Kevin Park

so i finally worked up the nerve to check into a local 2m net last tuesday night and i think i maybe did it wrong? the net control asked for check-ins and i just said my callsign once and then kind of waited. a couple other people gave their call and their name and location and i felt a little dumb sitting there. nobody said anything to me about it but im still not sure if theres like a standard way to do it that i missed. ive been licensed about 4 months now and i mostly just listen but i figured checking into a net would be a good way to actually get on the air and practice a bit. is there some kind of script people use or does it depend on the net? the guy running it seemed friendly enough he just moved on pretty quick. also do you always have to give your full callsign or do people just use the suffix sometimes on local stuff

the exam is pulled from the question pool in a pretty structured way actually, each subelement has a set number of questions that come from it so its not completely random. like youll always get a certain number from the operating procedures section vs the electrical principles section. the hamstudy thing does a decent job of tracking which areas youre weak in so just keep hammering the ones where youre getting stuff wrong. on the CSCE question yes you can operate with general privileges as soon as you pass, you dont have to wait for ULS to update. the CSCE the VE team gives you is your proof that you passed and you can use that. just make sure you actually get it from them before you leave the session. some guys have walked out without grabbing it and then had to track down the VE team later which is a pain. your callsign wont change but your class will update in ULS usually within a few days and after that you dont really need the CSCE anymore.

i built basically the same thing last year for 40m and went through like three different center insulator designs before settling on just buying one of those cheap plastic ones from the big online ham vendors, think it was like $4. not the most satisfying homebrew answer but it had the SO-239 already mounted and drilled properly and honestly i spent way more time trying to reinvent that particular wheel than it was worth lol. the 35 foot apex inverted V should work great on 40, you might notice it has a slight preference in pattern toward the ends of the dipole but at that height and on that band it probably wont matter much for general operating

15 wpm is actually harder to come back to than like 20+ in my opinion because theres more time to overthink each character lol. i had an elmer tell me to just send random 5 letter groups for 20 minutes a day without worrying about what your sending, just focus on the rhythm. took me about two weeks and things started clicking again. also the playback feature on the 7300 is great for this, just brutal hearing your own fist recorded back at you but it works

so i finally did my first POTA activation yesterday at a state park about 45 mins from my house. brought my ft-891 and a linked dipole i built a few months ago, figured id just string it up between two trees and bang out my 10 contacts easy. yeah that didnt happen. couldnt get the antenna high enough because turns out the trees i picked were kinda short and had a ton of branches in the way, ended up with it maybe 15 feet up at best, drooping in the middle like a sad noodle. got it tuned eventually with the ldk-100 but swr was still kind of ugly on 40. managed to get 6 contacts before the band just died on me, had to switch to 20 and then it started raining. packed up with 8 contacts total, one short of the qualifying 10. not complaining too much because i learned a ton and the portable setup actually worked better than i expected considering. just need a better plan for antenna deployment next time. anyone else have a rough first activation like this?

so ive been messing around with trying to get a proper remote station going for the past few months and finally got something that sort of works but im not totally happy with the audio chain. the basic setup is a IC-7300 at the home QTH connected through RemoteHams RCForb server software, works fine for basic stuff, latency is acceptable on a good day maybe 150-200ms which i can live with for SSB and definitely for CW if youre not doing anything crazy fast. the part im trying to figure out now is adding an SDR receiver alongside it — i have an RSPdx sitting there and i was thinking about using it for panadapter data streamed separately so i can see whats going on on the band while operating through the main rig. tried piping the SDR data through a separate VNC session just for the spectrum display but its kind of a mess bandwidth wise and the whole thing gets sluggish when both streams are running. has anyone actually done something like this cleanly? i saw some stuff about using SDR-Console's network server feature but wasnt sure if that plays nicely alongside the RemoteHams stack or if its going to be fighting over the same audio device. also wondering if theres a smarter way to do the internet linking part — right now im just poking holes in the firewall which works but feels sloppy. considered putting it behind a VPN but then im adding another hop and the latency creeps up. anyway if anyone has a similar setup id love to hear how you handled it especially the SDR side of things

so this has been driving me nuts for a few weeks now. my 7300 will run fine, full 100w out, and then somewhere around the 20 minute mark it just starts pulling back power on its own. not all the way down, like maybe 40-50w, sometimes less. no fault codes showing up on the display that i can see. ALC looks normal before it happens, SWR is fine, feedline is fine, antenna hasnt changed. at first i thought it was the finals getting hot and the radio protecting itself but the fan seems to be running fine and the heatsink on the back isnt even that warm when it happens. i pulled the bottom cover off and watched it do it once and nothing looked obviously wrong. no capacitors bulging, no burn marks, nothing smells. i did notice the internal temp sensor reading climbs a little faster than i expected but idk if thats normal for this radio or not. anybody dealt with something like this before? wondering if its worth pulling the PA board or if im missing something obvious before i go that far.

