Steven Wright

same here man, tuesday was rough. i had a contact lined up with a guy in ZL land and we just could not make it work even with him running a kW. we tried for like 20 minutes and gave up. checked again wednesday evening and boom, 20m came alive again out of nowhere and i worked him no problem on my first call with 100 watts. propagation is honestly kind of magic sometimes haha. or black magic i guess depending on the day

yeah the gateway status page on winlink.org is your friend, theres a channel table too that shows frequencies and modes for each station. i spent way too long trying to connect to a gateway that had been offline for weeks because i just assumed anything on the map was active lol. one other thing worth checking is whether pat is actually passing the right mycall to vara. i had a weird issue where pat was sending it lowercase and vara was choking on it, not sure if thats still a thing but worth a look at the logs. pat has pretty decent logging if you crank up the verbosity.

i ran into the same exact problem last winter during the ARRL 10m contest. ended up with like 40 duplicate QSOs because i forgot i had the ADIF auto-export running in WSJT-X and then also had the UDP feed going into Log4OM. took me an embarassingly long time to sort it out with an ADIF editor. honestly at this point i just keep N1MM for contests, full stop. theres no world where Log4OM beats it for running a pile or S&P during a big contest. the network connectivity for multi-op stuff alone is worth keeping it installed. and N1MM is free so its not like youre paying for two things. the annoyance is really just the post-contest merge and i've started doing that the same day so i dont forget what happened.

dont give up, im in the same boat right now kind of. just hit 10wpm last week after being stuck at 7 forever. what helped me was just shorter sessions more often instead of long ones. like 15 minutes twice a day beats an hour once a day for me anyway. also just started doing actual QSOs on 40m with the slow speed nets and that is way more fun than just staring at lcwo scores, even though im still pretty rough at it

so i finally did it after like 6 months of putting it off, passed my technician exam yesterday and got my callsign this morning. already programmed my baofeng (yeah yeah i know) and jumped on the local 2m repeater. first transmission i completely forgot to ID at the end, then someone came back to me and i panicked and gave the wrong callsign, like i said my old study callsign from the practice tests. the guy on the other end was super patient with me though and we ended up talking for like 20 minutes about nothing in particular. honestly wasnt as scary as i thought once i got going but man that first key-up had my heart pounding. anyone else have a rough first QSO or is it just me

The RCForb client honestly works pretty well once you get the server side configured right, which I'll admit took me longer than I expected. The SDR integration is nice if you have something like an RSP1A hanging off the same machine -- you can run it as a second device in the RemoteHams server and clients can pull up the panadapter view independently of whoever is controlling the rig. That part is actually pretty slick. That said the audio path is still the weak link in any of these setups and RemoteHams is no exception. I run mine through a dedicated VPS and even then hotel wifi is going to murder your QSO quality half the time. The codec options in RCForb help -- I usually drop it to the lower bitrate OPUS setting when bandwidth is garbage and it stays intelligible. Not great for SSB but usable. On the DMR hotspot thing, those are really two separate worlds. You could theoretically link them through something like MMDVM if you wanted a bridged audio path but thats a whole separate project and I dont think its what RemoteHams is designed for. The internet linking stuff people do with Echolink or AllStar is a different use case -- more about RF linking nodes together over IP rather than remote control of a physical transceiver.

that simplex dead spot thing is so real and it catches everyone off guard. i remember during a real activation a few years back (nothing huge, just a bad storm that knocked out some infrastructure) we had a volunteer at a shelter who genuinely could not hit any other station directly. ended up parking someone in a parking garage rooftop for like 3 hours just to act as a relay. worked fine but we definitely hadnt planned for it. now we do a simplex map exercise every year where everyone just goes to their assigned shelter or post and reports what they can and cant hear. takes maybe 90 minutes and you learn so much. anyway welcome to the exercise world, its frustrating but way better than finding this stuff out for real

