James Wilson94

yeah i did almost exactly this for my shack like two years ago, except i was using a TS-590 so kenwood CAT instead of CI-V, but same basic idea. the byte dropping thing is almost certainly a buffer overflow on the arduino's hardware serial - if youre using Software Serial for CI-V that thing is notoriously flaky especially if anything else in the loop is blocking. even a small delay() call in the wrong place will cause you to miss bytes. what i ended up doing was switching to one of the hardware serial ports on the mega (you have 4 on that board which is great) and then just making the main loop as non-blocking as possible. no delay() anywhere, just state machines and millis() for timing. its a bit more code to write but once you do it that way it just works. also double check your baud rate matches exactly what the 7300 is putting out, CI-V is usually 19200 but some people have theirs set different and its easy to miss. raspberry pi would work too and you'd have more headroom for sure but honestly the arduino is fine for this, you just gotta be careful about blocking code

so ive been getting reports for a while now that my audio on SSB sounds kind of muddy or muffled, one guy on 40m last week said it sounded like i was talking through a pillow. im running an IC-7300 with the stock mic and i havent really touched the audio settings much since i got it a couple years ago. i set up a frequency offset once and thats about it. i know the 7300 has a ton of EQ options in the menu but honestly i never dug into them because the manual is kind of overwhelming. i also read somewhere that SSB audio benefits from a bit of a mid-range boost and cutting some of the low end because the low frequencies just eat up power without actually helping intelligibility. not sure if thats true or just something someone made up on reddit. also my mic gain is probably set too high, ive been told that before. but i dont know what level to set it at without actually being able to hear myself. is there a way to monitor that on the radio itself or do i need a second receiver to check? genuinely unsure how people dial this stuff in without spending hours on the air annoying everyone while they tune their audio.

so i was just messing around on 10 meters yesterday afternoon, not really expecting much, and all of a sudden the band just exploded open. was working stations in south america like they were across town, S9 signals just pouring in. ran a bunch of contacts in about an hour and a half before it faded out. honestly forgot how good 10m can be when the solar cycle cooperates, we havent seen conditions like this consistently in a long time and its been a real treat lately. also wanted to bring up the new IC-7760 that Icom apparently announced — saw some chatter about it on a couple other forums and there's a video floating around showing the remote head setup. looks like they're really leaning into the remote operation angle which makes sense given how many people are dealing with HOA situations these days. i havent seen official US pricing yet but the Japanese market price someone converted was... not cheap. curious if anyone here has more info on it or has seen hands-on coverage from a hamfest or dealer demo. anyway just thought id share, felt like one of those days that reminds you why you got into this hobby in the first place.

yeah this trips up a lot of new folks and honestly even some people who've been licensed for years get it slightly wrong or just do what they were taught without looking it up. the actual FCC rule is that you have to identify at least once every 10 minutes during a communication and at the end of the communication. so on a short net check-in where you're on and off in under 10 minutes, you technically just need to ID once at the end of your transmission. giving your call at the start is good practice and courteous but its not strictly required by the rules for short exchanges. now giving BOTH calls — yours and the station you're working — thats actually not required in the US at all, thats more of an old habit carried over from HF or just tradition. some guys do it out of habit or because they like the formality and theres nothing wrong with it, but you dont have to. on a net specifically, the NCS usually has a rhythm going and if you listen to how the experienced checkins do it you'll pick up what that particular net prefers pretty quick. most nets i run with just want your call, your name, location, and whether you have traffic — clean and simple. dont stress too much, nobody's gonna yell at you for being a little extra courteous with your ID.

the ground plane argument against lip mounts is real but honestly for hitting repeaters 20-30 miles out it probably wont matter much. ive had a Larsen NMO-K lip mount on my Tacoma for maybe 3 years now and the only issue i had was one of the set screws backed out after a winter, retightened it and put some blue loctite on and havent touched it since. corrosion on mine has been minimal but i do spray it down with some dielectric grease every fall before the salt starts flying. the coax routing is the real headache with lip mounts compared to drilling. you still end up fishing it somewhere, just differently. if you go that route budget some time for the routing, it took me longer than i expected to get it looking clean going through the cab. as for the antenna choice, the G7 is a nice stick but i honestly couldnt tell a real world difference versus a decent 5/8 wave on a solid mount. the extra gain only matters if youre pointed the right direction anyway on mobile.

