Author: Kris – KZ7K

  • What to Actually Store in a Faraday Cage: A Realistic Radio Gear List

    A realistic, budget-honest list of what to actually shield in a Faraday enclosure: how many handhelds, which HF radio, antennas, batteries that survive storage, and the paper docs that matter more than people think.

  • How a Nuclear Blast Impacts HF, VHF, and UHF: Lessons from Operation Starfish Prime

    What Operation Starfish Prime actually showed about EMP, and why HF, VHF, and UHF each fail (or survive) for different reasons after a nuclear blast.

  • Setting Up a Neighborhood Radio Watch Program

    Part of our Emergency Communications and Preparedness guide. Your own household’s comms plan only covers your own household. A neighborhood radio watch extends that same resilience to the people physically closest to you, which is exactly who you will actually be relying on and helping during a genuinely local emergency. Start With Who You Already…

  • Building an EmComm Go-Kit Inventory You’ll Actually Update

    Part of our Emergency Communications and Preparedness guide. Every go-kit inventory starts out accurate the day you build it and slowly drifts out of date as batteries get swapped, gear gets borrowed, and expiration dates quietly pass. The fix is not a better one-time inventory. It is a system low-friction enough that you actually keep…

  • Business Band Radio vs GMRS: Why They’re Not Interchangeable

    Part of our GMRS Radio: The Complete Guide. Business band and GMRS radios can look nearly identical on a store shelf, and the confusion between them causes real legal problems for people who assume they are interchangeable. Different Frequencies, Different Licenses Business band radios operate on frequencies specifically licensed to a business or organization by…

  • Combining GMRS and Ham Radio on a Road Trip

    Part of our GMRS Radio: The Complete Guide. A road trip is one of the best real-world use cases for running GMRS and ham radio side by side, each covering a role the other cannot fill as well. GMRS for Caravanning With Non-Licensed Family If you are traveling in multiple vehicles with family members who…

  • GMRS Range Expectations: Marketing Claims vs Reality

    Part of our GMRS Radio: The Complete Guide. Every GMRS radio box promises impressive range numbers, and almost none of them reflect what you will actually experience in real-world conditions. Understanding why closes the gap between expectation and reality before you are disappointed in the field. Where Marketing Numbers Come From Advertised ranges of 30,…

  • Setting Up a Family GMRS Base Station Net Schedule

    Part of our GMRS Radio: The Complete Guide. A GMRS base station sitting unused between emergencies is far less valuable than one your family actually turns on and uses regularly, and a simple recurring check-in schedule is the easiest way to build that habit. Why a Regular Schedule Matters Equipment and skills you never practice…

  • My POTA Radio History: Five Radios, One Lesson About Carrying Less

    From an AnyTone 578 in an Armoloq cage, through a G90, an FT-891, and an FT-857D, to landing on the FTX-1 Optima. Here’s the actual radio history behind my current POTA setup, and why I kept swapping until it matched my shack.

  • Band Plans vs Frequency Allocations: What’s Actually Different

    Part of our Building Your First Ham Radio Station guide. New hams often assume band plans carry the same legal weight as the FCC’s actual frequency allocations, and mixing these two up leads to real confusion about what is actually required versus what is just strongly encouraged convention. Frequency Allocations: The Actual Law The FCC’s…

  • Understanding Duty Cycle: Why Your Radio’s Power Rating Isn’t the Whole Story

    Part of our Where to Spend Your Money guide. A radio rated for 100 watts does not necessarily mean you can key it at 100 watts continuously for an extended period without consequences. Duty cycle is the piece of the spec sheet that explains why, and it matters more than most hams realize until they…

  • Ham Radio and Drones: Legal Considerations and Practical Uses

    Drones and ham radio overlap more than people expect, both in the legal weeds around control frequencies and in some genuinely practical uses hams have found for combining the two. Amateur Bands and Drone Control: Proceed Carefully Most consumer drones use unlicensed ISM band frequencies for control and video, not amateur bands, and that is…

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