Diploe Dan

jump into cq ww, seriously. i remember being terrified my first time and just kind of tuning around for an hour before finally calling somebody. worst that happens is nobody comes back to you and you try again. the attic dipole might limit you a bit on 40 and 80 but 20 meters should be hopping that weekend and youll find stations. just have your logging software ready to go, n1mm is free and works great, and look up your cq zone beforehand so you dont have to think about it mid-qso.

yeah canada is actually one of the easier ones to deal with for this. there's a reciprocal operating arrangement between the US and canada so you dont need to apply for a separate license or anything like that. you basically operate under your US callsign but you have to follow canadian regulations which means IC (Industry Canada, or i guess its called ISED now) rules apply not FCC part 97. so your privileges are kind of the intersection of what both countries allow which in practice usually just means following whichever is more restrictive. you should append something to your callsign while operating from canada, like W1XYZ/VE3 or however your brother in laws province prefix works out. honestly just look up the CEPT agreement and also the specific canada-US arrangement because theyre slightly different things and people mix them up all the time including me for a while.

the Baofeng menu thing is real, i spent like an hour on mine before i figured out the T-CTCS vs R-CTCS difference lol. one thing that helped me was just downloading CHIRP and programming it from the computer, way easier to see everything laid out. you can double check that the tone is set on the transmit side that way.
also dont stress too much about repeater etiquette at first — most people are pretty forgiving with new hams. just leave a little pause before you respond to someone so you dont step on them, and if youre not sure if the repeater is in use just listen for a minute before keying up. some clubs also have a specific courtesy tone that plays after someone finishes transmitting so you know its safe to go.

honestly the two-logger setup is just kind of the accepted reality for a lot of people. N1MM is basically the standard for contesting and theres a reason it stays that way — the rate display, the dupe checking, the way it handles multipliers in real time, nothing else really touches it for that stuff. Log4OM is genuinely better for the everyday DX hunting and awards tracking side of things though so i get why you'd want both.
for WSJT-X during contests what i do is have WSJT-X log to N1MM directly via the UDP port, N1MM listens on 2237 by default and WSJT-X has the setting right there under reporting. works pretty reliably in my experience, occasionally it misses one if youre running fast but not often enough to stress about. after the contest i just export the N1MM log as ADIF and import it into Log4OM to update the master log. takes maybe ten minutes and its not as painful as it sounds once youve done it a few times.
the Log4OM contest module is fine for casual stuff but if youre doing anything serious i wouldnt try to run CQWW through it, you'll spend more time troubleshooting than operating

honestly the two-logger setup is just kind of the accepted reality for a lot of people. N1MM is basically the standard for contesting and theres a reason it stays that way — the rate display, the dupe checking, the way it handles multipliers in real time, nothing else really touches it for that stuff. Log4OM is genuinely better for the everyday DX hunting and awards tracking side of things though so i get why you'd want both.
for WSJT-X during contests what i do is have WSJT-X log to N1MM directly via the UDP port, N1MM listens on 2237 by default and WSJT-X has the setting right there under reporting. works pretty reliably in my experience, occasionally it misses one if youre running fast but not often enough to stress about. after the contest i just export the N1MM log as ADIF and import it into Log4OM to update the master log. takes maybe ten minutes and its not as painful as it sounds once youve done it a few times.
the Log4OM contest module is fine for casual stuff but if youre doing anything serious i wouldnt try to run CQWW through it, you'll spend more time troubleshooting than operating

honestly the two-logger setup is just kind of the accepted reality for a lot of people. N1MM is basically the standard for contesting and theres a reason it stays that way — the rate display, the dupe checking, the way it handles multipliers in real time, nothing else really touches it for that stuff. Log4OM is genuinely better for the everyday DX hunting and awards tracking side of things though so i get why you'd want both.
for WSJT-X during contests what i do is have WSJT-X log to N1MM directly via the UDP port, N1MM listens on 2237 by default and WSJT-X has the setting right there under reporting. works pretty reliably in my experience, occasionally it misses one if youre running fast but not often enough to stress about. after the contest i just export the N1MM log as ADIF and import it into Log4OM to update the master log. takes maybe ten minutes and its not as painful as it sounds once youve done it a few times.
the Log4OM contest module is fine for casual stuff but if youre doing anything serious i wouldnt try to run CQWW through it, you'll spend more time troubleshooting than operating

the doppler thing is probably your main issue. on a linear transponder the uplink and downlink are on different bands so the doppler shift is different for each one and you have to correct both independently. gpredict can drive the 9700 via CAT if you set it up right, there's a radio control section in the settings where you point it at the CI-V port. once thats done gpredict will chase the frequency on both VFOs as the pass progresses.
but honestly even before that, try just listening first. tune around the downlink passband during a good pass, like 60 degrees or higher elevation if you can catch one, and just see if you can pull out any SSB signals. AO-73 isnt always active depending on its power budget too, worth checking amsat's status pages before you go out because sometimes the bird is in economy mode and the transponder is off or limited.
also your homebrew yagis — are they circularly polarized? linear pol works but you'll have deep fades as the satellite tumbles, which AO-73 does. not a dealbreaker but something to be aware of.