so ive been on SSB for about a year now mostly on 40m and 20m and people keep telling me my audio sounds 'thin' or 'tinny' and i cant figure out what the deal is. im running an IC-7300 which i know is a pretty decent rig so i dont think its the radio itself. using a Heil PR-40 mic which everyone says is great but honestly i wonder if im just not setting it up right. the mic gain is sitting around 50% and i have the compression on but only like 2-3 bars showing on the ALC. someone on the air told me to turn the TX bandwidth up but i messed with that and it didnt seem to help much or maybe i was doing it wrong. i also noticed the high frequency stuff in my voice just doesnt come through and i sound almost like im on a telephone from 1985 according to one guy lol. is there some baseline setup people use for SSB voice that i should know about? i feel like theres a combination of settings that work together and i just havent stumbled on the right combination yet. any help appreciated, been bugging me for a while now

so ive been wanting to get into ham radio for a while now and finally decided to just go for the tech license. problem is i dont really know where to start with studying. a friend mentioned the ARRL handbook but that seems like way overkill for just the tech exam? also saw some stuff about hamstudy.org online but idk if thats enough on its own or if i should get an actual book too also kind of confused about the question pool thing, like is the actual test pulled directly from those questions or is it similar questions or what. im a pretty fast learner but i have zero background in electronics so some of the math stuff is going to be rough probably any advice appreciated, trying to take the exam in like 3-4 weeks

so ive been a Tech for about 8 months now and honestly been mostly just doing 2m/70cm stuff with my HT and a little bit of packet radio stuff on the side. but lately ive been really wanting to get on HF, i tried listening on 40m with just a wire antenna i threw up and man theres just so much going on down there, i want to actually transmit not just listen anyway my question is how hard is the General exam compared to Tech. i remember the Tech test wasnt too bad, i used the HamStudy website and just drilled questions for like 3 weeks. is it the same kind of deal for General or is there like actual math i need to know. someone at my club mentioned something about the electrical principles section being tricky and now im a little worried. also wondering if its worth going straight for Extra but that seems like a big jump any advice appreciated, trying to figure out how much time i need to set aside for this

yeah same boat as you last year, passed it and the Extra at the same session actually which maybe wasnt the smartest idea lol but it worked out. for the electrical theory stuff i just watched some YouTube videos, there's a few guys who specifically go through the General pool and explain the why behind the questions instead of just making you memorize. that helped me way more than just flashcards for the formula stuff. dont stress too much about impedance matching and all that, you'll run into it again when you actually start messing with antennas anyway and it clicks better with hands-on stuff

congrats on the first build, MTR-3B is a great kit to start with. Steve Weber designs are really solid and well documented so if something seems off theres usually a good explanation in the build notes or the yahoo group archives (or whatever replaced those). on the sidetone thing — theres a trim pot inside for adjusting that, pretty sure its labeled on the board. just a small screwdriver and you can dial it up to whatever feels comfortable. i like mine a little lower actually so i dont fatigue on long sessions but thats personal preference. for portable antennas the EFHW is genuinely hard to beat for simplicity, especially if you wind your own 49:1 unun. you can get the whole thing including wire under 200 grams easy and it'll load up on multiple bands. i use a 40m EFHW for most of my SOTA stuff and it just works. dont overthink the antenna, get out and operate is my advice.

yeah 35 lbs sounds like where everyone starts lol. did you self spot on SOTAwatch before you went up or just wing it? i always forget to post an alert ahead of time and then wonder why the chasers arent there when i start calling. also whats the trail like on that one, ive had it on my list for a while

Yeah both stations definitely have to upload to LoTW for a confirmation to show up — that's the part that trips a lot of new folks up. You could have a perfect log entry but if the other guy never uploads his side you'll just sit there waiting forever. Some operators upload every week, some do it once a year, some never bother at all. Just kind of how it is. Physical cards are still very much a thing, especially in the DX world. A lot of DXers still prefer paper cards for certain awards or just because they like having something tangible. I've got a whole wall of cards going back to the 80s and I'd never give that up. But for DXCC specifically, LoTW is honestly the way to go now — the ARRL accepts LoTW confirmations and it saves you a ton of hassle versus mailing cards back and forth through QSL bureaus which can take like a year or more sometimes. eQSL is kind of its own separate thing — it's faster and free and a lot of casual operators use it, but it's not accepted for DXCC credit the same way LoTW is. Some awards programs do accept it though. I'd set up all three honestly, takes like an afternoon and then you're covered no matter what the other person prefers.

