Brazil Ham

so ive been sitting on doing the mars/cap mod on my FT-857D for a while now and finally just did it last weekend. took like 10 minutes, just the two diodes on the main board. figured id share some thoughts since i was going back and forth on it for months before pulling the trigger. honestly the main reason i did it wasnt even for out of band TX, i wanted to be able to do some NVIS stuff on 60m with a bit more flexibility and also just wanted to unlock the TX on 6m down lower than the stock limits allow. the mod itself is pretty well documented over on mods.dk if anyone hasnt seen it, pretty hard to mess up if you have halfway decent soldering skills. what i did notice after is the 10m and 6m performance seemed a little cleaner to me but that might be placebo honestly. anyone else done this and noticed any actual RF changes or is it purely just unlocking the freq range? also wondering if anyone has done any of the other mods, ive seen some stuff about improving the cooling on these since mine runs pretty warm doing any extended digital modes.

so ive been licensed about 6 years now, mostly HF stuff and some 2m weak signal but ive always been kind of fascinated by moonbounce. watched a youtube video of someone working JT65B EME contacts and went down a rabbit hole for like 3 hours last night. now im wondering if this is actually something i could do or if im totally in over my head. i know the path loss is absolutely brutal, something like 250-252 dB round trip on 2m which is just insane when you think about it. and i know you basically need serious antenna gain and low noise figures to make it work. my current setup is a single 9 element yagi for 2m which i know isnt going to cut it, not even close. ive seen people run 4x yagi arrays and some guys running big dishes on 23cm. my question is really around what the minimum viable setup looks like these days with JT65 and the digital modes doing so much of the heavy lifting. like what power level and antenna gain are people actually pulling off contacts with, and is 23cm easier to get into than 2m for a first timer? or does that make it harder because of dish requirements. just trying to get a realistic picture before i go down an expensive rabbit hole i cant get out of

so ive been a tech for about two years now and mostly just done 2m and some 70cm stuff, little bit of satellite which was fun but anyway i keep hearing people talk about HF and how its a completely different world and it got me curious about upgrading. i downloaded the question pool and honestly some of it looks pretty intimidating, like the propagation stuff and all the math for calculating things. i dont really have a background in electronics at all, just kind of stumbled into the hobby through a friend. is the General exam actually hard or does it just look harder than it is? and is there like a recommended order to study things or should i just grind through the question pool? also once i pass, what bands am i actually going to be able to use that i couldnt before, im a little fuzzy on exactly where my privileges expand to

yeah the go-bag thing catches almost everyone the first time. i've been doing this for probably 12 years now and i still occasionally get to an activation and realize i forgot something dumb, last time it was just a notepad and pen which sounds silly until you're trying to log traffic with nothing to write on. the simplex fallback plan is something a lot of groups dont practice enough — it's one of those things that seems obvious until the repeater goes down and suddenly half the team is just... quiet on the air not sure what to do. glad your first one went well though, flooding events are no joke to work, they tend to go long and the situation keeps changing.

General is definitely more material but i wouldnt say its harder in terms of like difficulty per question, its just more of it. there's more propagation stuff, more about operating practices on HF, some extra electronics theory but nothing too wild. if you passed Tech you can absolutely pass General, just give yourself a solid 3-4 weeks with HamStudy or whatever you used before and you'll be fine on the FCC question yeah you do have to wait for it to update in ULS before you can operate on the General portions of the bands. usually takes a day or two but ive seen it go faster sometimes. just keep checking and dont operate until your new privileges show up. not worth the hassle of jumping the gun

so i finally bit the bullet and decided to learn morse code. been licensed for about 6 years and always told myself id get around to it eventually. downloaded the lcwo.net lessons and been doing the koch method for about 3 weeks now, im somewhere around 12 characters in and its going okay i guess. anyway my question is really about paddles vs straight key to start with. i borrowed an old straight key from a guy at my club and ive been using that but everyone keeps telling me different things. some say start with a straight key to really feel the rhythm, others say just jump to a paddle and iambic keyer right away so you dont build bad habits. i honestly cant figure out which camp is right. also if i do get a paddle eventually whats a reasonable budget for something that wont drive me crazy but doesnt cost a fortune either. i saw those bencher paddles come up a lot but then people say the cheap ones are fine to start. genuinely unsure what to do here.

yeah the band edge thing tripped me up too when i was a general. someone on the air actually told me to move up after i called CQ on like 7.174 because i was right in the extra segment. wasnt trying to cause trouble just genuinely didnt realize. nobody was super rude about it but it was embarassing. just bookmark the ARRL frequency chart and keep it open when youre getting started, after a while you just kind of know where you are

the LPF relay is probably your first thing to check on that. those little relays on the 817 are known to get flakey and on 40m specifically the relay switching can cause exactly that kind of power drop, and the ALC thing you're describing fits too because if the relay contact isnt fully seated the reflected stuff can confuse the ALC circuit. theres a known fix floating around on the QRP forums where guys just reflow the solder joints on the relay coil pins, apparently they cold joint over time from the thermal cycling. grab the service manual if you dont have it, the LPF board isnt that bad to get to once you pull the top cover. i'd hit every relay joint on that board with fresh solder before assuming the PA transistors are shot, way cheaper to find out first.