the listening thing is huge and most people skip it completely, they just key up and start calling right away. ive watched guys in pileups for years and the ones who actually break through fast are almost always the ones who spent 5-10 minutes just observing first. figure out the ops rhythm, is he working by region, by number, does he always come back a little high in the split or low, all that stuff matters way more than just running more power. on the partial call thing, honestly i go back and forth on it. some ops hate it and won't come back to a partial, others clearly work partials all day long. if i can hear the op picking out fragments i'll try it but if it sounds like he's copying full calls i just send the whole thing. i run a KPA1500 so i'm not exactly hurting for signal but even with the amp i've had pileups where i called for 45 minutes and got nothing until i changed my timing. timing is probably the single most underrated thing in a pileup, just slightly off the tail of the QSO not on top of it

dayton hamvention is in may if thats what you mean? its huge, like way bigger than a normal hamfest. first time i went i had no idea what i was getting into lol walked around for like 4 hours and still didnt see everything in the flea market

so ive been a general for about two years now and i keep going back and forth on whether to bother with the extra. like i mostly do HF phone and some digital stuff, nothing super exotic. a buddy of mine keeps telling me the extra is worth it just for the extra band segments but honestly when i look at what i'd have to learn — like all the filter theory and the transmission line stuff and the impedance matching formulas — i start to wonder if i'm going to actually use any of that or if its just trivia to pass a test. anyone gone through it recently and found the theory actually useful in practice, or is it mostly just memorizing stuff to get the ticket and move on? i dont have an engineering background so some of those questions in the practice exams look pretty intimidating to be honest.

so ive been doing contests for maybe 3-4 years now, mostly single op on 20 and 40, occasionally dabble in 15 when conditions cooperate. usually end up somewhere in the middle of the pack in my category and im fine with that but i keep seeing these crazy high rates from the top guys and reading about SO2R and wondering if its actually what makes the difference or if theyre just better operators than me my current setup is a k3 and a pretty modest station, i have a second radio which is an old ft-950 sitting on the shelf doing nothing. ive read a bit about SO2R and i get the concept — run on one radio while the other is S&P on a second band — but honestly every time i try to set it up even just casually without any of the proper switching stuff it feels like im just making mistakes and losing QSOs instead of gaining them. like my brain cant split the focus fast enough is this just a thing you have to grind through and eventually it clicks or is it genuinely only worth it for the guys who are already top tier and have the full SO2R switching setup with the antenna isolation and all that? curious what people who actually do it think, not just the theory

yeah the Koch method is worth understanding before you go any further. basically the idea is you learn at a higher character speed from the start, like 15-20 wpm for the actual dit-dah timing, but you put a longer gap between characters so you have time to think. the goal is your brain learns to hear each letter as a sound, not count dits and dahs. if you slow everything down too much you end up counting and then you hit a wall around 10 wpm that's really hard to break through later. LCWO dot net is free and a lot of people swear by it, it uses the Koch approach and you can set your character speed vs your overall speed separately. i'd say start there honestly. the forgetting thing is totally normal by the way, your brain needs a lot of repetition before it starts to feel automatic. i think it took me maybe 3 or 4 weeks before i stopped feeling like i was guessing on every letter. just dont try to cram too much in one session, 15-20 minutes a day is way better than an hour on the weekend

so ive been a member of our local ARES group for about eight months now and mostly its just been monthly nets and the occasional tabletop exercise which honestly felt pretty low stakes. but our EC just told us theres a real activation coming up — county emergency management asked for radio support during a pretty big flood response situation and they want us deployed at two EOC locations plus a couple shelter sites. i dont really know what to expect. during drills its all kind of relaxed and if you mess up a message format or whatever people just laugh it off. but the idea of doing this for real with actual emergency managers relying on us is making me second guess whether im actually ready. been studying up on ICS-100 and ICS-200 which our group requires but thats about it. has anyone been through their first real activation and felt this way? any advice for what to actually expect versus what training prepares you for? like the mechanics of passing traffic i feel okay about but its more the whole environment i guess

dont stress about embarrassing yourself, seriously. everyone was new once and the contesting community is pretty welcoming especially to newer calls. if anything people get excited when they hear a new callsign they havent worked before. one thing i'd say though — CQ WW can be kinda overwhelming your first time just because the band is absolutely wall to wall signals, especially on 40 and 20. might be worth tuning around during a slower contest first like maybe the ARRL Sweepstakes or even just a state QSO party to get your feet wet before the big one. but hey if you want to dive straight into CQ WW thats totally valid too, just maybe manage expectations a little on the score front haha

so ive been trying to get into CW for a few months now and i finally passed my extra but honestly the code is still giving me grief. im using an old Bencher BY-1 paddle i picked up at a hamfest and a Winkeyer USB running into my rig. the problem is it just doesnt feel... natural i guess? like when im copying is fine, im doing about 15wpm solid on the straight stuff but when i actually have to send something my brain just locks up and i start squeezing wrong or the spacing comes out all weird. i watched some videos about iambic mode A vs mode B and i honestly cant tell which one im using or which one would feel better. is there a way to tell without digging into the manual? and does it actually matter that much for a beginner or am i overthinking this also my paddle tension feels really light, almost too light. i adjusted it a bit but im not sure what "right" feels like since ive never used another paddle before. appreciate any help here

the ARRL has a pretty decent plain english summary of Part 97 if the actual FCC document is too much. i spent like an hour confused by the same section when i was studying and the ARRL handbook version made way more sense. also honestly just ask on your club's net, most guys have been doing this long enough they know when something is or isnt an issue

