Concepts Don’t Excite Me — Innovation Does

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HamVention is over, and the “release” of Icom’s “new” X-026 radio has been, in this writer’s opinion, a major disappointment. But while it was disappointing, it was certainly not unexpected (see previous article).

I found it puzzling that a company would tease a major new release, only to unveil little more than a concept asking operators to tell them what they want — while providing no meaningful way to actually give that feedback. It was puzzling, to say the least.

So, in the absence of a way to provide feedback directly, and with little indication of what this new radio might ultimately become, I figured I would use this article to offer my own “two cents” on the kind of radio that might actually convince me to spend my hard-earned money.

To begin with, the concept radio featured a detachable head. I genuinely love this idea and strongly encourage manufacturers to continue down that road. A detachable head allows operators to hide the radio body under a seat, in a trunk, or — in a home shack — under a desk. It gives us access to the controls and display where we need them, while keeping the bulk of the radio tucked away.

But what if the detachable head was more than just detachable? What if it was truly modular?

Imagine a detachable control head that was compatible with several different radios. For example, imagine an operator who wants:

  • a VHF/UHF mobile rig for the vehicle,
  • an HF radio for POTA, SOTA, Field Day, and portable operations,
  • and a “shack-in-a-box” radio for the home station.

Now imagine each radio body costing somewhere in the $600–$700 range. Yes, that sounds inexpensive — but remember, that price would only include the radio body itself. The detachable control head could make up the remaining cost at perhaps $400 or so. (These are arbitrary numbers, of course, but stay with me.)

The idea is simple: one premium control head, multiple radio bodies.

You could move the same detachable head between your mobile rig, portable HF setup, and home station. The head unit would recognize which radio it was connected to and automatically configure itself for that platform.

Suddenly, instead of buying three complete radios with three displays, three control surfaces, and three sets of duplicated hardware, you would invest in a shared ecosystem.

The operator saves money over time, while the manufacturer builds long-term customer loyalty as hams continue purchasing additional radio bodies to expand their capabilities. Everybody wins.

And honestly, this feels like the kind of innovation many operators are actually looking for. Not another slightly updated mobile rig with marginally better specs, but a smarter, more flexible system built around how modern hams actually operate today — mobile, portable, and at home.

Ham radio operators are often willing to invest in good equipment. But increasingly, we want equipment that feels thoughtful, adaptable, and future-focused. A modular ecosystem built around a shared control head would not only stand out in a crowded market, it might actually change the way many of us build our stations.

Now that would feel like a real release.

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Campfires, Callsigns and HamVention 2026

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HamVention 2026 is over, and for me, it did not disappoint. The main reason I attend each year is to meet the hams I’ve enjoyed making contacts with throughout the year. Thousands of people, all incredibly friendly, helpful, and encouraging, gathered together because of a shared love for radio.

Historically, I’ve camped with three other guys — two from Ohio and one from Wisconsin. We spend the weekend catching up, sharing meals, and telling stories… lots of stories. But this year felt a little different. Almost every night we were invited to a different campsite for dinner, and one evening even turned into a full dessert night. It gave us the chance to meet new operators, hear even more stories, and laugh harder than we had all year.

Even though I’ve only been home for one full day, I’m already looking forward to next year. Here are a few moments from the weekend that stood out to me.

  • On Saturday, I met a 10-year-old girl named Zoe who had just earned her General license. She was a bundle of energy and absolutely loved POTA. Seeing young operators excited about amateur radio is always encouraging and reminds you that the hobby still has a bright future.
  • On Friday, I activated Caesar Creek Lake State Wildlife Area (US-7850) for only the second time ever. Both activations were done entirely on 146.52 and completed within about 15 minutes. When you have that many hams camping in the park, .52 is almost always a good choice.
  • I also had one of those classic “technology moments.” I hadn’t used my PoLo logger on my phone for a couple of months, so imagine my surprise when the screen informed me that “PoLo Beta has expired.” Not knowing what else to do, I contacted the “PoLo Helpdesk” — which is to say, I texted the creator directly. Obviously, he was extremely helpful and got me back up and running quickly.
  • One of my favorite parts of the weekend happened every evening around the campfire. Eight to fifteen hams would gather around, making QSOs on 2 meters and 70 centimeters while activating Caesar Creek State Park. There was plenty of laughter as people forgot their own callsigns, announced the wrong frequency, fell behind on logging, or simply shouted their QSO information across the fire instead of transmitting it over the radio.

