Amanda Foster

JS8Call is definitely not as populated as FT8 but its not dead either, you just have to know when to look. 40m late evening seems to work okay for me, usually see a decent cluster of activity around 7.078 like you said but also try 7.079, people scatter a bit. the HF nets that run on it are probably your best bet for actually getting a response — there are a few that run scheduled times and theyll respond to pretty much anyone who shows up.
normal mode is probably your best starting point, turbo is faster but the SNR advantage shrinks and honestly if the other station isnt running turbo you'll just confuse things. i run normal at 40 watts into a dipole and work stations pretty regularly, nothing exotic. the thing that got me was the heartbeat feature — once you set that up your station kind of announces itself automatically and you start seeing responses without even actively calling CQ, which is nice when youre just monitoring.
PSK31 scratches that same itch if you havent tried it, way more conversational feel and the waterfall activity on 20m can still be pretty good on weekends. old school but it works.

yeah i was in your exact spot about 18 months ago and went with the BF-F8HP which is kind of the slightly beefier baofeng and honestly it was fine to start. got me on the air, learned a ton just fumbling around with it. but i did eventually get a FT-70DR and the difference in how the receiver handles busy areas was pretty noticeable. not trying to talk you out of the baofeng if budget is tight, just saying the upgrade itch is real and you might end up spending the money anyway down the road. whatever you get just get on the air, thats the whole point right

yeah i was in your exact spot about 18 months ago and went with the BF-F8HP which is kind of the slightly beefier baofeng and honestly it was fine to start. got me on the air, learned a ton just fumbling around with it. but i did eventually get a FT-70DR and the difference in how the receiver handles busy areas was pretty noticeable. not trying to talk you out of the baofeng if budget is tight, just saying the upgrade itch is real and you might end up spending the money anyway down the road. whatever you get just get on the air, thats the whole point right

so anyway this is something that tripped me up too when i first started. i actually made up my own phonetics for a while because i kept blanking on the real ones mid-transmission which is embarassing. like i'd get to X and just completely freeze. the thing that helped me was just using them every single time i gave my callsign, even on the local repeater where nobody probably needed it spelled out, just to drill it in. after a few weeks it was totally automatic. and yeah the Adam Boy thing is definitely the old system, my elmer used those sometimes and it took me a minute to figure out what was going on the first time i heard it

yeah i had the same issue for months and it turned out my transmit filter shape on the 7300 was set way narrower than i realized, i think someone had been messing with the passband settings and cut the low end way back. once i reset it to defaults and then nudged the low cut to about 100hz and high cut to 2800 it sounded way more natural. also — and this is a little thing but it helped me — mic placement really does matter with the PR-40, its a side-address mic and i was basically talking into the wrong part of it for way too long and felt dumb when i figured that out lol

thats basically how i operate every weekend tbh. dont have the patience for contesting so just having something on in the background while i do other stuff around the shack works for me. sometimes ill hear something interesting and actually sit down and work it

Hey everyone! I'm diving into my first QRP homebrew project - trying to build a simple 20m CW transceiver based on some circuit ideas I found online. I'm struggling with getting the Class E power amplifier stage working efficiently. Class E amplifiers are supposed to be incredibly efficient but are difficult to get right. My calculations show it should work, but I'm only getting about 60% efficiency instead of the theoretical 90%+.
Has anyone built a successful Class E PA for QRP? What are the most common mistakes beginners make? I'm using a 2N7000 MOSFET and trying to get about 2-3 watts out on 14 MHz. Any tips on component selection or layout would be much appreciated!

so ive been a tech for about 2 years now and mostly just doing 2m and some 70cm stuff, worked a few satellites which was cool but honestly im getting kind of bored and everyone keeps telling me i should just go ahead and get my general so i can get on HF. the thing is i took the technician exam like forever ago and barely remember how i studied for it and the general pool just looks... a lot more intimidating? like the electrical theory stuff especially.
i downloaded the ARRL general study guide from somewhere but havent really opened it beyond the first couple pages. is the exam actually as hard as it looks or am i overthinking this. also is there any difference between studying from the actual question pool vs just using one of those apps. my buddy uses hamwhisperer or something like that and swore by it but idk if just memorizing answers is really the best way to go about it
also slightly unrelated but once i actually do get general what bands am i even going to have access to that i dont already, like is 40m actually as useful as people say for regional stuff

From an Elmer's perspective, consider your operating style. Many operators choose vanity calls to honor family members or friends who were silent keys. If you have a meaningful connection to a specific call, that emotional value might outweigh the fee. Otherwise, free sequential calls work great for most activities.

The link between radio/amp/tuner/antenna switch is an open protocol so FlexRadio handles audio separately from control data. My 6700 typically shows 80-120ms total latency over broadband. The native SmartSDR protocol is optimized for this unlike repurposed remote desktop solutions.