I've built an Arduino-based VFO using the Si5351 clockgen and 3.5" TFT touchscreen following KW5GP's design. Works great for SSB/CW switching and step control, but I'm seeing about +200Hz drift over the first 20 minutes of operation on 20m. Temperature compensated crystal oscillator helps but doesn't eliminate it completely. Running off 12V regulated supply, adequate heatsinking on the Si5351. Anyone else experienced this thermal drift with clock generators? Wondering if I need to implement software compensation or if there's a hardware fix I'm missing. Current sketch uses Etherkit Si5351 library with default 25MHz crystal correction — should I be measuring and adjusting this value more precisely?

yeah the 44 QSO minimum is real and it does seem daunting at first but honestly once you get set up and start calling CQ it goes faster than you think especially on 20m during a decent part of the day. the POTA and WWFF references can overlap yes, a lot of US national forests and wildlife refuges have both a K- number and a WWFF reference, you just log both and submit to each program separately. the WWFF log goes to wwff.us if youre in North America or through the global WWFF logbook system depending on where you register. one thing that helped me early on was spotting yourself on the WWFF spotter page, not just POTA spots. there are hunters specifically looking for WWFF activations who wont necessarily be watching the POTA cluster. made a huge difference in my pile up speed. good luck on your first one, its a lot of fun once you get the hang of the rhythm

yeah i was in the same spot when i started. honestly i just do all three now, once you have your logging set up it doesnt take much extra effort to export and upload everywhere. the LoTW setup is the annoying part because you have to get a certificate from the ARRL and it involves mailing something in or having a VE sign off, i dont remember exactly but theres instructions on their site. took me like a week to get sorted but after that its pretty seamless. eQSL i like because the confirmations happen faster, a lot of people confirm same day. physical cards i still request via QRZ for special contacts, worked a station in a country i'd never heard of last spring and definitely wanted a card for that one. dont stress about uploading everything retroactively, just start from now and you'll build up credits over time

so ive been chasing LEO passes for a couple months now mostly on FM birds like SO-50 and that went fine once i figured out the timing. decided to try AO-73 last week since everybody says the linear transponder is where the real fun is and honestly i kind of wish i hadnt because now im obsessed and also confused. the doppler thing is killing me. i get the concept, uplink and downlink shift in opposite directions on the inverting transponder so you have to chase them in opposite directions. but in practice my brain just cant keep up. i was using Gpredict and had it set to compensate but i think i had the wrong TLE or something because my signal kept drifting off and i could hear other guys just fine holding their freqs steady. also not sure if my downlink audio was just weak or if i was off passband. running an FT-817 and a handheld yagi which i know isnt ideal but i figured id try before spending money on a proper az/el setup. anyone been through this learning curve and have tips that actually helped it click

okay so i passed my general exam like three weeks ago and im still trying to figure out exactly what frequencies im allowed to use. i know theres a chart somewhere but every time i look it up i get confused because some sources say different things or the chart looks different depending on where i find it. like i understand technician gets basically nothing on HF except a little bit on 10m but general opens up a lot more right? but then there are these areas that say "general" and areas that say "amateur extra only" and i cant always tell if the frequency im on is okay or not. also someone at my club mentioned something about phone vs cw privileges being different segments and that made it even more confusing. is there like a simple way to understand this or do i just need to memorize the whole chart

Not a dumb question at all, this stuff confused me too when I first got started. So basically here's the deal — LoTW (Logbook of the World) is run by the ARRL and it's what you need for most of the big awards like DXCC and WAS. You upload your log to their system, the other station uploads theirs, and when both logs match it counts as a confirmed contact. No physical card needed. It does take a bit of setup because you have to get a digital certificate from ARRL but it's worth doing early. eQSL is a separate system that a lot of people use, it's easier to sign up for and some folks like it for the little digital card images you get, but it's not accepted for DXCC so if that's your goal it's kind of secondary. Still fun to collect though. Physical cards are totally optional these days but some people really love them, especially for rare DX contacts or when you work someone in a new country. Some awards programs still accept them and honestly theres something nice about getting a card in the mail even if it takes months sometimes. I'd say get LoTW set up first and then decide if you want to bother with the others.