Kukri
Well-known member
This is a whole new world to me but it seems a very useful thing.
Where do I start learning about HF/SSB?
- Thread starter Kukri
- Start date
maby
Well-known member
Well, I'm sure that there are plenty of RYA approved training schools that will teach you everything that is necessary to pass the exam, but that will probably not be quite what you are looking for. You could do worse than do the training course for the amateur radio Foundation Licence - that will cover the technical aspects of HF SSB quite well and you will end up a far more competent radio operator than the basic RYA course will ever do for you. These guys - https://www.essexham.co.uk/train/foundation-online/ - seem to do an on-line training course which is completely free of charge. You don't have to actually take the Foundation Licence exam unless it catches your interest.
maby
Well-known member
P.S. a lot of the trick for effective HF SSB usage is understanding propagation conditions - unlike VHF, these change dramatically throughout the day and the year. You are trying to communicate over long distances and you need to understand how to select a frequency band and time that is going to maximise your chances of making contact. A frequency band that will let you talk to someone several thousand miles away in the middle of the afternoon may well be completely dead a few hours later.
Motor_Sailor
Well-known member
It's even more useful if you're an Amateur Licence Holder. Not only is the training more in depth, but the amateur nets give far more opportunities for contact these days.
Kukri
Well-known member
Thank you both for very much indeed.
GHA
Well-known member
You could start by having a listen to some of the many live receivers here -
http://websdr.org/
around 14.1 - 14.3Mhz you should find some Ham guys talking during the day.
10.1Mhz USB (upper side band) you'll hear a lot of gurgling. That's DWD, German weather sending text.
So brief nutshell - (marine) SSB you need (in the UK anyway, yanks get it for free!) license, think it's something like 500 quid for the exam and takes quite a few days. And the radios are quite pricey too. But have many benifits like being part of GMDSS. Ham you need advanced license to transmit. Radios are loads cheaper. 1st & second level exams are pretty easy but advence needs more effort. Both you can send/receive email With a little tweaking most ham sets will transmit on the SSB frequencies, not legal but unlikely anyone will know if you know what you're doing. Speak to anyone on Ham without a license you'll be spotted in seconds.
Though very little use round Europe, cross ocean much more use.
https://www.practical-sailor.com/blog/Ham-Versus-SSB-for-the-Sailor-12194-1.html
npf1
Active member
Give me a shout if you are looking for a set. I've an Icon 700 pro, antenna tuner and SWR meter fitted to the boat that I ought to remove at some point. Plus can probably still recover the insulated backstay from the old mast. PM if interested.
PhilipH
Member
Why do you want SSB radio? This is important because it is expensive to buy and it can be difficult to set up. I have an ICOM 801E in an aluminium boat and it has been fantastic and we have used it a lot. If you have a GRP boat then getting the ground right is crucial and requires large amounts of copper inside the boat - in an aluminium boat, the whole of the hull is the ground. Assuming you can get the set-up right, what will you use it for? Voice comms? E-mail and weather forecasts? BBC radio? In some parts of the world there are SSB voice nets at regular times on defined frequencies and these can be very useful - in the Caribbean in season there is an excellent Ocean Cruising Club net where folks share information and arrange to meet up for social activities (there are other nets too). On our crossing from the Bahamas-Bermuda-Azores this year we were calling in to two USA based nets where our position, COG, SOG etc were recorded. We also called in six days a week to a US based weather forecaster and router. We sent daily emails to our shore contacts and received daily email GRIB files with weather information. Our blog was updated twice via SSB on the passage from Bermuda to Azores, with a feed to Facebook. For email you need a pactor modem. The applications that you download and pay for such as sailmail also provide propagation charts for the various shore stations that you might be using for email. In the Pacific and Indian Oceans we joined with other cruisers to create our own nets for the passages and beyond, enabling at times over 30 boats to share their position and conditions info. So hope this helps.
capnsensible
Well-known member
Or you get into the 21st Century with Iridium Go. https://www.iridium.com/products/iridium-go/
GHA
Well-known member
Like AIS/Radar argument on steroids
Very different systems each with pluses/minuses depending on many factors.
capnsensible
Well-known member
GHA
Well-known member
Or imagine a VHF radio where you can have a chat to fellow yachties a thousand miles away, send email, receive Wfax and is free to use, not locked into a line rental if you want to keep it running anchored up for half a year
You can have a phone as well if you want..
maby
Well-known member
Or imagine a VHF radio where you can have a chat to fellow yachties a thousand miles away, send email, receive Wfax and is free to use, not locked into a line rental if you want to keep it running anchored up for half a year
You can have a phone as well if you want..
