CQ Op

First off, sorry to hear about your elmer. That's a real loss and it sounds like he meant a lot to you. On the net question — yeah that "any further traffic or comments" window is exactly the right time for general stuff. If you have something specific to the net topic or just want to make a comment, that's your moment. The earlier check-in window is really just for saying you're present and maybe passing formal traffic if you have any. Some nets are more relaxed than others about this though, so honestly just listen to how other folks handle it for a couple sessions and you'll get a feel for that particular net's vibe. For breaking into a simplex QSO, the usual thing is to just say your callsign once during a pause between transmissions. If they dont acknowledge you after a couple tries spaced out a bit, they probably didnt hear you or they're in the middle of something urgent. Try again or just wait. Nobody's going to get mad at you for a polite break. The worst that usually happens is they finish their conversation and then come back to you.

so i dont usually hang out on 6 meters much but my buddy texted me tuesday saying the band was wide open to europe and i figured id fire up WSJT-X and see what was happening. holy cow. i was working stations in spain, germany, portugal, all over the place on like 100 watts and a simple 3 element yagi that honestly needs some work. ran that for about 3 hours before the opening finally faded out. also heard there was some decent sporadic-e happening over the weekend too but i missed most of that. anyway if you havent been checking 50.313 lately you might want to keep an eye on it, pskreporter was lit up like crazy. anyone know if the solar flux has been contributing to this or is it just that time of year for Es season to start picking up?

congrats on the first activation, that feeling when the pile-up starts is something else right? i remember my first one i was fumbling with the log sheet and trying to work the radio at the same time and it was a mess but i still made it count lol park to park contacts are great, they count as a bonus for the hunters and you get credit too so its a win all around. if you havent already download the POTA app on your phone, makes spotting yourself really easy and you can see who else is activating nearby. some weekends there are parks all over the place getting activated at the same time 20m is usually the go-to for activation but dont sleep on 40m, especially later in the afternoon when 20 starts to die down. i've had some of my best contact totals just camping out on 40m SSB with a simple wire

Check Colin VK5HI's SatBlog - he tracks this data religiously. The FUNcube Dashboard correctly decodes the data and uploads it to the FUNcube Data Warehouse where you can examine the correlations. I use his reports to pre-tune my radio before each pass.

so i've been putting this off for like 6 months but i finally got my FT-7900R mounted in the cab of my F-150. ran the power cable directly to the battery with an inline fuse, antenna is a NMO mag mount for now sitting on the roof. overall pretty happy with how it came out but im getting a little bit of ignition noise on receive, like a whine that changes with RPM. i've seen people mention ferrite chokes and bonding straps but im not sure where to start with that. do i put the choke on the antenna feedline, the power leads, or both? also the mag mount is probably not a permanent solution so i'm looking at maybe drilling for a proper NMO mount eventually but my wife would kill me if i scratch the truck doing it, lol anyway. mostly just curious what other folks have done for noise on newer vehicles, seems like modern trucks are a nightmare for this stuff.

i went through basically the same thing last year, took me like three or four contests before SO2R stopped feeling like it was actively hurting my score compared to just single radio. the drop in rate while you're learning is real and kind of demoralizing but it does click eventually. one thing i dont see mentioned much — practice during low-pressure moments, not during a rate run. like find a slow hour in a contest, maybe sunday afternoon doldrums on a domestic contest, and just force yourself to work the SO2R workflow even when theres no urgency. that way the motions get ingrained without it costing you much if you fumble it. trying to learn it during a hot saturday night run on 40 is just gonna frustrate you.

oh man i remember being exactly where you are a couple years ago, it really is a lot to take in at first. ok so the short version — WAS (worked all states) is probably the easiest to knock out relatively quickly and it gives you a good feel for how the whole LoTW confirmation process works before you jump into something bigger. DXCC is the big one most people end up chasing longterm, 100 entities confirmed to get the basic certificate and then you just keep going from there. WAZ is worked all zones, 40 CQ zones around the world, thats a fun one too but some of the zones are genuinely hard to fill depending on where you live and what bands you have access to. for your setup honestly dont sell yourself short, 100w and even an attic dipole can get you a lot further than you think especially if you learn to work the bands at the right times. and yes you can mix LoTW and paper QSLs for most ARRL awards, but LoTW is so much faster and easier i'd really just push people to use that whenever possible. get an account set up if you havent already and start logging everything, you can always figure out what you're close to later.

