Mike Thompson

so ive had my general for about 4 months now and i keep hearing people talk about checking into nets but honestly i still dont fully understand how it all works. like i know you listen for the net control station and give your callsign but thats about it. are there certain nets that are better for newer hams? i tried listening to what i think was a traffic net on 40m last week and it felt really formal and i wasnt sure if it was appropriate to just jump in as someone with nothing to pass. also saw something about a special event station for some kind of historical anniversary coming up and wondered if thats something totally different or if it works the same way as a regular net check-in. any pointers would be really appreciated, still trying to figure out what counts as a good time to transmit vs just listen

the UDP dropout thing with WSJT-X and N1MM used to drive me crazy too. turned out for me it was a windows firewall thing blocking the port intermittently, once i added a proper inbound rule for UDP 2237 it stopped happening almost completely. might be worth checking before you go through the whole migration hassle tbh

I use the ARRL RF Exposure Calculator - makes the math easy for typical setups. Most 100W HF operations are compliant if you maintain proper distances. If fields could exceed limits in accessible areas, you must take action to prevent human exposure.

so i've been wanting to get into satellite work for a while now and last weekend i finally just sat down and did it. grabbed my vx-6r and a cheap arrow antenna i borrowed from a club buddy and went out in the backyard during a pass that gpredict was showing as like 28 degrees max elevation. not the greatest pass but figured id try anyway. managed to hear the downlink pretty clearly once i figured out which way to point but the doppler correction thing is kind of killing me. i was manually adjusting frequency during the pass and its just a lot to juggle while also trying to rotate the antenna. how do people actually do this smoothly? like are you memorizing the frequency offsets ahead of time or is there a better way to handle it with a ht that doesnt have computer control also i could hear stations working each other but couldnt seem to get a contact through. not sure if it was my tx power or just timing or what. using like 5 watts out of the vx-6r. the pass was decently loud on downlink so i dont think i was totally off frequency

so ive been running N1MM for contests for a few years now and honestly its great for that specific thing, no complaints really, but outside of contest season i find myself wanting something that handles everyday logging better and tracks awards progress and all that. a buddy of mine swears by Log4OM for his day to day stuff so i installed it and started poking around. the thing im trying to figure out is whether its worth the hassle of maintaining two separate logs or if theres a clean way to keep everything in sync. i know you can export ADIF from N1MM after a contest and import it into Log4OM but ive had some weird duplicate issues and the exchange fields dont always map right, especially for contests where youre logging things like serial numbers or section codes that dont really have a clean ADIF equivalent. also the WSJT-X integration is kind of its own mess. right now WSJT-X is logging to Log4OM through the udp broadcast thing but then if im doing a digital contest i switch N1MM in and everything gets confused about which program is supposed to be the master. anyone else dealing with this or did you just pick one program and commit to it

the rhythm thing is real and most people completely ignore it. i spent years just firing my callsign into the void before someone told me to shut up and listen first. embarrassing in hindsight but thats how you learn i guess. one thing i'd add is tail-ending. when the DX comes back to someone and that station sends their report, theres a tiny window right as they finish where the pileup hasnt fully spun back up yet. if you send your call clean and confident in that gap you sometimes slip through. doesnt always work and honestly annoys some operators if you do it wrong but when you nail the timing its surprisingly effective. also worth noting that some DXpeditions post their operating patterns on the cluster or their own website. T32C i think had a blog going during the operation. reading that stuff tells you a lot about where theyre listening and what time of day they favor certain bands. people sleep on that resource completely.

yeah the 44 QSO thing got me too on my first couple activations, i was basically refreshing my log count every few contacts toward the end. one tip someone gave me was to try and get on earlier in the day when more hunters in europe are active if youre in north america or vice versa, makes hitting the threshold way less stressful. also dont forget you can combine modes if youre set up for it, mixed ssb and ft8 counts fine i think as long as the reference is logged correctly on each contact

yeah the KX2 is basically made for this stuff. ive been doing POTA more than SOTA just because im lazy about hiking but the operating is the same vibe. 11 contacts is a solid first run dont let anyone tell you different

so i've been chasing 3Y0 for years obviously and when the recent dxpedition went up i was not gonna let it slip again. spent probably 3 solid hours on 20m before i finally got through and wanted to write up what actually seemed to make a difference because i wasted a lot of that time doing stuff that just doesnt work. first thing i learned the hard way — calling on top of everyone else when they're already in QSO is completely pointless. i know everyone does it but you're just adding to the noise. what actually started working was listening to where the DX was *ending* their QSOs, the rhythm they use, how many seconds before they come back. once i got the timing down i was able to drop my call right in that window instead of just blasting continuously. i also switched from using the full 100w on my IC-7300 to actually backing off a little and working on my audio. cleaned up the mic settings, dropped some of the bass, and i think that helped me cut through because a lot of the pileup is just a wall of low-end mush. running a dipole so no antenna tricks available to me unfortunately. the split operation thing took me forever to figure out tbh — i was transmitting on the wrong side of their listed split for a while because i misread how they were working the pile. once i figured out they were actually listening about 3-5 up from where i thought, it came together pretty quick. anyone else have techniques that actually work? curious what the vfo-b crowd is doing different than me

