John Patterson

so ive been at this for about three months now and im just... stuck. i can copy at maybe 5wpm if the sender is being really clean and consistent but the moment someone speeds up even a little i lose the thread and then i panic and lose even more. its frustrating because i feel like i practice every day but im not really getting faster. right now im using the Koch method on an app and i do maybe 20-30 minutes a day. i started with just K and M like you're supposed to and worked my way up to all the letters but numbers and punctuation are still kind of shaky. the thing is i feel like i can recognize the characters fine when i really focus but 5wpm feels like its the ceiling and i cant break through it. has anyone gone from this level up to like 15 or 20wpm and if so what actually made the difference? im not trying to get on CW right away just want to be able to eventually have a real QSO without it being a disaster

so i finally got activated for a real event last weekend, been doing the monthly nets and the occasional tabletop exercise for like 8 months now but this was the first time we actually got called out for something real. county had a pretty bad storm come through and EOC wanted radio support because some of the repeaters were acting up and they were worried about comms gaps in the southern part of the county. i have to say it was pretty different from the exercises. during training everyone kind of knows what to expect and theres always someone nearby to ask questions but out in the field it was just me and my HT at a shelter and the net control was like 20 minutes into the event before i even got a check-in confirmation. not complaining, i know they were slammed, just was not prepared for how much waiting there is and then suddenly everything happens at once. the ICS stuff we practiced actually helped a lot more than i thought it would. knowing the message format and not freelancing on the radio made a big difference i think. anyway just wanted to share since ive been lurking here for a while reading other peoples experiences. curious if others had a similar kind of first activation or if i just got thrown into a weird one

so anyway i had almost this exact same situation a few years back. had my 40m dipole broadside east-west too and was scratching my head why a guy down the street with a vertical kept beating me to JA and west coast. turns out angle of radiation was exactly the culprit like the previous reply says. i did end up building a simple quarter wave vertical, used about 30 radials cut to roughly 33 feet, elevated them about 6 inches off the ground on little stakes, and the difference was honestly night and day on 40 toward the pacific. kept the dipole up because its great for 80m NVIS and local rag chew stuff, just use both now depending on what im trying to work. the GAP Titans look cool but from what ive seen they really need a solid ground to shine and a lot of people just dont put in the work on the radials.

the RSP1B is a solid step up from the dongle for HF, no question. dynamic range is noticeably better especially if you're anywhere near broadcast AM stations, those will just completely wipe out adjacent frequencies on the RTL in direct sampling mode. i went through the same thought process and ended up getting the RSP1A a couple years back (basically same thing, RSP1B just added the notch filters) and it was worth it for serious HF work. on the software side — SDRuno is fine but yeah it looks like someone designed it in 2003 and never touched the UI since. the good news is there's an ExtIO plugin that lets you use it with HDSDR and that works pretty well. SDR# support is spotty and kind of depends on which version you're running, the older stable builds tend to work better than the cutting edge ones. if you're into decoding stuff like WSPR or FT8 the RSP1B plays nicely with WSJT-X via virtual audio cable same as any other SDR so that part isnt a problem.

so ive been messing with this for about three weeks now and im pretty sure im missing something obvious but cant figure out what. running a TM-D710G with the built-in TNC, got it set to beacon every 3 minutes with WIDE1-1,WIDE2-1 path. i can see my own packets decoding locally on the radio display but they're almost never showing up on aprs.fi — sometimes one gets through, maybe every 30-40 minutes if im lucky. theres definitely a digipeater about 8 miles from me, i can see it beaconing fine on 144.390 and it shows up on the map with good activity. so its not like the local infrastructure is dead. my antenna is a mag mount on the car which i know isnt ideal but it shouldnt be this bad right? when im mobile it seems even worse, barely a trace on the map. checked the TX power, its at 50W. ssid is set to -9. not sure if the issue is the path, the antenna, or something with how the 710 is configured. anyone dealt with this before?