so i passed my general back in october and got my sequential callsign assigned pretty quick, like within a few days of my license showing up in the FCC database. its a fine callsign i guess but its kind of long and clunky sounding on the air, one of those 2x3 deals with letters that just dont flow great when youre doing CW or whatever. anyway my buddy told me i should apply for a vanity call and i looked into it a little bit but the whole process is kind of confusing to me. like i understand theres a window system based on license class and there are preferred calls you can pick from available 1x2 or 2x1 or 2x2 formats depending on what youre eligible for as a General. but i guess my question is do i just submit through the FCC ULS and then wait and see? is there a specific application form or does it go through ARRL or some third party or what. and how long does it usually take to hear back. i submitted something a few days ago and im not sure if i did it right honestly also is there a fee now? i heard something changed with that

yeah the RSP1B is a solid step up, made that move myself about two years ago. the big thing you'll notice right away is the 12-bit ADC vs the 8-bit in the rtl dongles, theres just a lot less noise floor nonsense and the dynamic range improvement is real not just spec sheet talk. near those AM towers you mentioned the RSPdx might actually be worth the extra money because it has the notch filters built in, the HDR mode on the lower bands is specifically designed for that kind of situation. for WSPR decoding with WSJT-X it works great, i was pulling stations in from all over on 40m that i was completely missing before. the SDRuno software is a bit of an acquired taste honestly, some people like it some people dont but you can use it with sdrpp or even SDR# with a plugin which is nice. only real gripe is the RSP1B doesnt have the bias tee which matters if you want to power active antennas directly off the coax.

I went through the exact same thing with my Tacoma a couple years back. ended up getting a mount that clamps onto the trailer hitch receiver and running a NMO mount off of that with a dual band antenna. its not quite as clean as a roof mount for pattern but honestly for hitting local repeaters it makes zero difference and i dont have to worry about paint or drilling anything. the cable routing is a little awkward through the bed but once i figured it out its been solid for two years now with zero issues. worth looking into if you have a receiver hitch already.

the room acoustics thing is real and most people completely ignore it. hardwood floors and bare walls will absolutely kill your audio — youre basically broadcasting in a bathroom. even throwing a rug down or having some bookshelves with stuff on them makes a noticeable difference. the PR-40 is a good mic but its a large diaphragm condenser and it picks up everything, so a reflective room is gonna be very obvious with that mic. on the 7300 specifically, dig into the menu and look at the TX tone settings. theres a parametric EQ in there and the defaults are honestly fine for some people but not for everyone depending on your voice. i ended up boosting around 2-3kHz slightly and rolling off some of the low end because my voice is naturally pretty bassy and it was getting muddy. also make sure your TX bandwidth isnt set too narrow — some people accidentally have it set to like 1.8kHz or something which just sounds awful. i run mine at 2.4kHz for general ragchewing and bump it up to 2.8 when the band is quiet and i want it to sound nicer. the ALC barely moving thing is right, dont chase high ALC. and yeah leave the speech processor off until you actually understand what its doing to your signal, its easy to overdo it and sound crunchy.

20 feet inverted V on 40m is actually totally workable, dont let anyone tell you otherwise. yeah the takeoff angle is going to be higher than if you had it at say 40 or 50 feet, which means youre going to favor closer in skip distances. but honestly for evening regional stuff on 40 thats often exactly what you want anyway. you'll still get DX when conditions are decent, just dont expect it to compete with a dipole at a half wavelength up. the classic rule of thumb is half wavelength above ground for a dipole, which on 40m is around 66 feet, but nobody is putting a dipole at 66 feet in a residential backyard so we all just work with what we have. your 1.4 SWR is fine, most rigs handle that no problem and the actual feedline loss at that mismatch is pretty small. nice work on the first build, the pvc center insulator trick is solid, ive been doing that for years.

ok so i just got my technician license about three weeks ago and ive been trying to get on the local 2 meter repeater. i can hear people talking on it just fine but when i key up nobody responds and i dont think im actually getting into the machine. looked up the repeater on repeaterbook and it shows a CTCSS tone of 100.0 hz but im not totally sure where to even program that in my radio. i have a baofeng uv-5r which i know everyone has opinions about but its what i could afford to start with. anyway i set what i thought was the tone but i tried calling and still nothing. is the tone something the repeater requires to open the squelch or is it more like a courtesy thing? also someone mentioned i might need to set it as encode only and not encode+decode, is that right? i really dont want to be that guy who steps on people mid conversation so ive mostly just been listening but id really love to actually make a contact on there at some rate.

one thing that helped me was just keeping a little cheat sheet next to the radio for the first few months. also QRP means low power operation, under 5 watts, you'll hear people say they're running QRP especially on CW. and speaking of CW thats where a lot of this shorthand really comes from, morse code operators needed fast ways to say things so the Q codes kind of carried over into phone too. honestly just jump in and if someone uses something you dont recognize just ask them, most hams are pretty happy to explain stuff and wont make you feel dumb about it

The transmit capability is nice to have but the transmit capability does not really add extra cost. That said, for your stated use case, the RSP1A's filtering and sensitivity will be more valuable than HackRF's TX capability. You can always add a HackRF later for experimentation.