honestly the theory isnt as brutal as the reputation suggests, at least not if you give yourself a few weeks and dont try to cram it all in a weekend. the harder parts for most people are the filter sections and anything involving reactance and impedance calculations but even those follow patterns once you sit with them long enough. i used the ARRL extra class manual and just worked through it chapter by chapter, took me about 6 weeks studying maybe 30-45 min a night.
the thing people forget is you dont need a perfect score, you need 74% so there's room to have weak spots. i was never fully comfortable with the transmission line loss calculations but i understood enough to pass and honestly being forced to study that stuff made me a way better operator overall. i actually understand why my antenna tuner is doing what its doing now which i definitely could not have told you before.
as for privileges changing day to day use — yeah it does matter if you're into contesting or dx chasing. that extra slice on 75m and the cw portions of 40 and 20 are not huge but they add up when a pileup is happening and the dx station is parked right at the edge of the general limit and you just... cant get there.

one thing i dont see mentioned much is just working the less popular bands for the same DXpedition. everyone piles onto 20m and 15m, but if thats a longer haul DX the 40m window in the evening might be way less crowded and propagation might actually be better for your path anyway. got my ZL8 on 40 CW years ago in about three calls while 20m was an absolute mess. sometimes the obvious band isnt the right band.

Been experimenting with ground plane configurations on my homebrew 20m vertical and getting conflicting advice. 76.5 is the recommended angle for achieving an impedance of 50 ohms when using a single elevated radial. 45 degrees is recommended when two or more or used. Some sources insist on 4+ radials while others claim single radial works fine.
Currently running SWR of 1.02 with one elevated radial at approximately 76° angle. Performance seems decent for DX but wondering if I'm missing something. As long as you install at least 60 ground radials, it will work well enough for DX to keep your Amateur Radio enjoyment up for a long, long time - but that seems excessive for elevated systems.

yeah i remeber my first time keying up on a repeater i sat there for like ten minutes with my thumb hovering over the ptt button just kind of psyching myself up. its dumb but it felt like a big deal at the time. congrats on the ticket, stick with it

not a dumb question at all, honestly most new hams go through exactly this. for a regular net the net control station will usually open it up and say something like "is there any station wishing to check in" or whatever their format is, and you just key up and say your callsign phonetically. thats really it. some nets want your name and location too, net control will usually tell you what they want when they ask for check-ins.
the nervousness goes away fast, i promise. first few times your voice might shake a little but nobody cares, everyone was new once. just make sure you wait for a clear break and dont step on anyone. if you miss the check-in window some net controls will still take late check-ins toward the end too so dont stress if you miss the first round.
the special event stations are a totally separate thing from nets. youre just making a normal QSO with them to get the credit or certificate, no formal check-in procedure. the lighthouse ones are usually on weekends and theyre fun to hunt around for. worth doing if you have time.

yeah what he said about audio levels is probably it. i went through the same thing last year with a different TNC setup and drove myself crazy for like three weeks. turned out my mic gain on the radio was cranked up and everything i sent was way overdeviated, sounded fine to me on the radio but the digis just werent decoding it.
one other thing — are you sure your comment field doesnt have any weird characters in it? i dont think thats your problem but ive read of edge cases where malformed packets dont get igated. probably a long shot. honestly just hook up a cheap rtl-sdr and listen to yourself transmit, youll hear pretty quick if the audio sounds right or if its all distorted.

Just had to share this with someone who'd understand. Made my first HF contact today! I'm still just a Tech but found some CW activity on 40m that I could legally use. Fired up my old Kenwood TS-430S that I bought used and threw up a random wire antenna. Called CQ and got an answer from W5ABC in Texas - I'm in Vermont! He gave me a 559 report and we exchanged names and locations.
Used 25 watts Wire antenna in the attic Propagation was decent around 1400Z Still shaking from the excitement. This hobby is incredible!