CW being better than SSB over remote links is just how it is, you get used to it. the audio codec handling on most of these systems is tuned more for voice intelligibility than low latency and CW basically doesn't care as much about a few hundred ms of jitter. i ran a remote station for a club for a couple years using a completely homebrewed setup, hamlib on the back end, mumble for audio believe it or not, and a cheap VPS in between. worked suprisingly well for contesting but getting new members set up on it was a nightmare every single time

73 is the one that threw me off for ages, i kept thinking it was some kind of code for something secret haha. its just best regards basically, like a friendly sign-off. 88 is love and kisses and youre really only supposed to use that one with YLs but people bend that rule. OM is old man which sounds rude but its just how hams refer to other male operators, totally normal. YL is young lady for any female operator regardless of age, and XYL is ex-young lady meaning basically a wife or partner. i made a little cheat sheet when i was starting out and kept it next to the radio, that actually helped me a lot more than trying to memorize from a list. context is everything, if you hear QSB while somones signal is clearly fading it just clicks and you remember it. also ARRL has a decent reference but honestly the cheat sheet thing works better for me personaly

hamstudy.org is honestly all you need, just go through the question pool on there and do the practice tests until you're consistently hitting like 80% or better and you'll be fine. the actual pool only has 423 questions and they pull 35 from it so the more you drill the more familiar everything gets. took me maybe a week of evenings and i passed no problem. the electronics stuff looks worse than it is, for ohms law just memorize the triangle trick and you can get through most of those questions without really understanding the underlying theory. not saying dont learn it eventually but for the tech test you can kind of brute force it

so ive been a ham for about 3 years now and always told myself id eventually learn CW. well i finally started and im using just a straight key to learn the characters but someone at the club told me i should be thinking about getting a paddle and a keyer sooner rather than later so i dont build up bad habits with the straight key. is that actually true? i always thought the straight key was the "proper" way to learn also im using the G4FON koch trainer software which seems pretty good but im only at like 10wpm and hitting a wall around that speed. been at it for about 6 weeks. is that normal or am i doing something wrong. i practice maybe 20 minutes a day which might not be enough i guess anyway the keyer question is the main thing. i have no idea what to look for, theres so many options and i dont want to spend a ton of money if im not even sure ill stick with it. someone mentioned the Begali paddles and i nearly fell off my chair when i saw the price

the HackRF above 2 GHz is kinda rough honestly, like yes it technically works but the sensitivity drops off pretty significantly and youre fighting a lot of noise. i tried doing some 2.4 GHz band monitoring with mine and it was usable but not impressive. for what you're describing i'd probably just get the RSP1B and call it done, especially since you already have the RTL for ADSB.

so ive been messing around with a raspberry pi zero w for a few weeks now trying to get it to handle my antenna switching automatically based on band selection from my radio. the idea is pretty straightforward — the radio sends band data out over a serial port (its a kenwood so it uses the AI command to broadcast frequency) and i want the pi to read that, figure out what band im on, and then trigger the right relay to switch between my yagi and my wire antennas. i got the serial reading part working fine, python script runs on boot no problem. the issue im running into is the relay board. i have one of those 8 channel relay modules from amazon and i cant figure out why two of the channels seem to be triggering inverted — like they energize when i send a LOW instead of HIGH to the gpio pin. the other 6 work exactly how i expected. already checked my code like three times and the wiring looks right to me but im probably missing something dumb. also wondering if anyone has done something similar and whether the pi zero is fast enough for this or if i should have just used an arduino. latency probably doesnt matter much here but curious what others think.

