My April 29, 2002 reply to a question about using modified ham radios on the playa in a Burning Man theme camp.

The FCC frowns on modified ham radios because they are not type-certified for use on the business bands. Operating radios and frequencies they were not designed for can cause interference to legitimate services which operate on those bands. Plus the antennas and final RF amplifiers aren't tuned for the 154 MHz band and using them up in those channels can cause the radio circuitry to heat up and wear out more quickly than usual.

That said,

1. Amateur rigs are USUALLY pretty resilient and take well to being modified in skilled hands, without causing interference. Modification can also break them. Then you have a $99 paperweight.

2. Most of the VHF commercial bands are already really polluted with people who buy the $99 Radio Shack business band radios and never get their commercial licenses either.

3. It's against FCC rules and they CAN fine you for it and confiscate your radios if they catch you, but the FCC has bigger fish to fry than a bunch of yahoos on 5 watt handy talkies.

4. At 5 watts from a little rubber antenna, you'll probably go a mile or two, maybe 5 or 6 until you hit a mountain, your signal will disappear and nobody will notice. If they do notice, they probably won't care.

However,

Real ham radio operators will frown on this sort of operation, and if you do wander down into the ham bands and cause problems out there they will track you down with 36 inch directional antennas, break your radios and shove them up your ass.

If you guys ARE hams and not using these radios for personal gain out in the desert (ie. not being paid or compensated for their services), why not just use ham channels with your ham callsigns? If not, why not have everyone get their ham licenses and communicate legitimately with as much wattage as they wanted?

The test is only a couple of bucks in most places, and ham radio clubs are glad to see new licensed operators out there and will do anything they can do help!

Check out http://www.hamtest.com/ and http://www.arrl.org/ for more information.

And $99 is a good price. ADI makes an okay radio, even if I wouldn't buy one. You may run into some problems with dust and moisture after a week with a bargain basement radio.

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