KJ5EDM Amateur Extra • EM12

Station equipment

Current gear

The station has evolved from a basic handheld into a mix of base HF, mobile HF, hand-tracked satellite gear, and a few trusted handhelds.

Base Station

Yaesu FT-710 AESS on a premium walnut amateur radio desk overlooking Fort Worth at night

Yaesu FT-710 AESS

Primary HF base station rig.

20 and 40 meter bent fan dipole installed inside an attic

Bent 40/20 Fan Dipole

Attic-mounted bent fan dipole for 40 and 20 meters. Compact and compromised, but useful for getting on HF from home.

Mobile

Icom IC-7100 mobile HF radio station inside a Ford Explorer overlooking Fort Worth

Icom IC-7100

Mobile all-band rig used with Hamsticks and a mobile tuner from the Ford Explorer.

Satellites

Icom IC-2730A satellite operating station with satellite tracking software

Icom IC-2730A

FM satellite radio with true dual receive for working 2m and 70cm satellite passes.

Elk Antennas 2M and 70cm handheld directional antenna on a walnut desk

Elk 2M/70cm Log Periodic Antenna

Handheld directional antenna used for portable satellite operating.

Handhelds

Yaesu VX-6R handheld radio on a walnut desk

Yaesu VX-6R

Trusty rugged handheld and one of the radios I actually reach for.

Alinco DJ-G7T tri-band handheld radio on a walnut desk

Alinco DJ-G7T

Tri-band handheld covering 2m, 70cm, and 23cm. Useful for experimenting with 1.2 GHz and local repeaters.

AnyTone AT-D168UV handheld radio on a walnut desk

AnyTone AT-D168UV

Kept in the lineup for local repeaters, simplex, DMR monitoring, and general VHF/UHF use.

Baofeng UV-5R handheld radio on a walnut desk

Baofeng UV-5R

Where it all started.

Digital & Data

Mobilinkd TNC4 packet radio interface on a walnut engineering workbench

Mobilinkd TNC4

Used for packet-related experiments including APRS and Winlink.

Meshtastic and MeshCore radio nodes on a cyberpunk engineering desk

Mesh Radios

Meshtastic and MeshCore experimentation, including multiboot setups on compatible hardware.