yeah i asked almost this exact same question when i got my ticket lol. what i found is that on HF it becomes second nature pretty fast because you actually need it. tried to give my call without phonetics once during a pileup and the DX station just came back with a completely different call that sounded nothing like mine so. lesson learned. on the repeater though half the old timers around here never bother and everyone knows who they are anyway so it doesn't really matter i guess

so ive been a tech for about 8 months now and honestly i feel like im hitting a wall with just 2m and 70cm. i hear people talking on HF and it sounds so much more interesting, like actual conversations instead of just repeating my callsign into a repeater and waiting for someone to acknowledge me lol anyway i downloaded the question pool from the arrl site and started going through it and some of it is way over my head. like the electrical stuff, ohms law i can kinda follow but then it gets into reactance and impedance and i lose track pretty fast. is the actual exam that brutal or does the question pool make it seem worse than it is? i feel like half the questions are things ill never actually use also not sure how long i should study before trying to take it. took me about 3 weeks to pass my tech exam if that helps anyone gauge where im at

Ha that birthday party situation is something every POTA activator runs into eventually, you learn pretty quick to scope out the park beforehand on google maps or even drive through the day before if you can. Look for the less popular trailheads or day use areas that arent near the main shelters, usually way less foot traffic and people are less curious about what youre doing. 14 contacts is totally fine for your first time out, honestly the fact that you relocated and still finished it is a good sign. some people pack up and go home. as for 20m being dead, if you were running a wire that wasnt real efficient and the band wasnt cooperating anyway it just compounds. 40m is your friend for POTA most of the time, especially if youre not chasing DX. id say keep the antenna situation simple and just get more activations under your belt, youll figure out what works for your rig and style pretty fast

i had something almost identical last summer except mine was just the RRC without the SDR part. turned out to be a QoS issue on the router at the remote end - the audio packets were getting deprioritized whenever anything else on the network sneezed. parents house by any chance? lol. they probably have a consumer router that doesnt do proper QoS and the audio UDP packets just lose the race whenever someone streams something. the RRC audio is pretty sensitive to jitter even if overall bandwidth is fine. anyway might not be your issue but worth checking. fiber doesnt mean the router isnt the weak link.

im in basically the same boat as you so take this for what its worth but i started using an app called Morse Mania on my phone like two months ago and its actually been pretty fun. im nowhere near actually copying anything on the air yet but i can at least recognize most of the letters now without thinking too hard. the gamification thing helps me not get bored i think one thing i heard that made sense is dont even touch a paddle or key until you can copy at least some stuff by ear first, apparently a lot of new people jump to sending before they can really receive and it causes problems down the road. no idea if thats true but thats what someone told me at a hamfest

WAS is actually a great starting point for most people in the US, especially with that kind of setup. 100 watts and a dipole will get you all 50 states if you're patient, just takes time and picking the right band conditions. the contacts you already have in your log should absolutely count as long as you have a QSL card or a LoTW confirmation for each one — thats the key thing. ARRL accepts Logbook of the World confirmations now which makes it way easier than it used to be. DXCC and WAZ are separate programs yes, and the mode endorsements are separate too so if you work 100 entities on phone that's your phone DXCC, 100 on CW is a separate endorsement etc. you dont need all three awards at once, most people focus on one and kind of passively accumulate credits for the others at the same time. i'd say get yourself set up on LoTW first if you havent already, that way every contact you make going forward is potentially counting toward multiple things at once. the ARRL website has the full rules for each program, a little dry to read but worth going through once

so ive had my TS-590SG for going on 7 years now and its been a solid radio, no complaints really. but i keep looking at the IC-7300 and wondering if i should just make the switch. my shack is pretty basic, just the kenwood into a LDG tuner and a dipole up about 35 feet, nothing fancy. i do mostly SSB on 40 and 20, occasional 10 when the band cooperates. the thing is i dont really have a good reason to replace it. the 590 works fine. but every time i see the 7300s waterfall display i get a little jealous. is that a dumb reason to spend 700 bucks or whatever the difference would be after selling the kenwood? im not doing any digital modes or contesting, just ragchewing mostly. would i actually notice a difference on receive or is this just shiny object syndrome and i should leave well enough alone

yeah that can be a little confusing at first, dont stress too much about it. the technical requirement is every 10 minutes AND at the end of your last transmission in an exchange — so if youre just doing quick back and forth on a net and its all happening within a few minutes you dont have to ID every single time. but a lot of nets have their own customs where they like you to lead with your callsign each time you key up just so the NCS and everyone else knows who they're hearing, especially on a busy repeater where signals arent always perfect. the person who said "please ID" was probably just being a little overzealous or maybe your signal was dropping and they genuinely couldnt catch your call from earlier. i wouldnt take it personally. just make a habit of saying your call when you first key up each transmission and youll never have to worry about it honestly. its good practice anyway even if its not strictly required every time.