oh man i remember my first contest, i had no clue what was happening for the first like two hours lol. one thing nobody told me — write down the exchange format before you start so you're not fumbling during a QSO. for CQ WW it's signal report and CQ zone, which sounds simple but when you're nervous and the other guy is going a mile a minute it helps to have it written on a sticky note or something. also look up SOTA if you ever want something more chill than a full contest. it's not really a contest but there's awards and points and you go activate summits, really fun way to get portable operating experience. totally different vibe but scratches a similar itch if contests feel too intense at first.

yeah dont overthink it, i studied for my tech off and on for maybe 3 weeks using just the free question pool on the ARRL site and passed no problem. the real test only pulls 35 questions from that pool so you just need 26 right to pass, which isnt that hard once you've gone through the material a few times. some of the questions about operating procedures and band priveleges you kind of just learn naturally once you start listening on the air anyway

oh man i remember my first solo activation, i over-thought literally everything. the exchange stuff confused me too for a while. i think of it more like a friendly contact than a contest so people kind of do whatever feels natural to them. one thing that helped me a ton for spotting was just texting a friend before i left and asking them to spot me once i said i was on frequency, i'd send a quick text if i had even one bar and they'd take care of the rest. not always possible but it works when it does. also the parksnpeaks app has a spot function that sometimes works on really minimal data connections if the pota website is being slow.

honestly the jump from tech to general isnt as bad as people make it sound. the math stuff looks scary on paper but you dont really need to derive anything, you just need to recognize which formula applies and the question pool kind of gives it away if you study enough. hamstudy is still your friend here, same as before. i think i spent maybe 3 weeks on it, doing like 20-30 practice questions a day and i was passing the practice tests pretty consistently before i went in. the electrical theory questions are the part people stress about but honestly once you see them enough times you just kind of memorize the patterns. the propagation stuff is actually interesting once it clicks, like understanding why 40m works better at night and 10m opens up during solar max, that stuff starts making sense when you read a little about it outside of just the question pool. as for HF privileges, general gets you a solid chunk of all the major bands. 40m alone is worth it, you can ragchew across the country most evenings no problem. 20m is where a lot of the dx action happens and yeah there are segments you cant touch til you get extra but there's plenty of room to play around and have a good time. i wouldnt worry about hitting a wall, most people who upgrade to general end up sitting there for years perfectly happy before they even think about extra.

the LM386 is notorious for picking up garbage if you dont layout the ground plane carefully, and dead bug on copper clad can go either way depending on how you handle the grounds. the 120hz hum is almost certainly power supply, i'd start by putting a bigger filter cap right at the V+ pin of the 386, like 100uf or even 220uf electrolytic with a small ceramic in parallel. also try lifting your audio ground and connecting it at only one point to the main ground — ground loops in homebrews will kill you. the muddy sound could be the high gain setting tbh. 46db on the 386 is a lot and it saturates pretty easily especially if theres any DC offset coming in from the detector stage. might be worth trying it without the gain boost caps first just to see if the audio cleans up even if its quieter. if it does, thats your problem.

so i passed my technician exam last thursday and i've been lurking on this forum for like two months before that just trying to figure out what i was getting into. finally feel like i can actually post something. got my callsign yesterday and honestly just sat there staring at it for a while on the ULS lookup page. made my first real contact last night on the local 2m repeater, just a quick check-in with the weekly net. the net control guy was super patient with me stumbling through my callsign. i wrote it down on a sticky note so i wouldnt mess it up but of course i still fumbled it a bit. anyway just wanted to introduce myself and say this community has been really helpful even just reading old threads.

So ive been running a mag mount diamond on the roof of my truck for about two years now and honestly it works fine but i keep reading that NMO is the way to go for a permanent install. The mag mount does slide around a bit in the car wash and i had one close call where it almost came off on the highway so maybe its time. My hesitation is obviously drilling a hole in a truck i still owe payments on. The lip mount option seems like a decent middle ground but i talked to a guy at the club last week who said lip mounts introduce a ground plane problem because youre not actually bonded to the roof properly. Is that actually a noticeable thing on VHF/UHF or is he being overly particular about it? Like for everyday 2m and 70cm use hitting the local repeaters im not sure it would matter much. Also if i do go NMO what feedline should i be running — the truck cab is pretty tight and i dont want a huge connector situation under the headliner. Currently using whatever coax came with the mag mount which i suspect is garbage anyway.