welcome to the hobby, the shaking thing is totaly normal. i was on HF for like 6 months before i worked up the nerve to call CQ on my own. just keep at it and honestly the repeater crowd is usually pretty welcoming to new calls, most of us remember what it was like starting out

had the exact same thing happen when i first set up my rig. drove me crazy for like two weeks thinking something was misconfigured. turns out there were three igates within range of me and on a busy street corner i was getting heard by all of them lol. completely harmless. the APRS-IS does have duplicate supression but its based on a hash of the packet content and a time window and sometimes packets that are technically identical still slip through depending on which server handles them. one thing i would double check is whether somehow you have two devices beaconing on 144.390 at the same time. like if both the D710 and the Mobilinkd setup are both active and set to the same callsign-SSID that could actually cause real problems beyond just cosmetic duplication. probably not whats happening but worth ruling out

ok so ive been listening to HF a lot lately and people throw around all these weird codes like QSL and QRZ and QTH and i kind of figured out a few of them from context but is there like a master list somewhere or does everyone just kind of memorize them over time. also people use other abbreviations that arent Q codes at all like 73 and 88 and DE and stuff like that and i wasnt sure if those were different or part of the same system. my elmer mentioned CW origins but i dont really operate CW so i wasnt sure if that stuff even applies to me on phone. do people actually say these out loud on voice or is that weird

so ive been licensed for about 6 years now and done a fair bit of HF DX stuff but the last year or so ive been obsessed with the idea of doing EME on 2m. i know its not exactly a casual weekend project but i feel like ive hit a ceiling with regular VHF work and this seems like the next logical thing to obsess over. my current setup is pretty modest for this kind of thing — i have a single 11el yagi up at about 30 feet, an IC-9700, and a decent SSB LNA preamp right at the feedpoint. from what ive been reading i probably need significantly more antenna gain to make any real contacts, and the stuff about system noise figure is starting to make my head spin a little. the question i keep running into is whether i should try to build a 4-yagi array or just go bigger with a single long yagi first. ive seen guys running like 4x17el M2 antennas and doing reasonably well but i also know some stations are running massive arrays and even then its not guaranteed. is weak signal digital like JT65 basically required at this point or do people still make CW contacts with modest stations? my lot isnt huge so im trying to figure out what the realistic ceiling is before i dump a bunch of money into this.

so ive been a general for about two years now and people keep telling me to just go ahead and get my extra but honestly im not sure if its worth the effort. like i mostly do HF SSB on 40 and 20 meters and i already have access to most of what i need right? the extra class portions of the bands seem pretty crowded anyway from what i can tell the theory stuff on the exam looks pretty intense too. ive been going through the question pool and some of the stuff about filter design and transmission line theory and oscillator circuits is stuff i havent thought about since i dont even know when. is there a good way to approach studying for it or do most people just memorize the pool and move on. im not trying to become an engineer i just want the ticket also does anyone actually use the stuff they learned for the exam in real life or is it mostly just trivia once you pass

this is really interesting to read, im still pretty new to ARES and haven't been in a full exercise yet. our group does tabletop stuff but nothing like what you're describing with actual radio traffic. do you find that the simulated pressure actually translates or do people kind of mentally check out because they know its not real? i always wonder if ill freeze up when it counts and i cant tell if drills actually help with that or not

so i was just sitting down with my morning coffee yesterday and figured id spin the dial around 28mhz just for kicks, not really expecting anything since 10m has been so hit or miss lately. well i ended up working like 14 stations in about 45 minutes, a bunch of EU and even heard a couple JA stations coming through pretty solid. i havent had a 10m opening like that in years honestly. the cycle 25 stuff is really starting to show up now in a meaningful way. also saw something about icom releasing some kind of updated firmware for the 7300 that supposedly tweaks the filtering options a bit? hasnt shown up on my radio yet but curious if anyone else has seen that. and did anyone catch the ARRL announcement about the changes to the field day rules they're floating for next year — not sure how i feel about the remote operating stuff personally but thats a whole other thread i guess. anyway just wanted to see if others were getting into 10m this week or if i just got lucky with the timing

the two VFO thing sounds scarier than it is tbh. i did my first linear sat QSO without any CAT control at all, just printed out the doppler schedule from heavens-above and kind of manually stepped the frequencies every 30 seconds or so. its clunky but it works well enough to prove the concept before you go down the gpredict rabbit hole. FO-29 might actually be easier to hear than AO-73 depending on where you are, the downlink seems punchier to me but that could just be my setup

so i finally did my first WWFF activation last weekend, been meaning to try it for ages after reading about it here and on the POTA forums. decided to head out to a local nature reserve that was already in the KFF database and just see how it went. i brought the FT-891 and my end fed halfwave up in a tree, pretty standard setup for me at this point. honestly i wasnt 100% sure about the logging requirements going in, i kind of just read the rules once and figured id work it out. ended up with 47 QSOs over about 2.5 hours mostly on 40m with a few on 20m, and i think that counts as a valid activation? the WWFF website says 44 minimum QSOs which i only found out after i got home and panicked a bit before counting again and realizing i was fine lol. the nature reference number for logging caught me off guard too, i kept second guessing which field to put things in on HAMRS. but yeah it was a really nice day out, the reserve was beautiful, saw some kind of hawk circling while i was operating which felt very on brand. anyone else done activations in the same area or have tips for uploading logs to the WWFF database? ive looked at the site and its a little confusing compared to POTA.

