As of February 2025, I am a licensed Foundation amateur in the UK. My callsign is M7XXI, and if you wish to QSL, see the contact me page. I am interested in the 2m and 70cm bands, and outside of amateur I do a lot of meshtastic (34cm) and PMR446 (67cm) working too.
I am using a Baofeng UV5RM currently, which seems to be doing a pretty good job (although I can feel the upgrade button itching to be pushed as RX is certainly not brilliant). I have also cobbled together a /P rig using a slim jim inside a casing up the top of a pole, which I find radiates particularly well!
Since being licensed I’m less active on 446 now.
I’m using a standard PMR446 radio to remain within the power and type compliance of the 446 bands. I only have TX access to the first 8 channels, but by using the Baofeng radio in recieve only, I can RX on all 16 channels. Generally when making 446 contacts, I use the Baofeng in recieve as it has a much better reciever than my 446 radio. This, and a lot of height from whatever hill I happen to be standing on seems to make making contacts significantly easier.
Sadly, there’s not much of a 34cms community in Newcastle as in Edinburgh but the board remains on for when one begins to form
I’m using a Heltec V3 board. It’s fantastic, and very fun to use, and I’ve made some decent contacts in Edinburgh. I’m amazed with the range, I can hit Glasgow very easily using other people’s more powerful antennae thanks to the meshed nature of the network.
Tagged as: utility-pages radio