That’s really what HamVention is about for me. Sure, there are radios to buy, forums to attend, and gear to admire, but the best part has always been the people. The conversations around a picnic table, the late-night laughter around a fire, and the friendships built through a shared hobby are what keep bringing me back year after year. Ham radio may revolve around equipment and technology, but weekends like this are a reminder that the real connection has always been between people.

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Same Radio, New Price Tag?

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This week, more than 30,000 ham radio operators will descend on Xenia for the Dayton Hamfest — better known as Hamvention. Held at the Greene County Fair and Expo Center, Hamvention is widely regarded as the world’s largest amateur radio gathering.

For hams, it’s an event packed with opportunity: the chance to finally meet people you’ve only talked to on the air (or exchanged CW with), hunt for rare treasures in the massive flea market, and get a first look at the newest gear from the major manufacturers.

This year, Icom is generating a lot of buzz with the debut of a mysterious new radio known only as the X-026. Based on the rumors and early speculation, it appears to be a mobile rig with a detachable faceplate and support for multiple antenna inputs — strongly hinting at a multiband radio that could cover HF, VHF, and UHF.

Beyond that, though, we’re firmly in speculation territory.

But here’s the question: don’t we already have “shack-in-a-box” radios? Radios with multiple antenna ports and wide band coverage have existed for years. And who doesn’t have a rig with a detachable face? [Yawn]

In a hobby that prides itself on experimentation and innovation, why do the “big three” manufacturers often feel like they’re really is no innovation?

Take something as simple as charging technology. Last Black Friday, I picked up two Baofeng handhelds that charged via USB-C. USB-C! A standard, everyday connector that nearly everyone already owns. No proprietary chargers, no bulky cradles — just plug it in and go.

And that feature didn’t come from Icom, Yaesu, or Elecraft. It came from Baofeng.

So what would I actually want to see in a new radio? What kind of innovation would make me seriously consider replacing my current rigs? Well, probably the very things that WON’T be in the X-026.

About a year ago, the internal speaker in my FT-891 failed after tens of thousands of contacts. Frustrated but resigned, I headed to Walmart to buy an external speaker. That’s when I realized how difficult it was to find a simple wired speaker. Nearly everything on the shelf was Bluetooth.

That got me thinking: why aren’t our radios Bluetooth capable?

With Bluetooth, we could easily use wireless speakers, headsets, and microphones. It seems like such a simple addition, yet it would dramatically improve convenience and usability — especially for mobile operators.

Imagine a mobile rig with reliable hands-free VOX support through a wireless headset. Our phones already do this effortlessly. The technology exists. So why are amateur radios still lagging behind?

And then there’s connectivity.

Most of us now have large monitors in our shacks — many of us have multiple screens. So why aren’t manufacturers embracing modern display options? Why not include a mini-HDMI or USB-C video output that would allow operators to connect external displays and customize what they see? Waterfalls, SWR graphs, ALC meters, frequency displays — all on a larger screen, arranged however the operator wants.

These are just two examples of features that would feel genuinely fresh and innovative.

Instead, I suspect we’ll see more of the same: superficial changes, minimal innovation, and price tags high enough to make it difficult to justify replacing perfectly capable rigs already sitting in our shacks that already do the same thing.

I guess we will discover the truth in a few short days.

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Radio Myths – “You’ve Got Too Many Radials!”

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There’s been a surge of new antennas hitting the market lately—many of them verticals. And in my opinion, vertical antennas are fantastic, especially for portable operations.

