Michelle Baker

I had the same thing with wobbly paddles when I started, turned out I just hadn't set the gap properly and the contacts were bouncing. There's a really good video on YouTube by OH8STN I think it was, about paddle adjustment — worth looking up. Also the N0SA sending practice videos helped me a lot just to hear what good rhythm actually sounds like and then try to copy it. Hang in there, 6 months in and already copying 13 wpm is honestly solid progress.

so ive been going back and forth on this for a couple weeks now and finally decided to just ask. i picked up a used Yaesu FT-7900R and want to do a proper mobile install in my Tacoma. the radio itself is going under the seat with a RAM mount for the head unit on the dash which i think will look pretty clean. my main thing is where to put the antenna. i was originally thinking trunk lip mount with a mag mount style but someone at my club said roof center is way better for the radiation pattern on VHF/UHF. that makes sense to me electrically but i really dont want to drill into the roof if i can avoid it. the truck is still pretty new and honestly the wife would kill me. NMO on the trunk lid seems like the compromise but then im worried about the groundplane being weird since the trunk lid isnt connected to the chassis the same way. anyone done this on a pickup or similar? worth just doing the roof and living with the hole or is there a good trunk lid solution that actually works well?

Actually started EME on 70cm with a similar single Yagi setup and had good success. The band is less crowded so finding clear frequencies is easier, and the shorter path loss does help. However, switching to 2m later opened up many more contacts due to higher activity levels.

honestly i just gave up trying to keep one master log and accepted that N1MM is my contest log and Log4OM is everything else. the import after the contest works good enough. not perfect but close enough that i dont lose sleep over it

js8call definitely has a smaller user base than ft8 but its not dead by any means. on 40m the activity tends to cluster around 7078 kHz, and on 20m i usually see traffic around 14078. there are also some organized nets, the js8call net runs periodically and there's emcomm groups using it for exactly the reason you described — you can actually pass traffic with it, not just exchange locators. the thing that got me hooked was the store-and-forward relay stuff, if a message gets passed through multiple stations to reach someone thats genuinely cool weak signal operation. propagation has to cooperate but ive had messages relayed through three or four stations on 40m at night. stick with it, just takes time to find when the regulars are on. most of the activity i see is evenings local time wherever the operators are.

so ive been doing contests for a few years now mostly single op single radio and i keep reading about SO2R and how much it helps your rate but honestly every time i try to wrap my head around it i feel like the cognitive load would just kill me. like right now i can hold a run frequency on 20m and S&P on 15 at the same time mentally but actually operating two radios simultaneously with two antennas and keeping both audio streams straight seems like a whole different animal. my current setup is a K3 and i have an old FT-950 sitting in the corner that i barely use anymore. antenna wise i have a 2el yagi for 20/15/10 and a dipole for 40/80. wondering if its even worth trying to set up a basic SO2R with that or if the antenna isolation issues are gonna make it more trouble than its worth. i know you need bandpass filters or at least some kind of filtering between the two radios or you'll just blow up your receiver front end on the second radio. also curious what people do for rate optimization when they're running — like when do you decide to abandon a run frequency and go S&P, and how do you keep your multiplier count from getting too thin when you're locked into a good rate. feels like there's always a tradeoff and i never quite know when to switch modes mid contest.

had the RSP1A for a couple years and its a solid step up from the rtl-sdr dongles, no question. the noise floor improvement is real and noticeable, especially if you do any HF work — the built in presets for different bands actually help a lot. SDRuno is fine but i eventually switched to SDRangel for most things because i like having all my devices in one place. the learning curve on SDRangel is real though, took me a weekend of just clicking around before stuff made sense. HackRF is a different beast. if you dont need TX dont pay for it. the RSP1A receive performance is actually better than HackRF in most practical situations anyway because the HackRF ADC resolution isnt great either, its only 8-bit. the RSP1A at 12-bit just gives you more headroom to work with when you have strong signals nearby. for what you're describing — ACARS, weather sats, general monitoring — the RSP1A is the right tool.

i tried SO2R once and went back to single radio after about 3 hours lol. maybe im just not wired for it. felt like i was doing both things badly instead of one thing well. the guys who are good at it seem to have like a completely different operating style, almost like they've automated certain decisions so they dont have to consciously think about them during the run. maybe someday ill try again but for now i just focus on running clean and keeping my exchange crisp. still managed top 10 in my section last SS so it cant be that bad a strategy

drilled my 4Runner about 8 years ago and never looked back. the NMO connection is just cleaner all around, no lossy coax adapter situation and the ground plane is solid sheet metal instead of whatever the magnet can grab. yes you can feel the difference on weak signals coming off a distant repeater, not dramatic but its there. for the drilling part, if you take your time and use a proper NMO hole saw bit, 3/4 inch, and put some self etching primer on the bare metal before the mount goes in, you wont have any rust issues. i used a little silicone under the mount flange too. been fine through winters with road salt and everything. the lip mounts are okay but youre adding a bunch of cable routing weirdness and the ground isnt as good, most guys i know who tried them ended up drilling anyway eventually

