They’re all (mostly) the same…on the outside. Solar panel technology has gotten so inexpensive that even the tightest budgets can do it. The solar panels on my roof cost about $2.50/watt ten years ago. Today I could replace every one of them for less than half that. In some cases… Read more »
It’s closer than it seems. Off Grid Christmas Wish List. We live in strange times. With many products out of stock and long lead times for the stuff you can get, it’s not too early to think about what you’d like to give (or get) for Christmas. An off grid… Read more »
Guilt trip. I came across an interesting discussion on an internet ham radio forum. The author, a ham, had misgivings because after being hounded (his term, not mine) to join an local emergency communications (EMCOMM) group, he finally had enough of the nagging and told them to shove it. Afterward… Read more »
Greater than the sum of its parts. Along the summer I’ve collected bits and pieces of topic suggestions and ham radio news. Any one of them by itself is not worthwhile as an entire stand-alone Off Grid Ham article, and a few are not even directly ham radio-related. But collectively… Read more »
It’s been a while. It’s been quite a while since I did an inverter article. Inverters have not changed a lot since then, but there’s still some new material to go over. It’s also a good opportunity to review older concepts. Most hams know what inverters do but don’t know… Read more »
One of the hardest problems to understand. Amateur radio is full of difficult challenges, but few of them approach the hair-pulling level of radio frequency interference, or RFI. It’s a hard issue to address because there are so many variables. For example, sometimes moving a piece of equipment just a… Read more »
Everyone is asking. buying a ham radio As I roam the internet keeping up with others’ thoughts about ham radio, the number one theme that seems to come up, by a very large margin, is “I want to get into amateur radio, but I can’t afford it!”. The sentiment is… Read more »
Special author’s note: The March 19 Off Grid Ham article mentioned Radio Shack only as a minor side story. So many readers commented about their experiences with the fabled electronics retailer that I thought it was worthwhile to address the topic in more detail. I wrote the following article for… Read more »
The halcyon days. As early as middle school, before I was a ham and still into CB radio, Radio Shack was my haven. They had pretty much anything a teenaged electronics experimenter and ham could ever want. With thousands of locations, they were everywhere. I know I’m dating myself but… Read more »
It’s not a comedy if you’re living through it. Bad news out of Texas gives us an opportunity to look at what can happen when energy policy and weather conspire to pull the grid down. If you live in the upper Midwest USA like me, or New England, or for… Read more »
An old concept. The voltage regulator has been around since the days of the vacuum tube. Modern radios are especially dependent on them. What are they, and why do they matter? In electronics, current can and does vary but voltage usually does not, or should not. Radios generally do not… Read more »
A curious trend. Just over two weeks ago, traffic to Off Grid Ham exploded. By January 15, OGH racked up more page views and unique visitors than it usually gets in an entire month. At this writing the website has surpassed its previous monthly traffic record by many thousands of… Read more »