Feb 10, 2026 – Handheld Radios

Good evening. This is W1UT and tonight’s training is about “Handheld Radios”.

Many years ago in the 1970s I picked up Heathkit handheld radio which we used to call a “brick.” With a heavy NiCad battery pack the radio literally felt like a brick. In those days you had to buy a set of crystals, one for TX and the other for RX. I vaguely remember the handheld could hold a maximum of 6 channels. There were very few repeaters back then so 6 channels was sufficient. Those were the days.

Handheld radios are still a popular choice for new hams as they are the cheapest way for new hams to try out their new license privileges. While they are portable and convenient to use, they do have have significant limitations. They can only produce fairly low power, typically 5W, and being battery operated they have limited usage time for a given charge. Handheld radios are meant for use in close-in areas such as event venues or local areas where communications will most likely be direct HT to HT or thru a line-of-sight repeater. I have had unlicensed people come to my home to have their Chinese radios programmed hoping to have emergency communications with family 35+ miles away on the other side of the Wasatch range. This is not possible thus Handhelds have limitations.

For those who want to stretch their HT radios to their limits, try to use it as a mobile or fixed station. While 5 watts is more than enough to hit your "local" repeater, this is only true if you are in a good location and using a decent external antenna. From inside a building the materials around you will easily block a high percentage of your signal, in both receive and transmit. It can be worse if your location is blocked by other structures. Keep in mind that radio signals are impacted by other structures, vegetation and even your own body. Your body can severely attenuate your transmissions. Make sure you hold the radio in the air vertically oriented away from your body. When operating from inside a vehicle, an HT can work well from locations close to the station that is line of sight, but with their limited power and the metal around you, do not expect good performance. Our mountainous terrain is also a factor.

When using an HT in a building or vehicle, a worthwhile investment is an outside antenna. A quarter wave whip or just about anything that is not a rubber duck will always be much better. You can also replace the OEM antenna that came with the radio with a better quality, lower loss and more efficient antenna. This will often result in a dramatic improvement to signal strength especially when you are outdoors. A typical rubber duck type antenna usually has significant negative gain.

Another problem is receiver overload where sensitivity can be degraded by the mere presence of another unheard, off-frequency signal. This "deafens" or overloads your HT’s receiver making a perfectly usable signal suddenly get muted. For serious operation consider investing in a quality mobile or base station radio that has better selectivity.

After buying your first handheld radio make sure it is set for wide-band and not narrow band operation. This can be found in the radio’s menu settings. If wide-band is not programmed, your audio volume will be significantly lower making it difficult for others to hear you. Then make sure you speak loudly less than an inch into the microphone located on the front of the handheld.

That is all for this week. This is a topic of great interest to newer hams so I hope to expand on this later this year. I will turn the time back to the net control station from W1UT.