When I head out to a park, I don’t always have a convenient tree available to hang an EFHW. Even when I do, time matters. I don’t want to spend half my activation wrestling with a throw bag, trying to get it over the right branch, and carefully positioning the antenna. EFHWs are excellent—but they take time. That’s why I often turn to verticals.

I’m not alone. Many activators are coming to the same conclusion, which explains the growing number of portable verticals on the market. Along with them comes a popular idea: using “resonant” or “tuned” radials. The logic usually goes something like this—use a certain number of radials for 20 meters, but when you switch to 40 meters, you need to add more.

At first glance, that sounds reasonable. But flip the logic around, and it starts to fall apart. If that were true, then when moving from 40 meters back to 20 meters, you would need to remove radials. And that should raise some red flags.

Rudy Severns, N6LF, addressed this very question in a QEX article (May/June 2009) titled *“How many radials does my vertical really need?”* His conclusion was simple: more radials are better. Period.

Now, there is a point of diminishing returns. As Severns notes, “You gain perhaps another fraction of a dB going to 32 radials, but by the time you reach 64 radials there isn’t much change. The broadcast standard of 120 radials, each 0.4 wavelengths long, is hard to justify for amateur use—especially at today’s copper prices”.

Still, the principle holds: additional radials continue to improve performance, even if the gains become small. Which means that once you’ve laid out radials for a lower band like 40 meters, removing some when switching to a higher band like 20 meters is actually counterproductive.

So don’t buy into the marketing hype. The idea that ground radials need to be “resonant” or “tuned” is largely a myth. And when someone asks how many radials your vertical needs, the simplest answer is still the best: 

More.

Note: This article is discussing ground radials only. Elevated radials, which play a different role in the antenna system, is a different beast all-together. Rudy Severns, N6LF, discusses these differences in another article written for QEX magazine Mar/Apr 2009. To gain a firm understanding of various ground systems and access to all his test data, I recommend all seven of his articles that can be found (for free) at “https://www.antennasbyn6lf.com/“

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Make It Work!

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Imagine you’re going on an adventure. A little out of state excursion, where nature abounds and state parks are plentiful. You have a couple full days allocated to grabbing your QRP rig, throwing a wire in a tree, and activating POTA parks to your heart’s content.

Sheer radio bliss.

You get to your first park, open your gear cases, and — much to your horror — realize that your wire antennas and ununs/baluns are in a bag you left on the bench at home. Your POTA dreams are over before they started.

Or are they?

This is where the trial and error experimentation aspect of the radio hobby really comes into play.

What I did have at my disposal was about 40 feet of 18 gauge speaker wire and a 4 foot section of 50 ohm coax with PL-259 connectors on each end.

One end of the speaker wire got shoved in the center pin hole of the SO-239 socket, careful to make sure the shielding covered the ground connector on the socket. Then the coax plug went in, holding the speaker wire in place, with the ground connector on the plug making as much contact as I could muster.

The other end of the coax ground ran to a grounded bolt on the car body, and the speaker wire got stretched out to a tree where I folded it back to as close to 33 feet as I could guess… And that reached a whopping 8 feet in the air at its absolute highest point.

The real star of this setup is the Xiegu G-90 transceiver. This radio will tune a vertical. It will tune a dipole. Heck, it’ll even tuna fish!

This setup tuned up to about 1.35:1, and dropped my 20 watts max down to about 16 watts going out the wire.

Voice modes were absolutely not going to happen with this rigging unless anyone was nearby to do some NVIS work, but I didn’t have the time to really invest in that today. The only real option was FT8 — and these situations are exactly what low signal strength digital modes were created for.

The result? 15 contacts in about a 30 minute window. Enough to activate a park!

If I have enough time tomorrow, I’ll hop on the local repeater network and see if anyone wants to try some NVIS phone on 20 meters… Or maybe I’ll see if I can cram enough Morse code refresher to operate CW… Or, better yet, maybe there’s someone in the area that can rustle up a spare 49:1 for me to buy.

The point, though, is that even with far less than ideal circumstances and gear, there’s always a way to enjoy a day playing radio.

Here are a few photos of what I managed to cobble together.

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