Contest Fan

yeah this sounds really familiar honestly. we went through something similar a few years back and the biggest lesson for us was that the paperwork side — message forms, logging, all of that — completely falls apart when people are stressed and improvising. we actually started doing monthly 30-minute nets that are just focused on one specific skill, like one month is just formal traffic passing, next month is just simplex fallback procedures, that kind of thing. nothing fancy but it keeps the muscle memory there.
the frequency programming thing is such a common problem and it basically comes down to having one person own that job and everyone knowing who that person is. we have a standing rule that if you havent checked in with the comms officer in the 60 days before a drill your radio gets checked before you're assigned anywhere. sounds rigid but it stopped that problem cold for us.
the tabletop idea is good too, we do those in the winter when nobody wants to stand outside and they're actually pretty useful for the newer folks who havent been through a real activation. gets them thinking about the scenarios without the pressure of being on the air in front of everyone.

ok so i finally got my technician license about 3 weeks ago and ive been listening to the local 2m net on tuesday nights for a couple weeks now just to get a feel for it. the net control guy seems really friendly and i think im ready to actually check in but im honestly not sure what im supposed to say when he calls for check-ins. like do i just say my callsign and wait? do i say my name too? i dont want to step on anyone or do it wrong and embarass myself in front of everyone. theres probably like 15-20 people on this net every week so its a bit nerve wracking. any advice would be great

For weak signal VHF/UHF work, go with the RSP1A. The HackRF will not be your receiver of choice for casual monitoring - it's better for signal analysis above 2GHz. The RSP1A's superior dynamic range will serve you much better.

Excellent reminder! I see operators pushing 100W into FT8 when 25W would make the same contacts. It's always recommended to use minimum output power to make a QSO. More power doesn't help you receive better anyway.

honestly just use HamStudy.org and grind through the question pool. the tech pool is only like 400ish questions and the actual test pulls from those exact questions word for word so once you recognize them youre basically set. i studied for maybe 10 days doing like 20-30 questions a day and passed with a 90something. the ARRL book is great but its way more than you need just to pass the test.
for the math stuff, yeah theres some ohms law questions and maybe a few decibel calculations but its not a huge chunk of the exam. if you can remember E=IR and do basic multiplication youll be fine. the license rules and band privileges are honestly where a lot of people trip up so dont skip that section. once you start getting 85 percent or higher consistently on the practice exams you're probably ready to go find a VE session near you

the wall wart is almost certainly your problem or at least a big part of it. switching to a battery will tell you pretty fast whether its a power supply issue. i built a similar rig a few years back and had the exact same hum, switched to a 9v battery and it dropped way down, then added a simple LC filter on the supply rail and it went away entirely.
the touch-the-ground thing is classic ground loop stuff. with ugly construction you can end up with little antenna loops in your ground path without realizing it. try to make sure all your grounds return to one common point rather than daisy chaining them across the board. also worth checking if your audio output wire is running close to the vfo section — that can couple noise in ways that are really hard to trace.
id stick with the TL072 honestly, the LM386 has more gain than most people need and its not actually easier to stabilize, just more forgiving of bad bypassing. make sure you've got a 10uf and a 0.1uf right at the opamp supply pins, not a few inches away.

I had the same feeling about FT8 honestly, feels automated after a while. I went back to RTTY for contesting because at least you're typing stuff yourself even if it's still kind of a macro fest. PSK31 on 14.070 used to be where all the ragchewing happened but that seems pretty quiet these days, at least on my end. might be a time of day thing but i dunno it feels like everyone just moved to FT8 and stayed there

yeah 50ah lifepo4 is plenty for that, especially if youre not running a linear or anything crazy. the 7300 pulls maybe 2a on receive and around 20a at full power transmit but if youre doing 50w its more like 10-12a peaks. over a 6 hour exercise with realistic duty cycle you're probably looking at 20-25ah total draw maybe less. i've done full day field ops on a 40ah battleborn and still had 40% left.
the solar panel is kind of a bonus at that point, with partly cloudy skies you might only get intermittent charging but honestly you dont even really need it for something that short. id bring the panel anyway since you have it but dont stress if its under a cloud half the day
the generator argument is the old school thinking, totally valid for a multi-day deployment or if youre running a full power HF station plus a repeater plus laptops, but for what you're describing its just noise and exhaust fumes and someone has to babysit the fuel level. battery is the right call here imo

Been running my contest station with basic #12 equipment grounds for years with zero RF issues. The real problem is usually common-mode currents on the feedline, not inadequate station grounding. Fix the source, not the symptoms.

Running a similar setup here with excellent results. Key point: enable "Simulate Internet Outage" mode rather than just disconnecting your network. This puts RMS Relay in the proper state for HF forwarding. Also monitor your HF forwarding logs - they'll show exactly why messages aren't being forwarded. Usually it's a configuration issue, not propagation.