Indeed - that is the advantage of HF comms - no price per minute! Satphones are excellent for short emergency messages but not viable for a long chat.
GHA
Well-known member
It was the constant line rental that was a major factor in ditching the sat phone and going ham, that and ham seemed very interesting anyway. You could always let the sim run out but then next time you look at a passage you're stuck in some dirty harbour waiting maybe weeks hoping the overnight delivery of a new sim might actually turn up while everyone else is out in the islands having barbecues on the beech.
Kukri
Well-known member
I have AIS and radar. The sum of the two is greater than the sum of the parts.
Boat had a big SSB/HF set up before, and has the grounding plates etc intact. PhilipH’s list is what I have in mind. I am still in the foothills of the learning curve, here.
Boat had a big SSB/HF set up before, and has the grounding plates etc intact. PhilipH’s list is what I have in mind. I am still in the foothills of the learning curve, here.
maby
Well-known member
If you don't still have the marine HF rig on the boat, then I would strongly suggest doing the Amateur Foundation Licence course first and getting a cheap Ham HF rig on ebay to understand what you can expect out of HF SSB. Only then can you make a reasoned decision as to whether or not to go to all the effort and expense to get your marine HF licence and purchase a legal marine HF rig for the boat.
HF SSB is very different to either VHF marine or satphone communications. It is far less predictable - you have to choose the right time and frequency to have a chance of making the contact that you want. Anchored somewhere in the Solent, it would be quite conceivable that you were completely unable to talk to someone in France, but could be having a clear conversation with someone in North Africa. It is a viable solution to the need for emergency communications, but you may well need someone to relay your call for help - a coastguard station a hundred miles away will quite possibly not be hearing you while another boat a thousand miles away is.
It can be useful to keep in touch with the rest of the world while you are in remote places - with no ongoing costs, it is a platform for a relaxed chat.
If you don't have the original marine HF rig, then you may find that amateur radio serves your requirements as well or better. It will cost you less to get the licence and you can buy perfectly serviceable second hand transmitters on eBay for a couple of hundred pounds. It is worth noting that the entry level UK Foundation amateur radio licence does not permit you to operate from a boat - you would have to take the exams to get one of the higher level licences before you could do that. But three or four weeks of evening classes with a local amateur radio club plus a couple of hundred quid on eBay will get you a licence that permits you to run a low power HF station from your house and understand just what is possible. It would also give you a much better start towards getting the marine HF licence and getting the boat transmitter and antenna back up and running without having to pay some professional electronic engineer a lot of money.
Kukri
Well-known member
Thank you for that advice.
I shall do as you suggest.
I shall do as you suggest.
KellysEye
Active member
Do a RYA course not an amateur one you need a marine SSB licence.
Motor_Sailor
Well-known member
That's sound advice.
Using HF gear requires a 'skill set' rather than simply plug and play. Some people have the inclination to get skilled and competent whist others never get their heads round it and think the whole thing is 'stupid'.
Spending a winter with your local amateur radio club is the fast track way of getting skilled; it will give you lots of hands on experience, rapid progress through the exams as well as some anthropological insights into another part of our human race.
Using HF gear requires a 'skill set' rather than simply plug and play. Some people have the inclination to get skilled and competent whist others never get their heads round it and think the whole thing is 'stupid'.
Spending a winter with your local amateur radio club is the fast track way of getting skilled; it will give you lots of hands on experience, rapid progress through the exams as well as some anthropological insights into another part of our human race.
GHA
Well-known member
+1 for local ham club, you'll learn loads. Though you need the advance license to transmit out at sea/anchor as a maritime mobile.