not a dumb question at all, this stuff genuinely confused me for the first year or two i was licensed too. so the short version is LoTW is run by the ARRL and it's what most of the major awards like DXCC and WAS actually require for credit. eQSL is a separate private service and while its fine for some things a lot of the big awards dont accept it. so if you care about chasing DXCC or WAS eventually, LoTW is the one to focus on. for your TQSL issue — when you upload a log it can sometimes take a few hours or even a day before the confirmations start showing up in your account. log into the LoTW website directly and check under your QSOs, if both you and the other station uploaded the same contact it should show as confirmed with a little checkmark. if you just uploaded and the other person hasnt yet theres nothing to confirm yet, you just have to wait. as for paper cards — honestly its kind of both, its still required for some awards when you want the actual certificate or plaque and some dx entities and rare stations only confirm via bureau or direct mail. but for everyday contacts most people just do LoTW now. the cards in the mail are also just... fun. i still send them for good DX contacts just because i like it. if someone sends you one its definitely polite to send one back, most people use the QSL bureau through the ARRL to keep postage costs down.

so ive been running FT8 for about a year now and yeah it works great for chasing DX and filling in grid squares but honestly it feels more like a video game than a radio contact. you get the grid, log it, done. theres no actual conversation happening. started messing around with JS8Call last week and its a totally different vibe. slower obviously but you can actually type something to the other person and they respond with words. had a 20 minute back and forth with a guy in finland on 40m last night running like 15 watts into a dipole and the whole thing just felt more like... radio? if that makes sense. my question is whether people are actually using JS8Call regularly or if its kind of a ghost town outside of certain times. i can hear some activity on 14.078 but its hit or miss. also tried the relay/store-forward stuff but havent fully figured that out yet. does anybody run JS8Call nets or is it mostly random calling? not trying to bash FT8, i still use it, just wondering if the JS8Call crowd is alive and worth investing time into learning the software better

so ive had my 7300 for about three years now and honestly its been a fantastic radio, no real complaints, but i keep looking at the IC-7610 and the Kenwood TS-890S and wondering if im leaving something on the table. mostly do CW and some SSB, occasionally dabble in FT8 when the bands are cooperating. the 7300 handles all of that fine but the dual watch on the 7610 seems really useful for contesting, which ive been getting more into lately. the 890S has that roofing filter setup that people seem to lose their minds over and i get it, when things get crowded on 40m during a contest the 7300 can struggle a bit with close-in interference. not terrible but noticeable. anyway my shack is pretty basic, alpha antenna, a P3 panadapter that i barely use now since the 7300 has the built in waterfall, an LDG tuner. wondering if anyone has actually made this jump and whether you felt it in your operating or if its mostly just gear acquisition syndrome talking.

the 891 audio mod threads on eham and qrz are kind of all over the place, some people are talking about different revisions of the board so it gets confusing fast. what might actually help more than the cap swap honestly is pairing a decent dynamic mic with the right impedance rather than the stock mic. i swapped to an SM-58 with a little interface cable and the difference was bigger than any hardware mod i tried before that. still worth doing the mod eventually if you want to dig in but sometimes the gain is sitting right there at the mic end and its cheaper to start there. just my take.

so ive had the 7300 for about three weeks now and figured id share some stuff for anyone sitting on the fence about it. came from an old FT-450D which honestly served me pretty well for years but i was getting real tired of fussing with the filtering and the waterfall on that thing is basically useless compared to what the icom gives you. first thing i noticed was how much easier it is to find activity on 40m at night, just watching the spectrum and clicking around is kind of addictive honestly. the built in ATU handles my off-center fed dipole reasonably well on most bands, had a bit of grief on 80m but i think thats more my feedline situation than the radio. audio out of the speaker sounds better than i expected for a shack radio, though i still run it into a little external speaker most of the time anyway. the touch screen took some getting used to, a couple times i brushed it by accident and changed something while transmitting which was mildly embarrassing. also the menu system is deep, like really deep, i still stumble across settings i didnt know were there. overall though pretty happy with it, feels like a significant jump from where i was. anyone else running one of these with a compromised antenna setup?

