Honestly, I didn’t have a scooby about amateur radio until I watched a few videos by Ringway Manchester - he’s a really knowledgeable amateur. He’s a bit of a wanker to people in his comments who dare to offer dissenting opinions, but his videos are generally presented with a classic no-bullshit British vibe.
The point of this is that he pushed me in the direction of the Baofeng UV-5RH, which is a handheld that operates on the VHF bands but is very versatile. The company gets grief for producing hamstrung cheap shit, but honestly being a so-called Baofeng Warrior has provided me with the inexpensive entry point into the world of Ham Radio - and it even has a function for listening to FM radio for the… lesser-legitimate audio broadcaster needs 😊
My advice would be to get a UV-5RH (around £25), get a quarter-wave magmount antenna for the car (around (£15 for a cheap one), and check out Essex Ham’s videos on Foundation-level radio guidance (free with a recommended donation).
If you like it, brilliant - get your chequebook out and go wild. If you don’t, then you’ve invested forty-odd quid and you can get half of that back on various internet auction sites.
Have fun!
edit: but yeah if you want beyond line-of-sight communication then £300 would be well under a lowball estimate 😢
Honestly, I didn’t have a scooby about amateur radio until I watched a few videos by Ringway Manchester - he’s a really knowledgeable amateur. He’s a bit of a wanker to people in his comments who dare to offer dissenting opinions, but his videos are generally presented with a classic no-bullshit British vibe.
The point of this is that he pushed me in the direction of the Baofeng UV-5RH, which is a handheld that operates on the VHF bands but is very versatile. The company gets grief for producing hamstrung cheap shit, but honestly being a so-called Baofeng Warrior has provided me with the inexpensive entry point into the world of Ham Radio - and it even has a function for listening to FM radio for the… lesser-legitimate audio broadcaster needs 😊
My advice would be to get a UV-5RH (around £25), get a quarter-wave magmount antenna for the car (around (£15 for a cheap one), and check out Essex Ham’s videos on Foundation-level radio guidance (free with a recommended donation).
If you like it, brilliant - get your chequebook out and go wild. If you don’t, then you’ve invested forty-odd quid and you can get half of that back on various internet auction sites.
Have fun!
edit: but yeah if you want beyond line-of-sight communication then £300 would be well under a lowball estimate 😢