Patricia Lee

so i passed my technician exam last tuesday after putting it off for like three years. studied for maybe two weeks using hamstudyorg and honestly the test wasnt as bad as i thought it would be. anyway my friend lent me his old baofeng uv-5r to get started and i managed to make my first contact on the local repeater the next day. the guy on the other end was super patient with me fumbling through the nato phonetics and gave me a 59 signal report which i think was just being nice but still felt amazing. now im already looking at hf rigs and wondering if i should just skip ahead and study for general. anyone else go down this rabbit hole immediately or is it just me lol

i had almost the exact same setup as you last year, trap vertical in a suburban backyard, noise was making 40m basically unusable in the evenings. put up an inverted V at about 30 feet and the difference on receive was pretty dramatic honestly. not perfect but i could actually hear stations i was trying to work. transmit performance was probably a wash or maybe slightly worse but who cares if you cant hear anyone. just do it, worst case you have two antennas and you can switch between them

im probably not the most objective person here because i went through this exact thing last year and ended up just fully committing to SO2R setup over the summer. but honestly the thing that pushed me was SS phone where mults are so geographically spread that you just cannot compete at a high level without being able to snipe them while holding a run freq. that said the station engineering side is no joke. if you dont have good antenna isolation between the two radios you will absolutely blow your front end or at minimum have desense that makes your second receiver basically useless while the first radio is transmitting. i went through two different bandpass filter setups before i got something that actually worked cleanly. 4O3A filters are the go-to but theyre not cheap and the whole thing with the antenna switching relay timing has to be right or you get these weird switching transients. anyway point is budget time not just money for the setup phase. the rate gain is real though once it clicks. added probably 15-20% to my SS score first time running it properly and i wasnt even doing it well yet

yeah i caught the tail end of that opening, maybe the last 20 minutes or so before it dropped out here in the midwest. still managed to log a few VPs and a LU which was nice. the solar flux has been creeping up pretty steadily this month and some of the propagation sites are showing some optimistic numbers for the next few weeks so fingers crossed we get more of that. on the Icom thing — i saw the same video i think, the one where the guy is demoing it at some japanese electronics show? the remote head design does look slick but honestly my first thought was 'how much is this gonna cost to repair in 5 years' lol. not trying to be negative i actually really like my 7300 and Icom makes solid gear, just getting to the age where i think about that stuff. would love to hear from anyone who got to actually touch one at Dayton or wherever.

dont overthink the antenna side if the linked dipole is working. for emcomm exercises the contacts are usually short and the bands are going to be semi-predictable since everyone knows which frequencies ahead of time. ive run 40m inverted V from a painters pole in the back of a truck and it worked fine for a full day exercise. the generator vs battery thing really comes down to how much your group wants to carry and deal with. generators are great until they need fuel or someone forgets to check oil and it seizes up, which ive seen happen. batteries are quiet and simple but yeah you gotta know your numbers. solar is nice as a trickle but i wouldnt rely on it as your primary source for an 8 hour op, too many variables.

haha that first QSO feeling is real, i remember mine like it was yesterday and that was probably 15 years ago. dont worry you'll get used to your call pretty quick, after a few weeks it just comes out automatic. welcome to the hobby, stick with it and you'll be chasing DX before you know it

FT4 is worth trying if you want something between FT8 and a real QSO, its faster paced at least and you actually have to be paying attention. still no real conversation but the timing feels less like waiting for paint to dry. i use it during contests mostly. havent tried JS8Call yet, keep meaning to. does it need a lot of CPU or is it pretty light? my shack computer is kind of old.

i just passed mine like six weeks ago so this is pretty fresh for me. i used hamstudy exclusively and probably did about 3 hours total spread over maybe 10 days. the practice exams on there are really useful, once you start consistently hitting 80% or above youre probably ready. the math was maybe 3 or 4 questions on my actual exam and one of them i just guessed on and got lucky lol. dont stress it too much. the hardest part for me was the band plan stuff and some of the repeater terminology but even that clicked after a while. just take the plunge and schedule the exam, having a date on the calendar made me actually study instead of putting it off

I went through exactly this about two years ago. Ended up settling on Log4OM as my main shack log because the interface is genuinely nice and the LOTW sync is basically automatic once you configure it, and then I just fire up N1MM when theres a contest I want to operate. The ADIF merge afterward takes maybe ten minutes and ive never had serious data problems from it. Log4OM does have a contest mode but I tried it once for a state QSO party and it felt like an afterthought compared to N1MM. Like it works but N1MM is just so much faster when youre in the zone and trying to keep your rate up. Keyboard shortcuts, the callsign lookup speed, the dupe checking — N1MM wins that fight easily. One thing worth mentioning, there's also the option of just using WSJT-X feeding into N1MM for your digital modes even outside of contests, some people do that and use N1MM as their only log. I personally find N1MM too clunky for casual ragchewing but thats a personal thing.