yeah i was in the same boat about a year ago. honestly just set up LoTW first since thats the one that matters for most awards and then add eQSL when you have time. i use Log4OM and it uploads to both automatically after each session which is nice, dont have to think about it. paper cards i only bother with if someone sends me one first or if its a really rare DX that i want something physical for.

i just did this like two months ago so its pretty fresh. went for a 2x3 call in my district and honestly it was pretty painless, just filed through the FCC ULS online and waited. got it without any issue because i dont think anyone else wanted that particular call lol. the hardest part for me was just deciding WHICH call i actually wanted, i spent way too long on that part. one thing to double check — make sure the call you want is actually available and in the right format for your license class. generals cant hold 1x2 or 2x1 format calls, only extras can. there's different formats for each class so just look that up before you get your heart set on something you cant actually get yet

the short version on SFI (solar flux index) is its a measure of how active the sun is putting out radio energy, and higher numbers generally mean the ionosphere is more ionized which means higher frequency bands like 10, 12, 15 meters can support long distance propagation. when SFI is down in the 70s or 80s youre pretty much stuck on the lower bands for DX. when it climbs up past like 150, 160, 180 then 10 meters can open up in ways that honestly feel kind of magical — i worked 40 countries in one afternoon last cycle peak on 10m with a vertical and 100 watts, it was nuts. for catching openings in real time, two things changed everything for me: PSK Reporter (pskreporter.info) lets you see where signals are actually being decoded right now, and the DX cluster — i use dxsummit.fi but there are others. you can filter by band and just watch spots roll in. once you see a cluster of spots from europe on 10m you know somethings happening. also check the planetary K index — when thats high (like above 4 or 5) propagation often falls apart even if SFI is good, geomagnetic storms mess everything up. dont ignore the K index, learned that the hard way after chasing a pile up for an hour during a storm and hearing absolutely nothing

im in almost the exact same boat lol, been general for two years and just started looking at the extra pool last month. the transmission line stuff is rough, like i had to watch like four different youtube videos about standing wave theory before it started clicking even a little bit. but the practice tests on hamstudy.org are really good, i just do like 20-30 questions a night and my scores are already getting better after a couple weeks. havent scheduled the actual exam yet but im getting closer

Honestly the best thing I ever did was just listen to a net a few times before checking in. Most of them the net control will say something like "QNI now" or "check-ins please" and you just wait for a pause and give your callsign phonetically. Some nets want name and location, some just want the call, kind of depends on the net. The net control will usually ask for whatever info they need if you leave something out, nobody's going to yell at you. The 13 colonies thing is a special event, different animal from a net really — those are more about making contacts and collecting confirmations from all the colony stations, W1A through whatever. Still a ton of fun though and a good excuse to get on HF. If you want something more structured to practice with, find a local 2m net first, way less pressure than HF and the net controls on those tend to be patient with new folks. You'll get the hang of it fast, first check-in is always the weird one.

the wall wart is almost certainly your problem or at least a big part of it. those switching supplies dump a ton of garbage into the audio on sensitive low-level circuits like this. i had the exact same symptom on a similar build and adding a 78L08 regulator plus some filter caps on the supply rail cleaned it up massively. also try running it off a 9v battery just to confirm that's the issue before you go changing anything else. the LM386 at max gain is also just inherently noisy and prone to oscillation, some people put a 10 ohm resistor in series with the output to stabilize it. but honestly diagnose the supply first, the muddy low frequency rumble is classic switching supply hash.

