Lisa Park

had a 757GX years ago, fun radio. if its putting out evenly low across all bands that does point more to the PA than anything band-specific like a filter or LPF issue. discoloration on the transistor case is never a good sign, id pull it and check it out of circuit. just dont forget to check the bias pot while youre in there, sometimes they drift and thats all it takes to mess up the output.

Absolutely normal! We've all been there. Making your first contact can be nerve-wracking, but following good etiquette will make you confident. Start simple - just ask for a radio check. Most hams love helping new operators.

this is really good to hear, im working on getting into my county's ARES group right now and stuff like this is helpful. i didnt know about the ICS courses being that important, i'll look those up. are those the fema ones online? i think i saw something about that on the arrl site but wasnt sure if they were required or just recommended

so ive been going back and forth on this for a few weeks now and cant really make up my mind. my backyard is maybe 60 feet wide so a full size 40m dipole would basically span the whole thing end to end if i ran it straight, but i could probably get it up about 30 feet or so off the ground. the other option i keep thinking about is just putting up a vertical, maybe a trapped one or i could homebrew a quarter wave with some radials and actually have room to lay out maybe 8 or 10 radials without my wife completely losing it.
ive been reading that a dipole at 30 feet on 40m is basically in the near field and wont do much for DX anyway, but then other guys say even a low dipole beats a vertical with a poor radial system. i guess my actual question is — for general ragchewing and some casual DX when conditions are good, which would you go with given that setup? im running about 100w, nothing crazy.

your setup is workable, don't let anyone tell you otherwise. single yagi EME on 2m with Q65 is totally a thing now, ive worked guys running less than you with small antennas since Q65 became popular. the mode is just incredibly sensitive compared to JT65, like 3-4 dB more or something in that range depending on the submode, and for EME that matters a lot.
that said you will have more luck pointing at stations with big arrays at first just because they can hear you even if you struggle to decode them initially. VK3UM calc is still totally fine, a lot of guys also use PY2BS's EME system or just pull data straight into WSJT-X which handles a lot of the timing stuff for you automatically now. scheduling is mostly done through the EME2 logger on ping jockey yeah, and also just on the 2m EME reflector email list which sounds old fashioned but people actually use it constantly. moon noise measurements are a good sanity check for your whole rx chain too before you start trying to make contacts, worth doing.

so ive been sitting on this idea for a while and finally started messing around with it last weekend. basically i have a 4 port coax switch (the manual kind, nothing fancy) and im trying to figure out if i can drive the relays off an arduino uno so i can switch antennas from the shack PC instead of walking over to the shelf every time.
i've got some basic arduino experience from a few years ago, made a keyer once that kind of worked, and i know enough to not blow up a pin with too much current. my plan is to use a relay board, the 4 channel ones you can get off amazon for like $8, and just trigger each relay with a digital output pin through a simple transistor stage or maybe just direct if the relay board has the optocouplers built in.
the part im not sure about is the software side. i was thinking a raspberry pi zero w might actually be better for this because then i could just hit it over wifi from any computer in the house or even my phone and not have to mess with USB serial every time. has anyone gone down this road? curious if theres a simpler approach im missing or if this is basically the right way to do it.