yeah the SFI number alone doesnt tell the whole story, thats the thing that tripped me up for a long time too. you also want to be watching the K-index and A-index for geomagnetic activity because even with a great flux reading, if K is up around 4 or 5 the bands can be completely dead or really weird. its like the flux tells you how much fuel the ionosphere has but the K-index tells you if somethings disturbing it. DXmaps and the DX cluster are your friends for figuring out if a band is actually open before you sit there spinning the dial. if you see spots coming in from your part of the world on a particular band thats a good sign. also gray line is huge and a lot of people dont pay enough attention to it, that 20-30 minute window around sunrise and sunset can produce some wild openings even on days where the overall conditions look mediocre. voacap online is worth bookmarking too if you want to try to predict windows to specific regions.

we ran almost the exact same scenario at our simulated emergency test back in the spring — 7300, couple laptops, a hotspot for the winlink stuff. ended up doing both actually, started on battery and had the generator staged as backup. worked pretty well mentally because you could see the battery state and decide when to fire up the gen before you got into trouble rather than scrambling. one thing that bit us was the laptop charging situation. everybody forgets that when you've got a couple operators rotating in, laptops need charging and that load adds up. also had one guy show up with a big USB fan because it was hot and yeah that stuff just piles on. on the antenna side, the parking lot with trees around the perimeter sounds like a good situation. if you can get one end of a dipole up 30-35 feet into a tree and slope it at an angle you'll do fine on 40. we used a 40/80 fan dipole at our last one and it was solid for both regional and some longer paths when 40 went long in the evening. bit more to set up but worth it if you have the time window you're describing.

I use DXWatch as my primary - the filtering is excellent and I love being able to set up custom views for different bands. The widget feature is handy too for embedding in other apps.

Just got my Tech license and want to dive into CW. I've been reading about different learning methods but I'm getting conflicting advice. What's the best approach for someone who's never touched Morse code before? Should I start with the Koch method or Farnsworth? And what speed should I begin with? I have about 30 minutes a day to practice. Any specific recommendations for software or apps would be appreciated. Also, is it better to learn receiving first or should I work on sending at the same time?

40m mid afternoon is rough depending on where you are, i always start on 20 now unless im doing an early morning activation. also have you tried just spotting yourself on the POTA app right when you get set up, the pile ups come pretty fast once youre spotted and it actually makes the 10 contacts go quick. took me a couple activations to figure that out

Q-Codes are three letter combinations that begin with the letter Q that CW operators use in place of common phrases. Yes, QTH means "my location is" and QSY means "change frequency." Start with these essential ones: QTH (location), QSY (change frequency), QSO (contact), QRM (interference), and QRZ (who's calling). Even if you're not a CW operator, you'll want to know these codes so that you'll understand what's being said.

so ive been on SSB for about 8 months now and i keep getting reports that my audio is either too bassy, sounds like im in a tin can, or occasionally clipping really bad on voice peaks. running an IC-7300 into a basic desk mic that came bundled with some other stuff i bought off a local ham. i went through the menu and turned the bass down a bit and that helped somewhat but im still getting mixed reports. the thing that really gets me is i can hear OTHER stations sounding totally clean and punchy and i dont know what they're doing differently. is it the mic itself, compression settings, the way im talking into it, what? i tried the TX monitor and honestly it doesnt sound that bad to me but then someone on 40m last week told me i was splattering all over the place. i wasnt even driving it that hard i thought. anyone been through this and figured out what actually made the biggest difference? not looking to go buy an expensive mic right away if the problem is something simple im just overlooking in the setup

so ive been sitting on doing the mars/cap mod on my IC-706MKIIG for like two years now because i kept reading horror stories about people bricking their rigs or voiding warranties on gear they paid good money for. finally just did it last weekend and honestly it went fine but there were a couple things that tripped me up that i dont see mentioned much. first off the jumper pads on mine were already partially done from the previous owner, which i didnt realize until i was already in there with a soldering iron and wondering why the layout didnt match the diagram i had printed out. so if you're buying used, worth checking before you assume its stock. second thing is the alignment after — i had a slight power drop on 10m that i thought was a problem but after letting it warm up for a half hour it came back to normal, probably just needed to stabilize. overall TX is clean across the expanded range, checked it with a spectrum analyzer my buddy has and no obvious spurious junk showing up. also while i was in there i replaced the finals cooling pad because the old one looked dried out and gross. not sure if that was strictly necessary but seemed smart. anyone else done the port expansion mod on these? been thinking about the CI-V speed fix too but not sure if its worth the hassle for how i use it.