yes I can listen in to peoples conversations and maybe even the police" but after some research and web browsing i soon realised that listening to the police was never going to happen, Well not in the UK anyway as they use Tetra Radio which is more secure then any radio network!
I Had my Baofeng for many years and used it time to time when i was bored, I thought to myself (One day soon ill get a licence and ill join in chatting to others). I put it off for many many many years. I had purchased the older version of the Amateur radio foundation booklet, Gave it a flick through and then stored it away and eventually I lost it during a couple of home moves.
So Years on and here we are in 2023 in Late November - Early December and i finally put in for my foundation exam after umm'ing and arr'ing about whether i should or shouldn't. By this stage I’ve only watched the Essex ham radio videos (modules) about once as i had previously signed up to there site and downloaded all there you tube module videos for the future if I wanted to go over them again. So now this was it! I had paid for the exam and had a pre exam and exam date booked and it was all or nothing, I had thrown myself in the deep end and there was no getting out of it now. I won't lie but i left my revision until the day of my exam and didn't study at all, apart from that one time i re-watched the Essex ham videos.
During my wait for my exam i had accidentally broke my old Baofeng radio and don't know how but i went onto Ali express and bough myself a Quansheng UV K5 and a UV K5(8). I had watched various You Tube videos with other Ham enthusiasts and Amateur radio licensees raving about how they was amazing, open source and had no limits not to mention was cheaper then ordering a takeaway on a Friday night! That’s right I said cheap! The UVK5 cost me about £20 and the UVK5(8) about £13, I was made up to have gotten a pair of dirt cheap Analogue ham radios for this much.
So It was D-Day (04/12/2023) and I watched most of the Essex ham module videos, skipping past the easy bits I already knew (Common sense stuff) and waited anxiously for my exam saying to myself "yeah ill smash this exam, its going to be fine" But little did i know that when I finally got into the exam and i had logged into test reach (Online Exam app), The questions were worded so complex as well as the answers which threw me completely off with quite a lot of the exam! I panicked and kept picking up my Reference Data Sheets and looking through. After coming to submit the exam I had the thought "I don't think I’ve passed this" But of course I had getting 21 out of 26 correct. I definitely did not know how i did that.
So now its the 7th of December and my certificate has come and my letter and I’m sure you can guess the rest (Applied for the licence, applied for a dmr number etc). So now its time to really learn as i go and get into this as I’m finally able to transmit and talk to others on the amateur bands!