Lisa Anderson

so we have a county-level exercise coming up in about 5 weeks and im trying to nail down the power situation before i start stressing about antennas. last time we ran this thing we had a Honda EU2200i and it worked fine but we were also only running an IC-7300 and a laptop, maybe 150-200w draw total. this time we're adding a second station (probably another 7300 or maybe a 706 if that's what somebody brings) and we want to keep a go-kit HT charging bank going too. my gut says the EU2200i can probably handle it if we're smart about it but im wondering if anyone has actually pushed one of those generators with two HF rigs and misc accessories at the same time. the 2200 watts is peak, continuous is more like 1800 i think, and once you factor in the inverter efficiency and whatever else is pulling... i dont know, it feels tight. we also want to have a fallback battery setup in case the genny craps out or we need to go quiet for some reason (noise complaints have been an issue at this site before). on the antenna side we're thinking two separate dipoles on separate feedlines, oriented about 90 degrees from each other to cut down on intermod between the two stations. spacing is gonna be whatever the site allows, probably 75-100ft apart if we're lucky. anyone done this at an exercise and had interference issues even with that separation? last exercise we had some nasty audio on the other station when both were transmitting near the same time and it was just one antenna shared with a switch. separate antennas should fix that right? anyway open to any thoughts on the power side especially, that's the part keeping me up at night

so ive been running an inverted V for 40m for a couple years now, center fed with the apex around 35 feet and the legs drooping down at maybe 120 degrees or so. works fine, no complaints really, but i keep reading that a flat top dipole is supposed to be noticeably better and i'm wondering if anyone has actually done a direct comparison or if its mostly theoretical. the problem is my yard situation makes a flat top kind of a pain — i'd need to get both ends up to at least 30 feet and theres really only one tree that cooperates, the other side would need a mast of some kind. just trying to figure out if the gain difference is actually meaningful on the air or if im chasing a small number on paper and wouldnt notice it in practice. running about 100w into an lc tuner, mostly rag chewing on 40 and sometimes 80 if i use it as a loading coil situation. any real world input appreciated

the nets thing — honestly just listen for like one full session before you try to check in. you'll hear exactly how everyone else does it and then it wont feel weird. most net controls are really patient with new folks too so even if you mess up the timing nobody cares

so ive been using WSJT-X for a while now with the built in logging and it just dumps everything into an adi file which i then import into Log4OM and that workflow has been fine for casual FT8 stuff. but im starting to get more into contesting, did my first serious effort at a state QSO party last month and realized pretty quick that N1MM is basically what everyone uses for that. my question is whether it makes sense to run both or if theres a way to get N1MM and Log4OM to play nice together so i dont end up with dupes all over the place or missing contacts in my main log. i know N1MM has its own database and Log4OM has its own and they dont really talk to each other natively as far as i can tell. does anyone export from N1MM after a contest and import into Log4OM or is that more trouble than its worth also curious if anyone has WSJT-X feeding into N1MM during like a digital contest, i think thats possible with the UDP logging thing but havent messed with it yet

so ive been messing around with an RTL-SDR v3 for about a year now mostly doing aircraft and some weak signal stuff and honestly its been fine for what it is but i keep reading about the RSP1B and wondering if its actually worth the jump in price or if im just falling for gear acquisition syndrome again my main use case is HF monitoring, some 40m and 80m band listening when im not actually transmitting, and occasionally trying to decode some WSPR signals which the RTL-SDR handles ok with the direct sampling hack but its obviously not ideal. i run SDR# mostly but ive been experimenting with SDRuno and CubicSDR on the linux machine the dynamic range thing is what keeps coming up when i read about the RSP1B and i genuinely dont know if my antenna situation is good enough to even expose the difference — running a 40m dipole at maybe 25 feet, coax into a nooelec balun, nothing fancy. would i even notice the improvement or is this one of those things where you need a really clean setup to see the benefit

The RPM whine is almost certainly alternator noise getting in through the power leads or a ground loop somewhere. Try adding a ferrite choke on the power cable right near where it connects to the radio — snap-on type works fine. Also check that your radio chassis has a solid ground to the vehicle body, not just relying on the negative lead. Sometimes running a short bonding strap from the radio bracket to a nearby chassis ground point kills it completely. I chased that same noise on my FTM-400 for a week before I realized the ground on my power connector was a little loose. On the 70cm SWR — the NR770H is a decent antenna and 2.2:1 isnt terrible, you're not gonna hurt anything at that level, but it could probably be better. Sometimes those dual band antennas are a little finicky and the connector end or how the coax is dressed near the mount can affect UHF more than VHF. Make sure your NMO connector is torqued down properly and there's no moisture getting in. LMR-400 is overkill for a mobile run but it certainly won't hurt anything.

yeah i think lotw and qrz announcements are where i see most of the special event stuff but honestly i still miss a ton of them. there's also a site called ng3k.com that has a contest and special event calendar which i check every now and then, its not the prettiest website but the info is usually pretty complete. for nets specifically the net directory on the ARRL site is decent but some of the listings are way out of date so always worth verifying before you sit there waiting for net control that maybe stopped running the net two years ago lol. ask me how i know

Welcome to the addiction, haha. Seriously though CQ WW is one of those contests where you can go as hard or as easy as you want. With your setup id honestly recommend starting with search and pounce, just tune around and work whoever you can hear, get comfortable with the exchange before you try running. The exchange is simple -- you send your call, they send theirs plus their zone, you come back with 59 and your zone, done. Yes you send zone 5 every single time, its part of the exchange no matter what. 15m has actually been really good this cycle, we're coming up on solar max territory so dont write it off at all. Saturday afternoon 15m to Europe can be wild. 40m gets crowded and noisy but its solid for closer stuff especially at night. Honestly just get on, make some contacts, and dont stress about rate. Your first CQ WW is just about learning the flow.