JS8Call is definitely not dead but you gotta know where to look. 40m is hit or miss depending on time of day, i've had better luck on 20m in the evenings especially around 14.078. there's a loose community of people that check in on JS8 regularly, you just might not see the traffic because they're running low duty cycle or leaving the radio on in relay mode without actually sitting there. the relay thing — make sure you have RELAY enabled in the settings and also that you're not accidentally filtering out relay messages in your inbox. theres a checkbox that a lot of people miss. also the heartbeat interval matters, if you set it too long you'll miss the window when someone is listening. i run mine at like 15 minutes or so. and yeah i know exactly what you mean about FT8 feeling hollow. i still use it for chasing DX but JS8 is where i actually have conversations anymore. had a long ragchew with a guy in New Zealand last winter that took like 45 minutes total because propagation kept fading but we just waited it out and kept going. that doesnt happen on FT8.

so ive been going back and forth on this for like three weeks now and i cant make up my mind. i have decent yard space, maybe 80 feet end to end if i run diagonally, and im trying to decide between throwing up a 40m dipole at maybe 30 feet or just doing a ground mounted vertical with a radial field. the vertical is tempting because i dont have great supports for a dipole and 30 feet honestly isnt that high for 40m anyway, but then again ive heard the old saying about a dipole in a tree beats a vertical with a great radial field or something like that. my main interest is ragchewing on 40 in the evenings, some DX would be nice but its not the primary thing. i live in a pretty average suburban lot so salt marsh radial fields arent exactly an option, i was thinking maybe 16 to 24 radials at whatever length i can fit. anyone actually done a back to back comparison on 40m with these two setups or am i just spinning my wheels overthinking it

so the short version is they're all different things and honestly most active operators do at least LoTW and keep physical QSL cards for the ones that really matter to them. LoTW is run by the ARRL and yeah the certificate setup is a little annoying the first time but you only do it once and then uploading logs is pretty easy once you get the hang of the TQSL software. it's the one that counts for DXCC and most of the serious awards so if you ever want to chase DX it's worth getting set up now before you have a big backlog. eQSL is totally separate, some people swear by it and some ignore it completely. it counts for a few awards like the eQSL awards obviously but not DXCC. the nice thing is you can get pretty digital card images which is kinda fun especially when the other station puts effort into their card design. physical cards through the bureau or direct mail are kind of their own world. for most FT8 contacts people dont bother sending paper anymore but for a rare DX contact or a special event station a lot of folks still really like having the actual card. you're not losing anything urgent right now but i'd go get the LoTW cert sorted sooner than later, your local club or the ARRL website have decent walkthroughs for it

so i finally finished building a direct conversion receiver for 40m, been working on it for about three weeks now. used a NE602 as the mixer and a LM386 for the audio amp stage, pretty standard stuff. the thing actually works which honestly surprised me a bit because my soldering is not exactly museum quality. problem is theres this weird hum coming through that i cant seem to kill. its not 60hz, sounds more like 120hz so im thinking rectified AC getting in somewhere but ive got it running off a 9v wall wart and i even tried batteries and the hum is still there. less on batteries but still noticeable. also the audio is kind of muddy, like stations that my commercial rig pulls in clean sound like theyre underwater on the homebrew. the sensitivity seems okay though, im hearing things i didnt expect to on 40m at night. anybody built one of these and run into the hum issue? im wondering if its RF getting into the audio stage or if my ground plane is just a disaster. built it on perfboard which was probably a mistake but i wanted to see if it even worked before committing to a real PCB layout.