i just passed mine like 6 weeks ago so this is super fresh for me. i used the gordon west book which some people think is old fashioned but it actually helped me understand the why behind a lot of the answers instead of just memorizing. took me maybe 5 weeks of casual studying. the math questions scared me the most but theres only like 3 or 4 of them and if you can remember a few key formulas honestly you can get through it. one thing i wish i knew earlier is the band privledges for general vs extra are actually pretty close on most bands so you get alot of the good stuff right away. 40m and 20m in particular are great as soon as you upgrade. good luck, just keep doing practice tests until youre consistently hitting 80+ and you should be fine

yeah the click moment is real, it does happen. cant tell you exactly when but one day you'll realize you copied a whole sentence without thinking about it and it kind of blows your mind one thing i dont see mentioned enough is just listening to actual QSOs on the air even when you cant copy them yet. tune to 40m around 7.050 or so in the evenings and just let it wash over you. your brain starts to recognize rhythms and common words like CQ and 73 and signal reports before you even consciously learn them. also the RufzXP program is great once youre a bit further along for building speed but maybe not quite yet at 5wpm

congrats on the first one, that feeling of making those 4 contacts from a summit never really gets old even after you've done dozens of them. to answer your question yes you can absolutely update your spot from the summit, just go to SOTAwatch and post a new spot with the corrected time or just spot yourself in real time when you're actually ready to operate. a lot of activators use the SOTA Spotter app which makes it really easy to self-spot right from your phone without messing around with the website. chasers are usually pretty patient and will often check back if they see a new spot go up. for logging just enter everything in the SOTA database at sotadata.org.uk, you'll need the summit reference (should be something like W4V/XX-XXX), the date, your callsign, and the contacts with their callsigns, bands, and modes. it's a little clunky the first time but you get used to it fast. make sure the chasers log their side too or it'll just show as a uniqe on your end with no points for them.

I've recently started operating QRP with my new QCX+ and I'm loving the challenge, but I'm struggling to break into conversations or get answers to my CQ calls. One of the key skills for any QRP operator is to select the right moment to call - being quick to start to transmit, but not calling all the time and causing nuisance. Often jumping in just after the end of a contact or just at the end of a CQ call can help. Calling other stations rather than calling CQ works is one of the major operating approaches that should virtually always be used. Calling other stations works far, far better. Any other advice for successful QRP operation?

so ive been a general for about two years now and i keep going back and forth on whether to bother with the extra exam. i like operating and honestly the general privileges have been enough for me most of the time, but i keep getting annoyed when i tune around and hear something interesting happening on a frequency i cant touch. especially on 20m and 40m cw where the extra portion seems way more active sometimes. the thing holding me back is everyone says the theory questions are genuinely hard, like not just memorize a band chart hard but actually understand the math and electronics hard. ive been reading through the pool a little and some of the questions on things like impedance matching and filter design and i dont even know where to start. is it realistic to self study this stuff without an engineering background or do i need to take a class or something. i picked up a copy of the arrl handbook but its kind of overwhelming honestly also does anyone actually use the full privileges once they get it or is it more of a just to have it thing

not a dumb question at all, everyone goes through this. so the short version is — for getting INTO a repeater you need to encode the tone, meaning your radio transmits that subaudible tone along with your voice so the repeater knows to open up. the decode side (sometimes called tone squelch or CTCSS squelch) is optional and just affects what YOU hear coming out of your speaker. a lot of people leave decode off so they can hear everything coming through the repeater. the baofeng menu for this can be a little confusing because it labels things differently depending on the firmware version but look for something that says T-CTCS or T-DCS for the transmit side, that's the one that matters for accessing the repeater. as for linked systems, functionally you use them the same way — same tone, same offset. just be aware that when a repeater is linked up to a network like EchoLink or IRLP or even just physically linked to another machine, there might be a slight delay before the link actually connects when someone kerchunks it, so its good practice to pause a second after the courtesy tone before you start talking. some linked systems also have their own tones or DTMF commands to connect and disconnect but the trustee or repeater owner usually has that info on their website.