man that's exactly the feeling right there. i remember my first real QRP contact like it was yesterday and i've been licensed 22 years. there's just something different about knowing you're running less power than a christmas tree light and someone 500 miles away is hearing you. it never really gets old honestly. the QCX mini is a great first build too, Hans does solid work on those kits. once you get comfortable with it you should really try a SOTA activation if theres any summits near you, that combination of QRP and portable operating is just... it's the good stuff. and yeah CW will absolutely change your world for QRP, the mode efficiency compared to phone is night and day. even 5 watts on CW feels like cheating sometimes.

i was in the same spot like six months ago lol. what helped me was just looking up the arrl frequency chart and bookmarking it. also honestly just upgrading to general opens up so much more that it might be worth just studying for that next, the test isnt that bad

so ive had my technician for about 8 months now and honestly i've been mostly doing local repeater stuff and some APRS which is fun but i keep hearing people talk about HF and working DX and it just sounds way more interesting than waiting for someone to hit the repeater on a tuesday night my question is basically how much harder is the general exam compared to tech, like i studied for maybe 2 weeks for tech and passed fine, is general going to be a whole different level or is it more of the same kind of stuff. i looked at the question pool online and some of it looks pretty intimidating, like the propagation questions and all the stuff about operating procedures i dont really know yet also is there anything specific i should focus on or just grind the whole pool with hamstudy or whatever. i dont have a ton of time to study, maybe like 30 minutes a night

i passed mine last spring and used the ARRL book plus hamstudy on my phone whenever i had a few minutes. the math questions look scarier than they are, theres really only like a handful of different calculation types and they come up over and over so you end up learning them just by doing practice exams. i think i did maybe 10 full practice tests before i felt ready and honestly the real exam felt easier than the practice ones for some reason

so ive been licensed about 8 months now (general class) and i finally started getting into DX chasing a little bit. a buddy at my local club mentioned DXwatch and i also know QRZ has a logbook and some cluster stuff built in. im kinda confused about how these all fit together honestly. like right now my workflow is i have DXwatch open in one tab and im watching spots come in, then i go tune around and try to find the station. but half the time by the time i find them the pileup is insane or the spot is already like 10 minutes old. is there a better way to set this up? should i be filtering by band or region or something? i run mostly 20m and 40m with a modest wire antenna so i cant work everything i see obviously. also is there an app people use on their phones for this? i saw something called DX Toolkit mentioned somewhere but wasnt sure if thats still being maintained. just trying not to reinvent the wheel here if there's already a good setup that works.

ok so i just upgraded to general last month and im still trying to wrap my head around where i can actually transmit. i know there are the FCC allocations and then there's like the "gentlemans agreement" band plan stuff that isnt actually law but everyone follows anyway? at least thats what someone at my club told me. specifically on 40 meters im seeing different things in different places. like the ARRL band plan shows phone starting at 7.175 but i've also heard people say you can technically go down to 7.125 as a general for phone. and then theres the whole thing about staying away from the band edges which i dont fully understand either. is it just because of splatter or is there some actual rule about it also what happens if you transmit like right at 7.300 which i think is the upper edge? does the signal just get cut off or what. sorry if this is a dumb question im just trying to not step on anyone or do something illegal

yeah the SFI alone doesn't tell the whole story, thats something a lot of people dont realize at first. you also want to keep an eye on the planetary K index and the A index because even with a decent flux number, if there's been a geomagnetic storm the bands can be totally dead or really noisy. the K index being 0 or 1 is usually ideal, anything above 3 or 4 and you can pretty much forget about 10m DX from most locations the other thing is time of day and the path geometry matter a lot. 10 meters tends to do its best stuff in the afternoon and the specific paths that are open depend on where the terminator is and honestly a bit of luck too. i've had the flux at 180 and heard nothing useful and had great openings at 120, it really does vary. DXmaps and pskreporter are your friends, if you see spots appearing on paths that go through your region just get on the radio immediately because these can close fast. sounds like you did exactly the right thing honestly

congrats on taking the plunge, first activation is always a bit nerve wracking but honestly once you get up there and make that first contact everything kind of clicks into place. for the self-spotting without cell service, a lot of activators use the SMS spotting feature through SOTAwatch — you can text a specific number and it posts your spot automatically. worth setting that up before you go, sometimes you get one bar of cell service that wont load a webpage but will push a text through just fine. also if you have an HT with you, you might be able to hit a local repeater and ask someone to spot you, most hams are happy to help with that and theres usually someone monitoring who knows about SOTA. on the antenna question, i wouldnt overthink it for your first time out. an EFHW cut for 40m will get you plenty of contacts and its simpler to deploy than a linked dipole when youre still figuring out the flow of things. you can always experiment with more complex setups once you know how the rest of the activation goes. main thing is just get up there and have fun with it, the SOTA community is super welcoming and people will chase you even if your signal isnt perfect.

nice work getting out there. i did my first one last year and spent way too long stressing about the paperwork before i just figured it out by trial and error lol. one thing i'll add is the SIG fields thing the other guy mentioned is exactly right, i missed that my first upload and it just sat unprocessed for like two weeks before i noticed. the validation tool really does help. also if you have a smartphone out there the WWFF spotter app or just using hamspots works fine for self-spotting mid-activation, i usually just fire a spot off after my first 5 or 6 contacts once i know the frequency is working. gets the hunters rolling in pretty quick after that