Here's my systematic approach for staying within proper frequency allocations: Step 1: Reference current ARRL band plan chart before operationStep 2: Verify your license class privileges for the intended bandStep 3: Check mode restrictions (CW, phone, digital) for frequency rangeStep 4: Listen before transmitting - confirm frequency is clearThis process has kept me out of trouble for 15 years. Band plans can evolve over time, so always verify current references rather than relying on memory alone.

ok so ive been licensed for about 3 months now, technician class, and i finally got a baofeng uv-5r and programmed in a local repeater i found on repeaterbook. the thing is when i key up and say my callsign nobody ever comes back to me and i dont even know if im hitting the repeater at all. i can hear other people on it just fine though which is weird to me. a guy at my local club mentioned something about CTCSS tones but honestly i zoned out a bit and didnt fully catch what he said. do i need to set something on the radio for that? and also is there like a proper way to call out on a repeater or do you just talk? i feel kinda dumb asking this but better to ask than keep doing it wrong i guess

oh man i remember feeling exactly like this. honestly just go for it — net control has heard every possible variation of a check-in and they genuinely want new people to participate, thats kind of the whole point. when they ask for check-ins you just key up and say your callsign phonetically, so like kilo alpha one whatever. some nets want your name and location too but you'll hear other people do it first so just follow along. if you mess up the phrasing nobody cares, net control will just come back to you and confirm. the first time is the hardest and after that its just automatic. as for the special event station thing — during the net someone might announce a contact opportunity or the station might actually be active on a nearby frequency. you'd just make a normal contact and log it like anything else. some of them give out certificates or QSL cards which is kinda fun. dont overthink it, just jump in tuesday

I'm having persistent problems with VARA HF connections timing out during the initial handshake. So far I have it "working" in that it can initiate a session, and I hear the other station responding with good signal level, but no connect. Then it times out... The connection sequence requires a very quick tx/rx turnaround. Until very recently (after Flex did some work on reducing digital signal latency) you couldn't get two Flex radios (6000's) connecting. My setup is IC-7300 with built-in USB interface running VARA HF 4.9.0 and Winlink Express 1.7.4.0. I am having the same issue Ken was having with the timeout happening then an endless closing and opening of the session window... I have been working on getting Vara HF to work with my Flex 6500, but I am experiencing what alot of these other users are which is timeout happening after an endless closing and opening of the session window. Audio levels look good, PTT is working, but something in the protocol handshake is failing. Any specific settings I should check?

yeah that tuesday opening was real, i caught the tail end of it around 1800 UTC and still managed to log a couple italians and what i think was a greek station though the QSB was pretty brutal. i run an older TS-590 and honestly it held up fine, didnt feel like i needed anything fancier. the IC-7760 looks nice on paper but i keep reminding myself that the antenna matters way more than the radio at the end of the day. im running a pretty modest dipole and i was still getting through. solar cycle 25 is really delivering now, feels weird after years of being bummed out about 10m being basically a parking lot. my old elmers used to tell me stories about working 100 countries on 10m with a wire antenna and i always kind of rolled my eyes but i get it now

Been running a similar setup with DRA-30 for 18 months - rock solid. The RA adapters achieve PTT without VOX or COM port, and VARA FM recognizes them immediately for fast switching. Skip the SignaLink for RMS work - too much hassle with VOX timing.

honestly the theory stuff is more useful than you'd think, at least it was for me. i went in expecting to just memorize my way through it like i did the technician and general but some of the filter and impedance matching stuff actually clicked in a way that made me understand why certain things in my shack were behaving weird. that said there's definitely still a chunk of it that's just... memorize the answer and move on, especially the regs portions. for studying i used the ARRL extra class manual alongside hamstudy and the combination worked pretty well. the manual actually explains the why behind things which made the memorization stick better. as for the spectrum thing, the extra subbands on 75, 40 and 15 meters are genuinely less crowded in my experience, especially on 75 phone. whether thats worth the effort depends on how much you operate i guess

dont overthink the pi vs arduino thing, both work. i used a pi for mine because i already had one sitting on the desk but in hindsight the arduino would have been simpler for just relay control. one thing tho — make sure your relay module is optoisolated from the arduino, some of the cheap blue relay boards from amazon will backfeed voltage through the coil flyback and do weird things to the microcontroller. found that out the hard way, fried a nano before i figured out what was going on

so ive been messing around with an arduino mega for the past few weeks trying to get it to handle antenna switching based on what band my radio is on. the radio is a ts-590sg and it outputs band data on the accessory port which is nice. got the basic logic working where it reads the voltage levels and drives some relays but the timing is all messed up — like sometimes it switches before the radio has actually settled on the new frequency and i get this ugly pop through the audio. im using a 4 relay module i grabbed off amazon, nothing fancy, and just standard digitalWrite stuff in the loop. wondering if anyone has done something similar and whether adding some debounce delay actually helped or if theres a smarter way to do it. ive seen people mention interrupts but honestly my interrupt experience is pretty limited and i dont want to overcomplicate this if a simple delay(50) or whatever would just fix it. also considering moving this over to a raspberry pi zero at some point just because it would be easier to add a little web interface for remote monitoring but not sure if the latency on the pi would make the timing even worse. any thoughts from people who have actually built stuff like this would be appreciated

Your numbers align with my bench testing. One thing to add: charge time is dramatically different. The LiFePO4 accepts 10A charging safely, while AGM tops out around 4A for longevity. Critical for multi-day deployments with limited solar input.