the intermittent charging approach is actually what a lot of serious emcomm guys do and it makes a lot of sense. a 100ah lifepo4 at say 80% usable is 80ah, and your 7300 on typical emcomm traffic is probably pulling 15-20w average which is maybe 1.5-2a at 12v. so you've got way more runtime on the battery alone than you might think before you even need the genny. run the radio off the battery, kick the generator on for an hour or two when the battery drops to 50% or so, rinse repeat. your fuel consumption drops dramatically compared to running it continuously and the genny will thank you for the lighter duty cycle too. the buddipole sloper off the shelter should work fine for regional nets, just watch your feedline routing because if the coax runs near the metal shelter frame you can get some pattern weirdness. i usually try to keep at least a few feet of separation but honestly at those freqs it's probably not catastrophic.

yeah this is kind of the classic tradeoff isnt it. for casual hilltop stuff i just use a jpole or a slim jim rolled up in my bag and call it a day, but if youre actually chasing tropo or trying to work weak signal then honestly the yagi is worth it even if its annoying to deal with. the gain difference is real and 3-4 dB actually matters when conditions are marginal. the pointing problem is the real issue in my experience. i built a little az/el indicator out of a compass and a cheap inclinometer just to know where im pointing, nothing fancy. helped a lot. also if your tripod is wobbly the whole thing is kind of moot because youre constantly readjusting and losing your place. i switched to one of those surveying tripods with the geared head and its way better for antenna work. for what its worth i usually bring both now on longer activations. collinear goes up first so i can work locals while i set up the yagi, then switch over for the dx stuff. adds maybe 15 minutes to setup but i dont usually regret it.

so i've been lurking on this forum for like six months reading about QRP and finally just did it. built a little 40m CW rig from a kit, one of the 4state QRP group ones, took me probably three evenings spread over two weeks because i kept second guessing my soldering joints. anyway took it out to a state park saturday morning with a end-fed half wave wire thrown up in a tree and honestly was not expecting much. made 11 contacts in about 2.5 hours running maybe 4 watts. farthest was a guy in Colorado and i'm in Ohio so that was pretty exciting for me. the whole setup including the rig, keyer paddle, battery and antenna wire fit in a small backpack and weighed almost nothing. i dont think i can go back to hauling my HF rig out to the car now lol the only issue i had was finding a good tree branch to throw the wire over, ended up having to walk around for like 20 minutes before i found something at a decent height. does anyone have tips for getting wire up into trees more reliably? i was just using a stick and some fishing line which worked eventually but felt pretty clunky

so i finally did it, been meaning to get my license for like 3 years and just kept putting it off. passed the tech exam last tuesday with a 32/35 which i was pretty happy with honestly. borrowed a baofeng uv-5r from my buddy at work to get started while i figure out what i actually want to buy. anyway today i made my first real contact on the local 2m repeater, talked to some guy named Larry for maybe 10 minutes about nothing in particular, just signal reports and weather basically but man it felt so much cooler than i expected. kept fumbling with the PTT button and i think i was stepping on his transmission a couple times but he was really patient about it. forgot to say my callsign like twice which was embarrassing but whatever, got through it. just wanted to share i guess. anyone else remember their first QSO being kind of awkward and exciting at the same time

so i dont know if anyone else has been spending time on 10 meters lately but holy cow the band has been absolutely alive this past couple weeks. im seeing stations from all over europe and south america coming in strong, like genuine S7-S9 signals on FT8, not just the weak marginal stuff you usually get when its just barely open. i ran into a post somewhere (might have been the DX bulletin, cant remember) saying solar flux has been sitting pretty high and we're getting some nice F2 propagation going. made about 40 new countries in the last 10 days running like 50 watts to my dipole in the attic which honestly surprised me. thought my setup was too compromised to do much but apparently not when the band cooperates. also heard a rumor that Icom is supposed to announce something at the Tokyo Hamfair later this year, people are speculating its a new HF rig but who knows. anyone got any actual info on that? or just the usual internet speculation

so ive been running APRS for about 6 months now, mostly just position beaconing from the car with a TM-D710G and it works great, i can see myself on aprs.fi no problem. but i decided to try using the messaging function last week and i cant get anything to work consistently. i sent a message to a buddy's HT (he's got a VX-8DR) and it showed up on aprs.fi as delivered but he never got it on the radio itself, and when he replied i got nothing on my end either. we're both going through the same igate i think, at least we're both hitting W5XYZ-10 based on the heard-by info. is this a simplex messaging thing where the igate has to be two-way capable or am i missing something in my config. i went through the menu on the 710 and the message settings look right to me but honestly that radio has a million menus and i might have screwed something up somewhere. also kind of a side question — does anyone actually use APRS messaging regularly or is everyone just doing position tracking these days. feels like half the igates out there are receive-only and that kills the two-way stuff