so ive been licensed for about 4 months now (general class) and ive been listening around but havent really committed to checking into any nets regularly. i did the ARRL's monthly traffic thing once and kind of fumbled through it but the net control was really patient with me which was nice.

my main question is where do people actually find out about nets in their area or even regional/national ones worth joining? ive looked at a couple websites but half the links are dead and the schedules seem outdated. like i found one that supposedly runs on 7.258 every tuesday but ive listened three times and heard nothing.

also what about special event stations — are those usually announced somewhere specific? i heard somebody mention working a special event for a lighthouse or something and that sounds really cool. just not sure where to look or if theres some central place people go for this stuff

welcome to the addiction haha. okay so for nets, the best resource ive actually found that isnt completely dead is the Amateur Radio Relay League's net directory, but honestly your best bet is just asking your local club. every club ive been a member of had at least two or three weekly nets that werent listed anywhere official, just kind of word of mouth. check into a club meeting and mention youre looking — someone will point you in the right direction within about five minutes.

as for special events, W1AW has a list on the ARRL site and there's also a site called qrz.com that does a decent job of aggregating them, just poke around in the operating events section. lighthouse weekend is a big one, usually in August, and yeah it's a blast — stations set up at actual lighthouses all over the country. the World Castles on the Air and similar programs do similar things. once you work one you'll want to do all of them, just warning you now.

for that 7.258 net, 40m can be real finnicky depending on time of day and propagation. what time are you tuning in? might just be a propagation thing if youre not close enough to the net control station.

honestly same boat here like a year ago. what helped me was just joining a couple of Facebook groups for ham radio in my state, which i know sounds weird but thats where people actually post about nets starting up or going QRT. more current than any website i've found.

also if you have a local repeater trustee or know anyone who runs a repeater in your area just ask them directly because a lot of the 2m and 70cm nets are on local repeaters and they'll know every single one within 100 miles probably