I was in your shoes 6 months ago - completely overwhelmed! Focus on IS-100 and IS-700 first, they're the foundation. Most ARES folks start with basic FM voice on 2 meters, and you'll build skills through net check-ins and exercises. Your Tech license is fine to start with.

so ive been licensed for about 8 months now and i mostly do 2m FM through a local repeater and occasionally some HF when conditions are decent. my question is about phonetics — like i know the NATO alphabet, Alpha Bravo Charlie etc, but when is it actually required vs just optional? someone on the repeater last week just rattled off their call sign normally without using phonetics and nobody said anything but then another time someone asked me to use phonetics when i was giving my call and i felt kinda embarrassed because i wasnt sure i was doing it right also is there like a rule about it in part 97 or is it just a convention thing? i cant find a clear answer anywhere and the ARRL handbook kinda glosses over it

yeah that 10m opening was legit, i caught the tail end of it around noon and worked a couple EU stations which I honestly was not expecting on a Tuesday. my buddy in Texas said he was hearing South Pacific stuff earlier in the morning too. the solar flux has been creeping up the last few weeks and i think we might finally be getting closer to the peak, been a long time coming. on the Icom thing, what i read suggested it might be a successor to the 51A series but honestly take that with a grain of salt because ive been burned by that kind of speculation before. remember when everyone was sure there was going to be a new HF portable and it turned out to be a firmware update lol. i'll believe it when i see an actual product page. that said if they do release something new with decent battery life and maybe DMR capability i would probably look pretty seriously at it. for sweepstakes just do what feels fun, i spent one year going hard at it and wrecked my voice for a week, not worth it unless you're really in it to win it

Digital modes (FT8, FT4) will help you snag weak-signal DX, especially on 10m and 12m when conditions aren't perfect. Even with moderate SFI, FT8 can pull signals out of the noise that you'd never hear on SSB. Worth trying if you haven't yet!

Don't try to memorize 600+ questions! Focus on understanding the concepts first using the ARRL Extra manual, then use practice tests to identify weak areas. The circuit analysis gets easier once you grasp the fundamentals.

I keep hearing about the "exclusive" Extra class frequency segments, but looking at the band plans, it seems like pretty narrow slices. On 20 meters, Extras get 14.000-14.150 MHz while Generals start at 14.225 MHz - that's only a 75 kHz difference. For those who upgraded to Extra, do you actually use those exclusive segments regularly? Is there noticeably less QRM in the Extra portions?Better DX activity down there?Worth the study effort just for band space?

One thing that saved me during Harvey - an inventory of the kit. Laminate a checklist and tape it inside the lid. When you're stressed and tired, you'll forget what you packed. Also consider tape and tools, spare batteries, headphones, flashlights of some sort, cell phone chargers, and a multimeter. Other items that won't fit in a bag but may be needed include a generator, a working surface like a small folding table, a chair, and some type of shelter.

yeah the Koch method is pretty much what most people recommend these days and honestly for good reason. the basic idea is you start learning just two characters at full speed, like 20wpm, and you dont move on until you can copy them reliably, then you add one more character at a time. the whole point is your brain learns the sound of each letter as a single thing instead of counting dits and dahs which will absolutely kill you later if you try to go fast. LCWO dot net is the website a lot of people use, its free and does the Koch progression for you. theres also the Morse Trainer app if you want something on your phone. the other thing id say is dont skip the sending practice. a lot of people only do receiving and then wonder why they freeze up when they try to actually make a contact. get a cheap practice oscillator or even just a straight key hooked to nothing and send along with whatever youre copying. takes a while but it clicks eventually, just takes longer than most people expect so dont get discouraged after a week or two

dude 6 contacts is still a valid activation, dont beat yourself up. my first one i forgot my coax adapter and had to just hold the connector in place with my hand for like 45 minutes. made 4 contacts before my arm gave out. we all do dumb stuff the first few times out, the checklist gets better after you ruin a trip or two lol the linked dipole will serve you well once you get the setup dialed in btw. i run basically the same thing on most of my activations and its hard to beat for weight vs performance.