so i finally did my first activation last weekend at a state park about 45 minutes from my house, K-4721 if anyone knows it, and honestly i was pretty nervous going in because ive read so many posts about people struggling to make their 10 contacts or dealing with terrible conditions. i almost talked myself out of going like three times the week before. anyway i set up my KX3 with a random wire thrown up in a tree, maybe 30 feet up, fed it with my little 9:1 unun and just started calling CQ POTA on 40m around 10am local. within about 20 minutes i had 12 contacts in the log and a handful of hunters were just waiting for me to come back to them. i genuinely did not expect it to be that smooth. couple things i noticed that might help other people doing their first one — spotting yourself on the POTA app makes a huge difference, like night and day compared to just cold calling without a spot. also 40 meters was way more productive than 20 for me even though i kind of assumed 20 would be the go-to. maybe just conditions that day but worth experimenting. and bring more water than you think you need because i was out there way longer than planned once i got into a rhythm. anyone else have a park they'd recommend in the mid-atlantic area? thinking about doing a few more before the weather turns.

yeah that was me about three years ago, had been off the air for almost a decade. the tech stuff felt different, more digital modes and stuff i had no clue about, but the fundamentals were all still there. honestly the hardest part was just getting an antenna back up without my wife giving me grief about the roof again. welcome back though, it comes back to you pretty quick

That sounds really familiar honestly. My first activation was a search and rescue support thing back probably 2015 or so and I remember standing in a field trying to log traffic and hold a flashlight and keep my HT from sliding off the hood of someone's truck all at the same time. You figure out your system eventually — I ended up getting one of those clipboard things with a light built in and it made a huge difference. The ICS-214 stuff gets easier too. After you do it a few times it's just muscle memory. The real value of those low-key activations like a fun run is exactly what you experienced — figuring out where YOUR gaps are in a situation where nothing critical is riding on it. Better to fumble with the freq change at mile marker 6 than at an actual disaster site. Sounds like you did fine though, net control patience is a good sign your group has good leadership.

yeah the PTT delay is pretty much the thing everybody runs into first with RemoteHams. what helped me was switching to a dedicated audio interface on the shack side instead of using the rigblaster for the audio path — kept the rigblaster just for PTT and CAT, ran the actual TX audio through a USB interface with lower latency drivers. also if your home router supports QoS you want to prioritize that UDP stream or it gets absolutely murdered when anything else on the network decides to do an update or whatever. the SDR backend thing is interesting though, i havent tried mixing a pure SDR receive path with a conventional TX radio like that. curious how youre handling the frequency sync between what the SDR is tuned to and what the 857 is actually on — are you just doing it manually or is there some CAT loop keeping them matched

so i've been checking pskreporter and dxmaps kind of obsessively lately because we've been in this really active stretch of the solar cycle and i keep reading that 10m is supposed to be coming back to life. yesterday the SFI was up around 180 and the K index was low, like 1 or 2 most of the day, which from everything ive read is basically ideal conditions. and apparently there was a massive opening into europe from the east coast in the afternoon because i saw all these spots on the cluster after the fact. problem is i was stuck at work until almost 7pm and by the time i got home and fired up the rig it was mostly gone. caught a couple of weak signals down around 28.400 but nothing i could work. just wondering if theres some kind of alert service or something people use to get notified when a band actually opens up? i feel like i keep chasing these openings after the fact. been licensed about 8 months so still figuring out the rhythm of all this propagation stuff

yeah the low bands are a whole different beast, 40m pileups at night when a rare one is on can be absolutely insane. i remember trying to work a VP8 a couple years back on 40 and just gave up after an hour, my antenna situation wasnt cutting it at all. one thing nobody tells beginners — listen to where the dx is actually coming back, not just where everybody is transmitting. theres usually a sweet spot and if you can identify it and park there right before the dx comes back to that area you have a much better shot. some ops work a predictable pattern, others are all over the place and you just gotta hunt. i dont think 100w is your problem at all for most situations. its almost always technique and timing over power, unless youre trying to break through to somewhere thats genuinely path-challenged from your location. a dipole at 35 feet and good timing beats a kw with bad timing pretty regularly in my experience

might also want to double check your path isnt getting gated but just not showing with your callsign for some reason — occasionally ive seen aprs.fi be weird about new stations, try searching just your base call without the SSID. also make sure you dont have a typo in the callsign somewhere, APRSdroid can be finnicky about that and wont always warn you.

The power increase alone makes it worthwhile - going from 200W as a Tech to 1,500W as General is significant for HF work. Plus for emergency communications, having access to most HF bands is almost a necessity depending on propagation conditions.

