If there is an area where I am very weak when it comes to “prepping”, it is communications and I really need to work on that. With that in mind, this is a decent intro video to the topic….hopefully more are coming.
If there is an area where I am very weak when it comes to “prepping”, it is communications and I really need to work on that. With that in mind, this is a decent intro video to the topic….hopefully more are coming.
brushbeater.org has a lot of good stuff on comms.
Well, the good news is that you have a hell of a commo trainer via NC Scout, over at brushbeater.org.
Come take a class in person, or one near you. his basic RTO course is the first place to start. I have taken all of em, some (singint/intel) many times because there is ALWAYS a nugget of skill/info to glean, you will be able to effectively communicate using off the shelf kit, married w good commo protocols.
More importantly, imo, are the relationships developed over time.
I was a .mil signals guy back in the day, shit was analog, old school, and I have learned so much as a result, .civ commo is different than .mil commo, and Scout caters to the .civ with a crawl, walk, run approach, layering the skills so that future courses can stack onto the previous ones.
As a result, over the years, i have developed quite a nice emcomm set up for my home office, and while traveling and/or out camping, training, etc.
In fact, this weekend, i head to the smokies for some alone time at 6k ft elevation, while camping, and i’ll bring my field kit, and set up an ad hoc sigint station, see what signals i can collect and tinker with….
Might do a little opfor against frs/gmrs freqs….one of the skills learned…
\\NNNN
ps..if you have any questions feel free to email me, here to help.
What June J said!
Be somewhat familiar with your radio sir..and anyother gear you may have. You don’t have to be Johnny Ham, but know your gear.
I went in cold, which wasn’t the best move I could have made.
But boy howdy, did i learn. And the correct way.
Lots of options – now GRMS, plus FM CB. Lots of options.
NC Scouts comms classes are a must! I would highly recommend. Godspeed brothers!!
I’ll say it again…. when the big time crap goes down they will be running detection equipment. Fire up the radio and start listening or talking and you will get “seen”. You don’t want to be seen. Use them if you must but you WILL be a target. If you do it you better be ready to move out after. But location area is now known.
This is the part they don’t talk about cause it isn’t won’t sell radios and classes.
It is still fine as a passive listening device.
It is like passive sonar; it listens instead of also transmitting.
There are ways to ‘Detect’ a ‘Passive Receiver’, but the chances of that type of Military-Grade EW stuff being used to find a random Receiver are, IMO, Small. If I was Tasking limited EW/ECM recources, I would first be scanning the ‘Tactical’ bands such as CB, GMRS, 2-Meter Ham, and VHF/UHF Digital Comms. “Clusters” of these, could indicate locations of “Enemy Combatants” particularly if they are near “Sensitive Facilities”. A greater part of SIGINT is recognizing Patterns of Communications – what stations communicate in a Call-and-Response fashion – not necessarily the Contents of the Comms, reducing the need for Decryption Resources.
If one is planning to use Short-Range Comms in Mobile Operations, it is essential to Never use those Radios anywhere Near your Base of Operations, or Communicate with the Base. If you have a ‘Local AO’ of people in a small area, or Farm/Ranch type of situation. there is still a lot of the Vietnam-Vintage Wire Telephone Gear available- the TA-312 is the best “Field Telephone” you can find, and over Milspec WW-1 Commo Wire, good for a few Kilometers Range. Equipment in this series allows for either Central-Switched or Distributed Networks.
and FFS, People, the very Instant ‘the Balloon goes Up’, Destroy that Cell Phone….
That was also my question, Anon. If all you ever do is listen, and you don’t ever transmit, how can they see you?
Also, if your radio is simply a handheld Baofeng or something similar, even though they can see you by way of triangulation if you transmit, can they still ‘see’ you? As I understand it, even with a handheld set, in order to transmit at all, you still need a license. As such, if you transmit with a handheld from a location other than your home base, can they still see that it is YOU ?
George – I have a strong suspicion that those Baofeng (chineseium) Radios, being ‘Digital’, have a backdoor for reading their Serial Number, just like all Computers and Cell Phones. This allows Identification of the User by S/N > Retailer > Credit Card Purchase. Even if you avoid this problem by purchasing secondhand for Cash, every Time you use it, that Identifier can be used to do ‘Traffic Analysis’ of who you communicate with. These type of Radios also likely have the same type of ‘Transponder’ function as Phones, where a Signal can be sent to ‘ping’ the Device to Locate and Identify it.