JS8Call activity really depends on when and where you look. 40m around 7.078 tends to have some life in the evenings, at least here in the midwest. the thing people dont realize is JS8Call has this heartbeat/beacon thing where stations can be running in the background and you can query them even if theyre not actively watching the screen, which is kind of cool for a more async style of operating. that said yeah the activity is nowhere near FT8 levels and probably never will be. i think of it as a different tool entirely. FT8 is basically automated contact logging with a radio attached, JS8Call is more like a slow chatroom that also happens to work when propagation is garbage. if youre on during a contest weekend a lot of the js8 regulars seem to disappear anyway since they get sucked into the contest. for actual ragchewing though honestly i still drop down to PSK31 or even olivia sometimes when i find someone to schedule with. you just have to find people who are into it, cant really cold call on those modes the way you can on FT8.

Looking at the HF band plans, I see different segments allocated for CW, phone, and digital modes within each band. Different frequency ranges have specific mode restrictions like CW and RTTY only, or CW/phone/image combinations. Why are these segments separated this way? Can I use FT8 anywhere in the digital/data portions, or are there specific frequencies I should use? The 30-meter band is exclusively for CW and digital modes, making it efficient for DX communications with excellent long-distance capabilities.

Our section's SET exercise "November Gale" is coming up on 11/9 and I'm working on scenario development. I learned about a great drill where radio amateurs simulated a flood due to a dam collapse that forced people to take shelter in a school, with hams transmitting how many cots and hot meals would be needed, which got more complicated when they discovered refugees needed prescription drugs that were difficult to read and pronounce. The purpose of SET is to find out the strengths and weaknesses of ARES, NTS, RACES and other groups in providing emergency communications. What scenarios has your group used that really tested your capabilities? Looking for ideas that go beyond basic message passing. Interested in exercises that challenge both technical skills and operational procedures under realistic stress.

not dumb questions at all, EME has a pretty steep learning curve and the old timers dont always explain the basics well. so the short answer on your yagi situation is — one 11el can actually work with JT65 if youre patient and you pick your contacts carefully. you want to be working stations that have big arrays on the other end, like 4x9el or larger, because they can pull you out even when your signal is marginal. EMElog and the ON4KST chat are basically essential, you want to be coordinating ahead of time rather than just calling CQ into the void. the LNA thing is probably your biggest weak point honestly. a cheap preamp with a mediocre noise figure is going to hurt you more than the antenna situation in some ways. Kuhne makes good stuff and so does SSB Electronics, aim for something under 0.5dB NF if you can and get it as close to the feedpoint as possible, every bit of coax between the antenna and the LNA is killing you. the IC-9700 has decent receive sensitivity but you still want a good external preamp in the chain. for tracking i use a Green Heron controller with PstRotator software, it polls the moonrise/set data and keeps the beam pointed automatically. works great once you get it dialed in. just make sure your rotor can handle the elevation too if you want to track through the full arc, some people just use azimuth and catch the moon near rise or set when its lower but its easier with full az/el.

had almost the exact same thing happen on my 897 which is basically the same guts. turned out to be one of those tiny relays on the LPF board had a dirty contact. i just reseated the board connectors first and it actually helped a little but didnt fix it fully. ended up hitting the relay contacts with some deoxit on a thin piece of card stock slid underneath and that sorted it. probably a temporary fix but its been two years now so ill take it lol

so ive been running a Larsen NMO2/70B on my F-150 for about a year now, had it on a fender mount the whole time because i was nervous about drilling the roof. finally bit the bullet last month and moved it to the roof center and honestly i cant believe i waited this long. the difference on 70cm especially is pretty noticeable, i was getting into a couple repeaters that were kind of marginal before and now they're rock solid. anyway the actual question i have is whether anyone has done a comparison with a collinear on the same mount vs a 5/8 wave. i picked up a Tram 1185 from a swap meet and i'm wondering if its worth swapping out the Larsen or if the gain difference is just theoretical at mobile speeds. my main use is just commuting and some APRS so its not like im trying to win a contest or anything, just curious if people have actually noticed real world differences between them.

im kind of in the same boat as you, just got my general last spring so this is my first real solar cycle experience and its a lot to take in. i downloaded the HamSphere app mostly just to watch the band condition indicators but i dont totally trust them lol. one thing that helped me was joining a couple DX clusters and just watching the spots roll in for a while even when im not actively transmitting, you start to get a feel for what times of day certain paths open up and it kind of clicks eventually. 17m has been my favorite band lately when it cooperates, worked a station in Japan last tuesday which was a first for me so the conditions cant be all bad

the NR thing is super common, pretty much everyone who gets a 7300 cranks the NR down within the first week. icom ships it a bit hot from factory i think. also if you havent dug into the AGC settings yet thats worth an evening — the fast/mid/slow options make a bigger difference than you'd expect on SSB pile-ups. the mid setting is where i landed for most HF work. the RF gain thing took me a while too coming from older gear where you just kind of set it and forget it. once you get used to actually using it as a real control it becomes second nature. welcome to the dark side, the 7300 is genuinely a great rig for the price point.

