Ashley Brown

yeah the interference thing between the two radios is the part people underestimate. i tried running my 7600 and an old FT-1000MP on the same operating session during sweepstakes and even with the antennas being on different bands the IMD was making me crazy. ended up needing bandpass filters on both radios before it got manageable, the 4O3A or the Array Solutions ones are what most people end up with but thats another couple hundred bucks minimum not trying to talk you out of it just saying budget the full system cost before you decide, its not just a second radio its the whole ecosystem around it

so i've been licensed for about 8 months now mostly just doing some local 2m stuff and a bit of HF with SSB but ive been really curious about CW lately. i know its not required anymore but theres something about it that just seems really cool and like a whole other world of operating. the problem is i have absolutely no idea where to start. like do people just memorize the dots and dashes on a chart or is there some other method that actually works? i tried looking at one of those charts once and my brain just kind of shut off. is it realistic to learn this as an adult or is it one of those things thats way easier when youre a kid. i feel like ive heard people say the Koch method or something like that but i dont really know what that even means. just looking for how people here actually did it, not like a textbook answer

so i finally worked up the nerve to check into a local net last night, been licensed for about 4 months now and have mostly just been listening. the net control called for check-ins and i just said my callsign and that i had no traffic. guy came back to me and acknowledged me but honestly i wasnt totally sure if i did it right or if there was some specific format i was supposed to follow. like do you just give your callsign or do you give your name and location too? i've heard different nets do it differently and didnt want to ask on air because i was already nervous enough. also when net control was wrapping up and asked if there were any final comments i wasnt sure if i was supposed to say something or just listen. ended up just staying quiet. anyway overall it went okay i think but would love to know what the actual expected format is, if there is one. dont want to be that guy who does everything wrong on his first time.

so i had the shack open last night just kind of half paying attention while doing some stuff around the house and ended up just listening to a ragchew on 7.250 for like 45 minutes. two guys just going on about their gardens and the weather and one of them had just gotten a new tractor or something. didnt even matter what they were talking about honestly, just nice to have it on in the background. sometimes i forget why i got into this hobby and then something like that happens and i remember. anyway just felt like sharing that i guess

yeah what he said about the grounding. also just worth double checking your LO level into the SBL-1, those diode ring mixers want something like +7dBm at the LO port to really work right and if youre feeding it less than that conversion loss gets worse. easy thing to check if you have even a cheap scope — LO signal should be a pretty clean sine wave and reasonably healthy amplitude. ive seen people blame the mixer when the oscillator was just barely putting out enough to tickle it

so i've been studying for about 6 weeks and finally passed my technician exam yesterday morning, went home and borrowed my dad's baofeng to listen around on the local 2m repeater and ended up actually keying up and talking to a guy named Ron who was super patient with me while i fumbled through my callsign like three times lol. he walked me through the whole thing and gave me a signal report and everything. i know baofengs get a lot of grief on here but honestly it worked fine for a first contact, already looking at a proper radio though maybe the FT-65 or something in that range. anyway just wanted to say hi and that this hobby is already way more fun than i expected