IMO, for local comms, I would go with C/B Radios, and older ones that are not ‘computerized’ in any way. And Fuggedaboutit with those Ham Radios that are ‘Programmable’, both H.F. and 2-Meter.
Ok so what? Hidding in the basement isn’t doing antyhing. Its like elk hunting, fiinding them is the hard part, killings the easy part. If they come find you then your legs will be less tierd, stop being afraid
@hedge…
So wrong on many levels…Yes, being a dolt, and not using proper radio protocols, will get you rdf’d.
however, NCS will show you how to manage that, in real time, hands on environment.
I know, I’ve done it, and will do again this weekend.
Listening costs you nothing, and can’t be realisticly detected.
This is why having good hi speed scanners, analog/digi, and a decent sw receiver is key, listening is 2x more important than talking.
Having bubba scanners can be handy.
analog one https://bearcatwarehouse.com/collections/uniden-police-scanners/products/bc125at-500-channel-handheld-scanner-with-alpha-tagging
digital one https://bearcatwarehouse.com/collections/uniden-police-scanners/products/uniden-sds100-digital-police-scanner
if you hear frs/gmrs chatter, they are danger close and be generally rdf’d w a small yagi like this:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00S982R0G/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
listening is free and not an issue.
Most modern receivers like superheterodyne or sdr have local oscillators that make detection possible, though at shorter distances than transmitters. It’s how the British radio police determine if you have more receivers in your house than licensed. Most receivers are not totally passive.
Lots of great comments and great info. IMO for most guys like us, most radio/comms equipment will be most effective when dealing with non-military adversaries like indigent or displaced raiding parties. I personally believe that the wide groove of comms gear that most of the guys like us could afford and would buy is not going to be very effective against military forces that have resolved to use electronic signals to root out resistance. I also believe that it goes back to the premise that guerilla forces work best when they behave like guerilleros. When guerilleros try to behave like regular military the shelf life for said guerilleros gets pretty short pretty quick. I think Hedge might be on to something, also.
Seens pics out of SA that some of the groids “killing the boer” are running jamming gear, really high end gear, like the truck mounted stuff we had in the sand box for trying to stop ied’s, but in back packs. Jamming cell and WiFi would take out 99% of comms for most normies. Having backups and backups for those are a must. As said above, NC Scout has some great classes to do
+1 on the Brushbeater classes and books. Get the Guerrilla Guide to the Baofeng Radio book anyway even if you can’t get to a class. There is a ton more in that book than just the Baofeng radio.
I also recommend getting at least the Technician level FCC amateur radio license, as a learning experience if nothing else. Even if you never use the license to talk w other hams, you will learn a lot of technical and other things like what the rules are. Get a $30-ish ARRL ham study guide and go through it, you will learn a lot and it will help you use your radios much more effectively even the unlicensed ones.
The AMRRON project is worth checking out, too, whether you’re a ham or not. Lots of great info and ideas there, even if you don’t participate in their activities.
Remember too there is an inbetween point from Mad Max to nowadays.
Groups like antifa and others do use a ton of comms too, having scanners and something for passive listening is great just for SA.
Cellphones are the devil, though, as they have to communicate with a tower just to lurk on a sort of standby for the system to send you calls not including calling out yourself.
And of course the US has targeted such devices both in the states and elsewhere (there’s some news articles on that like LE using Stingrays).
Similar can be done with radios transmitting as they can have multiple receivers to triangulate shit but you should be aware how bad things are and what’s going on in your local area.
Old SF/SOD..DF is still out there..”if it can be seen/heard it can be shot,if it can be shot it can be killed”..my 2 cents worth
Good luck to all you chatter boxes out there looking to chatter it up and listen in on the happenings of the doomsday fantasy scenario in your head. My bets are that the stuff never gets used or not like you think it will be used.
Romeo foxtrot… you are the one who is wrong. But you go boy.
Nobody is going into the woods with their radios and rifles to squash the tyranny that is upon them. Cmon man!
You fuckin larpers crack me up. The dead Boomer of recent news comes to mind. I bet he had 5 radios and 2 cb’s. He’s probably stomping on your traffic right now from Fudd heaven.