For SOTA I prefer my Elecraft T1 - lighter weight and the auto-tune is clutch when you're cold and fumbling with controls. Manual Z-match is great for base station but in the field, convenience often trumps that last 0.5dB of efficiency.

so ive been licensed about 8 months now and i finally feel comfortable enough on HF to try checking into some nets. i've been mostly doing 2m stuff locally but my elmer keeps telling me to get on HF and just do it already. he mentioned something about the 40m and 80m nets being pretty active in the evenings but i honestly dont know where to start looking. i found the ARRL net directory thing online but its kind of overwhelming, theres so many listed and i cant tell which ones are actually active vs just listed there and dead. does anyone have nets they regularly check into and would recommend for a newer guy? i'm in the midwest so time zones and all that matter i guess. also heard something about special event stations being a thing — like i saw a callsign that started with W1 something and had a weird suffix, is that related or totally different?

no hard rule on it, at least not in normal everyday operation. the NATO phonetics exist because they were designed to be unambiguous across different languages and accents — each word sounds distinct enough that even in a pile of noise you can usually pick it out. but once you're mid-QSO and the other station has your call confirmed, yeah most people just say it normally. where it really matters is when youre making initial contact, especially if band conditions are rough or youre working DX. you definitely want phonetics then. the non-standard stuff drives me a little crazy too tbh. some of the old timers have their own pet phonetics theyve been using since the 60s and they wont let them go. "Texas" for T is an old one. it works fine domestically but the whole point of NATO standardization is so a station in Japan or Brazil knows exactly what youre saying. anyway dont stress it too much, just use the standard ones when it counts and youll be fine.

Check your power supply regulation too. Si5351 is very sensitive to supply voltage changes. Even 0.1V drift can cause frequency instability. I ended up adding a dedicated 3.3V LDO regulator just for the clock chip.

so i passed my technician exam on like tuesday and been lurking on the 147.225 repeater here in town for a few days just listening, finally worked up the nerve to key up yesterday afternoon and just said my callsign and that i was new and looking to make contact and this older guy came back to me immediately and we talked for like 20 minutes about antennas and where i lived and stuff honestly way less scary than i thought it would be, i was expecting silence or something. hes an elmer type guy apparently and said i could call him anytime on the repeater if i had questions. pretty cool honestly. anyway just wanted to share cause i feel like i actually did something real finally after months of studying

I'm pretty new to HF, just got my general a few months ago and I've been lurking on this forum trying to figure out what bands to focus on. This is actually really helpful to hear that 10 and 17 have been good lately because I set up my antenna for 20 meters and havent really tried much else. Do you need a different antenna for 17 or can a 20m dipole work on it with a tuner? sorry if thats a dumb question just trying to figure out what im working with before I go buying more wire.

The laminated card thing is not optional in my opinion, seriously. I've been doing ARES activations for about twelve years now and the number of times I've seen operators (myself included early on) blank on a simplex frequency or a net check-in time when things get stressful is embarrassing. I keep a laminated card with our county's ARES frequencies, the regional NBEMS channels, and a quick reminder of net etiquette stuff — sounds dumb but when you haven't slept and the served agency is yelling at you it matters. For antennas, honestly the EFHW with a 49:1 un-un has become my go-to because I can throw it in a tree with a fishing line launcher and be on 40 meters in like 15 minutes. Random wire with a tuner works too but sometimes those tuners get fussy when you're rushing. One thing I don't see you mention — do you have a way to charge that LiFePO4 in the field? Like a solar panel or a way to charge from a vehicle? Three days is fine on 20ah if you're not transmitting constantly but for a longer deployment you'll want options. Also honestly the thing most people forget is food and water for themselves. You laugh but I've shown up to EOC activations where the operator is totally dialed in radio-wise and then crashes four hours later because they didn't eat.

yeah i was thinking about it, my buddy has some old coax and a bunch of connectors he wants to unload cheap so we might set up in the tailgate area. dont know what time we'll get there though, depends on if his truck starts lol. what time does it open, is it still like 7am or did they change it

the discomfort with farnsworth spacing absolutely goes away, took me maybe 3 or 4 weeks before it stopped feeling like someone was talking to me in slow motion between fast letters if that makes sense. the key thing is dont drop the character speed down no matter how tempting it is. your brain needs to learn the sound of each character as one single chunk and you cant do that at 5wpm because you have time to count. for me personally it took about 8 months to get comfortably to 20wpm but i wasnt super consistent about it. some weeks id do nothing and then feel guilty and binge practice for a few days. if you can really stick to 20-30 minutes every single day you could probably do it in 4 or 5 months id guess. the other thing that helped me a ton was just listening to actual qsos on the air even when i couldnt copy everything. just having real code in your ears instead of practice files makes a difference somehow, the rhythm is different when a human is sending versus a computer

so ive been messing around with winlink for a few weeks now and i think i have it working but honestly im not 100% sure i set things up correctly or if its just kind of working by accident my setup is an IC-7300 running into Winlink Express on the PC, using VARA HF for the modem side. i can connect to a couple of the regional RMS gateways no problem and messages are going out and coming in fine so thats good i guess. but im confused about a few things. first — when i look at the gateway list in Winlink Express it shows a bunch of gateways sorted by distance but sometimes the closest one just wont connect even though the signal should be fine. im guessing its propagation but should i be trying multiple gateways in sequence or just wait and retry the closest one second thing is message handling. i sent a test message to my regular email and it showed up, but then i tried to reply from my phone back to my winlink address and it bounced. does the reply-to work differently than i think it does or did i fat finger something in the address format running 100w into a dipole up about 35 feet if that matters. 40 meters mostly