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I should hope not. I carry this with me every day. It receives 100KHz to 1.3GHz, and can monitor nearly all analog voice modes. I doubt that this would be illegal in any state, and if it was, the ARRL would be all over them. An amateur radio operator is licensed by the feds. This trumps any state law. IANAL, and this is a gross simplification of the facts, but legal precedents have been set as far as having amateur radio tranceivers in a vehicle.

Yeah, funny you should mention that. Maybe these guys should get involved. Or maybe these instead. Software-defined radios have been built and marketed for hams for quite a while now.

I haven't seen one available for VHF/UHF until now. I'm sure someone will correct me though.

llamafresh

For those of you interested in doing something similar with your car, consider getting yourself an amateur radio license, buy some hardware, and have your car broadcast its position. Do a net search for "APRS car" for information, or check out http://web.usna.navy.mil/~bruninga/aprs.html. I might recommend the Kenwood TH-D7AG radio, which has most all of the functionality you would want in a hand-held package.

While there are certainly some people who fit this criteria, many are not. There are people of all different ages, and weight categories, who are hams. The public should really try to visit something like Field Day sometime; people seemed to find it quite interesting that the back parking lot of a high school suddenly had four 70 foot towers and dozens of tents scattered around.

Also, as far as the equipment, the equipment is surprisingly modern, and we don't all make it out of scrap metal... Yaesu, Icom, Kenwood, and Alinco are all popular amateur radio manufacturers.

Also, hams have launched a ton of satellites; the newly-launched AO-40 satellite has a footprint that covers practically half the Earth at a time. Now I know, with your super-duper cell phone, you can contact anyone with a phone, even if you're in the middle of nowhere.

But suppose you're somewhere like California, with the power crisis. The cell towers suddenly lose power. Or worse yet, there's a major disaster. Experience has shown that cell towers quickly become extremely jammed; transmissions on trunking radio systems get queued; and the hams help out.

Also, even in normal conditions, there's a big difference between a cell phone and a ham radio. To paraphrase someone else (dont' remember who) - would you call complete strangers on complete cell phones? Would you ask them what type of cell phone they had? No, they'd think you're a nut and would hang up.

Of course, there's more to ham radio than contacting random people and asking what type of radio they have... There are actually a lot of neat things to do with ham radio, check out something like ARRL, which has a bunch of info about ham radio.
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In case you have trouble with that link... go here

I've been considering a similar attempt this summer during the Courage Classic ride in Colorado. The combination of a Kenwood TH-DA7G transciever and VC-H1 camera are hard for a gadget-hound-radio-amateur-cyclist to pass up. Paul, KB0LUR

I've been considering a similar attempt this summer during the Courage Classic ride in Colorado. The combination of a Kenwood TH-DA7G transciever and VC-H1 camera are hard for a gadget-hound-radio-amateur-cyclist to pass up. Paul, KB0LUR

Or, if you are timid,
http://www.kenwood.net/products/index.cfm? AMA=open &ama_hheld=open&radio=VC-H1&selection=Amateur&ID=5 1

All you'd need to do is get your Amateur Radio License. It's much easier than you might think.

Then, look at this device from Kenwood. It's a neat little package that includes a camera, the display, and all the computing you need.

Hook this baby up to your radio, have a similar setup on the other end, hook it up to a computer on the net and you're all set!

This is called Slow Scan Television (SSTV).

Another cool thing about this setup.. throw in a cheap GPS reciever and you're ready to do APRS! (report your position, send messages, and lots of other fun stuff)

Good luck

All you'd need to do is get your Amateur Radio License. It's much easier than you might think.

Then, look at this device from Kenwood. It's a neat little package that includes a camera, the display, and all the computing you need.

Hook this baby up to your radio, have a similar setup on the other end, hook it up to a computer on the net and you're all set!

This is called Slow Scan Television (SSTV).

Another cool thing about this setup.. throw in a cheap GPS reciever and you're ready to do APRS! (report your position, send messages, and lots of other fun stuff)

Good luck

All you'd need to do is get your Amateur Radio License. It's much easier than you might think.

Then, look at this device from Kenwood. It's a neat little package that includes a camera, the display, and all the computing you need.

Hook this baby up to your radio, have a similar setup on the other end, hook it up to a computer on the net and you're all set!

This is called Slow Scan Television (SSTV).

Another cool thing about this setup.. throw in a cheap GPS reciever and you're ready to do APRS! (report your position, send messages, and lots of other fun stuff)

Good luck

Something like this would be cool.

There's a bunch of solutions out there if you want to be a little crafty, and most of it is just limited by how much you want to spend and how reliable you need the data transfer to be (as you can guess.. the two are linked :).

A couple people have suggested a laser link. I built a small one for experimenting using a UART and some of the schematics from the book Lasers, -Ray Guns & Light Cannons ISBN: 0-07-045035-8. (Someone better buy it because I had to dig through two years of crap to find it! :) I got the lasers from some surplus place cheap. It worked well at 2400 baud or something like that, I was trying to build a circuit to act as a wireless point-to-point link to get high speed internet just slightly off campus (e.g. through my lab window to a buddy across the street :). It worked well, although I ran out of time to finish it. Think I was planning on selling them to build cheap point-to-point links at the time, or something. Hard to aim, though. Anyhow.

Another way is through wireless modules like the folks at Lynx Technologies or Parallax Inc. The parallax ones are of better quality right out of the box, and they'll sell to individuals, the former was nasty to me when I wanted to order some samples.

YET another way is through using Ham Radio and packet. You can get an all - in - one unit from Kenwood called the TH-D7A that is a small handheld with a 9600 baud TNC built into it. It's truely plug-and-play. Extremely expensive at $550cdn a pop, I know, I have one. You also need to be liscened to operate at these frequencies, and most/all places won't sell you one without your callsign or liscence. These work VERY well.

That said, one of those options will be the best for you. IR is out as it doesn't work worth a damn in direct sunlight, even laser detectors have a bit of a problem with sun. Sun is a great source of optical noise :). If I was needing something mission critical and a long distance, your best choice is the kenwood/packet option, or maybe the parallax modules. They hook right up to a serial port.

Alternately, you could just get a cheap 486 notebook and get a 802.11 card, and wire the whole thing to a big-ass car battery (find one that takes 12V, and make sure to put a fuse on it!). That might be cheaper in the long run, and will provide a lot of bandwidth.

Hope that helps.

Well, the FCC doesn't care. All that stuff is properly accepting the EM radiation as it should. But if I were walking by and operating my radio, I'd probably be able to pinpoint which room in your house was your computer room - from the outside.

With Kenwood having introduced the TH-D7A handheld radio with integrated APRS and simple packet function, there are other choices for compact packet operation, too.

73 de KB3DXS

They are the same company. The radio stuff is at www.kenwood.net