I built almost this exact thing a while back from the ARRL handbook design and had similar issues. For me it turned out the ground plane on my ugly construction had a gap right between the mixer and audio sections and I was getting a ground loop kind of situation. just bridging it with a bit of braid fixed most of it. also my NE602 was running a bit warm which i read somewhere can cause stability issues but im not sure if thats actually true or i just imagined it fixed itself lol

the rubbermaid tote is totally fine honestly, dont let the pelican guys make you feel bad lol. i ran a tote for years before i switched to a proper case and it worked great. the organization matters more than the container — just make sure everything has a spot and you can find it in the dark or when you're stressed. things i always tell people they forget: a small notepad and like 3-4 pens (sounds dumb but you'll thank yourself), a headlamp with fresh batteries, some kind of antenna stand or mast option because you cant always find a good tree, and copies of your license and any served agency IDs. also a power strip or small surge protector if you're ever running off a generator. oh and zip ties, always zip ties. i also keep a small printout of my most used frequencies and the regional net schedule laminated in there because when things get hectic i dont want to be digging through my phone. the SignaLink is a great call for digital, a lot of guys show up without that capability and its a pain when the net manager wants Winlink traffic moving.

not a dumb question at all, this stuff genuinely is a little confusing at first. short answer — yeah finish WAS first, youre already so close and it'll feel great to knock it out. alaska and hawaii are states for WAS purposes so they count just fine there, but they are also separate DXCC entities which is why people sometimes get twisted around on that. KH6 for hawaii and KL7 for alaska both count as entities toward DXCC so you get a little bonus there if you work them. as for which to chase — honestly most people end up working toward all of them at the same time without really meaning to. every contact you log could be counting toward multiple awards simultaneously depending on what you're working. i'd say get your WAS wrapped up, apply for it, and then start paying more attention to what DXCC entities you've already got sitting in lotw. you might be further along than you think. WAZ is fun too but the zones thing does take some getting used to — some zones are way harder to fill than others depending on where you are and what bands youre running

The beauty of the sequential system is its simplicity for the FCC's perspective. Each amateur station gets a unique call sign during license processing and it's based on your region and license class, falling back to later groups if needed. Been following this process for years - works reliably!

honestly it's mostly a judgment call unless conditions are rough or there's qrm. on a clear local repeater with a strong signal most people just give their call straight and move on, nobody's going to dock points for it. but if theres any doubt or you're working someone new or the band is noisy, phonetics just make life easier for everyone. the mix-up thing happens to everyone starting out, dont sweat it. best thing i ever did was just write the whole phonetic alphabet on a little card and tape it next to the radio until it got into my head. after a few months it becomes automatic and you stop having to think about it. november foxtrot lima... see i just did it without even trying ha

yeah i'd just bring the extra fuel can honestly. the eu2200i is such a good little genny that i'd rather run it than mess around with timing the battery cycles during an actual exercise when you've got other stuff to worry about. nothing worse than managing power state when you're supposed to be handling message traffic. one thing i'll throw out there — if the exercise has any kind of realistic scenario where you might need to go totally silent on RF noise, the eu2200i is already pretty clean but some gennys absolutely trash the bands. worth doing a quick noise check before the exercise starts, just tune around with the preamp off and see if anything lights up when you fire it up.

not a dumb question at all, this tripped up pretty much everyone when they were starting out. the short version is that LoTW is the one that matters most for ARRL awards like DXCC and WAS — the ARRL runs it and they accept LoTW confirmations directly for those. eQSL is a separate system that some people like but the ARRL doesnt accept it for their major awards, though there are some other awards programs that do take it. physical cards are still a thing and honestly a lot of DX stations still prefer them or even require them for certain awards. some rare DXpeditions will only confirm by paper card through their QSL manager. so depending on what you want to chase eventually you might end up using all three. but if youre just getting started and want to work toward DXCC someday, get LoTW working correctly first and make sure the other station is uploading too — when both sides upload a matching contact it confirms automatically and credits to your account. its actually pretty slick once you get past the setup. the certificate stuff in LoTW is annoying to set up i wont lie, but once its done its done. if you think you set it up right and youre seeing your logs upload without errors youre probably fine.

yeah i caught the tail end of that opening, was on around 28.400 and it was genuinely nuts for a while. worked a ZL which i havent done on 10 in probably two years. the SFI has been hovering around 180 which for this part of the cycle is pretty solid. cycle 25 is really delivering honestly, better than a lot of people predicted a few years back when everyone was doom and gloom about it. on the Icom thing — ive seen the same teaser and someone on reddit (i know i know) was saying it might be a new mobile rig rather than a base station update. like an updated version of the 7100 form factor maybe? pure speculation but if they update the IC-7100 with a better screen and maybe add some of the 7300 DSP features that would actually be a really compelling radio for people doing mobile HF. guess we wait and see. Hamvention is only a few months out anyway so shouldnt be too long before we know for real.