-20 dBm is definitely too hot for LO leakage, you could be causing interference plus its going to desensitize your receive path if any of it reflects back. with a hand wound diode ring mixer the balance is really sensitive to how evenly matched your diodes are and the symmetry of the toroid windings. worth trying to select your 1N4148s for matched forward voltage, even a small mismatch kills the balance. ive built a few of these and honestly getting below -40 dBm with hand selected diodes and careful winding is doable but takes some iteration. for the hum i'd suspect the supply first, those cheap wall warts are pretty noisy. try running it off a battery and see if the hum goes away, that'll tell you right away whether its the supply or something else like a ground loop in the audio stage.

APRS-IS to RF messaging worked yesterday but stopped after toggling telemetry settings. Using APRX 2.8.1 on Raspberry Pi with proper digipeater configuration. Logs show messages reaching APRX but getting discarded with "History entry for sending call from APRSIS is too new". RF-to-RF messaging via digipeater still functions, as does RF-to-IS direction. Has anyone seen this timing issue with message history filtering? The viscous-delay and filter settings appear correct but something in the dupe-checking logic seems broken.

oh man yes this is exactly what i went through last year. coming back after time off is rough because your brain kind of remembers the code but your hands definitely dont. what helped me was actually slowing way down — i mean painfully slow, like 10-12 wpm — and just doing one letter at a time until it felt effortless, then bumping up a couple wpm. the frustration usually comes from pushing speed before the muscle memory is solid. on the keyer timing stuff, the built in 7300 keyer is honestly pretty decent, ive heard worse in dedicated units that cost real money. but i would play with the weight setting more than you probably have — try bumping the weight up just a hair from default and see if that helps the dits feel a bit more defined at slower speeds. paddle tension is personal but a lot of people set it too loose when they first start, which causes bounce and errors. snug it up a tiny bit and see if that helps your accuracy. and give it time, seriously, its not gonna click overnight but one day itll just start feeling right again.

Still primarily using JT65B for EME because that's where most of the activity is. The setup is exactly the same as running WSJT-X locally - you're simply changing the mode from FT8 or FT4 to Q65 or JT65. I'll switch when I see more stations migrating to Q65, but for now JT65 gives me more QSO opportunities.

so ive been trying to get Winlink working for a few weeks now and i think i finally understand the basics but still running into issues. quick background - i have a Icom 7300 running into a Signalink USB, using Winlink Express on a windows 10 laptop. i set up the vara HF modem which took forever to figure out honestly but i got it running and the audio levels seem ok. did the calibration thing and it shows green. the problem is when i try to connect to an RMS gateway it starts the handshake, i can see it doing something in the waterfall, but then after maybe 30-40 seconds it just drops out with a timeout error. ive tried like 5 or 6 different gateways, some close some not so close. propagation hasnt been great but i did manage one partial session where it looked like messages were actually going through before it cut out. not sure if its a timing issue, audio level issue, or maybe i have the wrong COM port settings for PTT. the radio keys up fine when i initiate the session so ptt seems to be working at least. anyone dealt with this before or have any ideas where to start poking around

been licensed for about 6 months now and still feel awkward using alfa bravo charlie etc when giving my call. i hear some guys use it all the time and others hardly ever. when your on 2m repeaters do you really need to spell out your whole call every time? seems like overkill but maybe im missing something

so i finally got my technician ticket back in march and ive been mostly just listening on the local 2m repeater for the past couple months trying to figure out how things work before i actually key up. well last night i worked up the nerve to check into the tuesday evening net and honestly it went okay but i had no idea what i was doing half the time. the net control called for check-ins and i just said my callsign and that i was monitoring, which seemed fine, but then later he asked if anyone had traffic and i just stayed quiet because i didnt really know what that meant in context. also at one point someone asked for a signal report and i wasnt sure if i was supposed to give one since i hadnt really talked to that person directly. i just stayed quiet again. is there like a good resource for learning net procedures or is it really just one of those things you pick up by listening? i dont want to step on anyone or do something rude without knowing it.

nets are really not complicated once you've heard one go through a cycle, the first time is always the confusing part. basically the net control station calls the net, announces the frequency and purpose, then opens it up for check-ins. you just wait for that window and give your callsign once, then net control acknowledges you and you're in the log. some nets are just roll call type things that take maybe 10 minutes, others like traffic nets have more structure where people actually pass formal messages. for getting started i'd honestly just listen to a few sessions before jumping in, that way you get a feel for the pacing and how the net control handles things. the ARRL has a net directory but i've had better luck just asking around locally since a lot of club nets aren't listed anywhere official. there's also the 10-10 net and a bunch of HF nets on 40 and 80 meters that run daily. the lighthouse weekend station is a different animal — thats a special event station meaning a group set up specifically for an event to hand out contacts or sometimes a unique callsign. you just call them like any DX, theyre usually pretty quick exchanges. not really the same as a net but both are worth doing.