David Kowalski

dont get discouraged man, pile ups are brutal and even guys with big beams and amps miss stuff. i was in the same boat when i started chasing DX, felt like everyone had some secret advantage. one thing i do now is keep the DX Summit site open on a second monitor filtered to just the bands im interested in, and i actually log into a local cluster via my radio software (i use Log4OM) which sometimes gets me spots a few seconds before the web stuff updates. probably doesnt matter most of the time but psychologically it makes me feel better lol 8 months in and already working new entities is pretty solid btw

The short answer is LoTW is the one that actually matters for ARRL awards like DXCC and WAS. eQSL confirmations dont count toward those, at least not officially, though eQSL has its own awards system which some people care about. Paper cards still count for DXCC if you submit them but honestly most serious DXers just do LoTW now because its so much faster and cheaper than mailing cards around the world. The TQSL setup is annoying the first time, not gonna lie. But once you get your certificate sorted and figure out how to sign your logs before uploading, it basically runs itself. I just log everything in WSJT-X or whatever, export the ADIF, and toss it into TQSL every few weeks. Takes maybe two minutes. I still send and receive paper cards because i genuinely like them, got a whole wall covered at this point, but i wouldnt rely on paper alone if youre chasing DXCC. Do LoTW first, then if you want eQSL too its easy enough to set up and some DX stations upload there that dont bother with LoTW for whatever reason.

I used Ham Radio Prep's video course along with the HamStudy app. The key is taking lots of practice exams - I did at least 75 before my test day. You only need 37 correct out of 50, not perfection!

FO-29 has been a bit hit or miss lately from what ive seen, might wanna check the current status before spending too much time on it. AO-73 is generally more reliable for getting started. also dont underestimate how much antenna pointing matters on these passes, even a handheld yagi manually tracked is gonna outperform a fixed vertical by a lot, especially near the horizon where youve got the most time but the most doppler shift happening fastest

yeah the igate thing is almost certainly your problem. a receive-only igate will pull your position off RF and push it to the APRS-IS just fine, so you show up on aprs.fi no problem, but it cant inject messages back onto RF so your buddy never hears anything. you need a bidirectional igate in range of both of you for the messaging to work end to end over RF. the way to check is look at the igate's info page on aprs.fi, there should be something indicating if its IGating in both directions. a lot of guys run Direwolf or APRX and just never enable the RF transmit side because they dont want to deal with the PTT setup or licensing the gateway. totally understandable but it does cripple the messaging side of things. honestly if you want reliable APRS messaging you almost have to use APRS-IS on at least one end, like through an app on your phone connected to the internet. pure RF messaging is kind of hit or miss depending on your local infrastructure.

hey congrats on the general, good timing to start chasing dx on 20m this time of year. so the short answer is yes they're pulling from overlapping but not identical networks. dxwatch aggregates from the dx spider cluster network and a few others, qrz spots has its own feed but they do share a lot of nodes. the delay thing is totally normal and honestly 5-10 minutes isnt bad, sometimes spots can be stale by 15-20 mins depending on which cluster node they came through. for mobile i've been pretty happy with dx toolkit on android, it pulls cluster data and has a built in gray line map which is super handy for knowing when a path might open up. some guys swear by hamspots but i havent used that one much personally. the thing to watch out for is busted calls in the spots -- somebody will post a spot with a typo in the callsign and you'll chase a ghost for 20 minutes, been there more times than i want to admit.

had the same exact problem with mine a few years back. turned out to be the ALC circuit acting up. you might want to check the alc voltage while transmitting in ssb - should see some deflection on the meter when you talk into the mic. also make sure your processor settings are right, sometimes they get messed up and the radio thinks its overdriving when its not. mine needed a cap replacement on the main board but that was after like 15 years of use

yeah the 857 receive is its weak point, everyone knows that. i wouldnt bother with the NB mod honestly. what radio are you running it into, just a vertical or do you have a decent antenna? because sometimes what feels like a radio problem is just the antenna and feedline situation

had the exact same problem last year. turned out the RMS gateways i was picking looked green on the map but were like 800 miles away and propagation just wasnt cooperating that day even though they technically showed active. started sorting by distance and picking closer ones and it got way better. also worth checking the Winlink.org site for gateway status, sometimes the map is a little behind reality. one more thing — are you on the paid VARA license or the free version? free version has a speed cap and some gateways i think have issues with it, or at least the connection is flakier in my experience. might not be your issue but worth knowing

so i finally got activated for real last weekend, not just a drill. there was a pretty bad storm system that rolled through and our county ARES group got called up to support the EOC and a couple of the red cross shelters. ive been a member for about 8 months now and done maybe three or four SET exercises but this was the first time it was actually real and people were actually depending on the net. i have to say the training really does kick in. i was a little nervous on the way over but once i sat down at the shelter position and started checking in with net control it just kind of felt normal. the weird part was how much waiting there was between actual traffic, i guess i expected it to be more chaotic. mostly i was just passing welfare messages and doing periodic check-ins with the EC. anyway just wanted to share because i remember when i first joined ARES i was kind of intimidated and wondering if id ever actually be useful. turns out you just have to show up and pay attention during the drills. if anyone is on the fence about joining their local group i'd say just go for it, worst case you meet some good people and learn stuff.

okay so ive been chasing DX pretty casually for about two years now and i think i have somewhere around 140 entities confirmed but honestly i dont fully understand how the whole credit system works anymore. back when i started everyone said you need the QSL card but now people keep telling me LoTW is the way to go and the paper cards dont really matter as much? heres my actual confusion though — i have a bunch of contacts in LoTW that are confirmed, and i have a bunch of paper cards, but some entities i only have one or the other. like i worked a rare one from the south pacific last year and the op uploaded to LoTW but never replied to my card request. does that LoTW confirmation count toward my DXCC credit even without a paper card? i genuinely cant find a straight answer on the ARRL site and reading the rules makes my head spin a bit. also while im asking — WAS and WAZ, are those tracked the same way or does each award have totally different confirmation requirements? i work a lot of phone so im on HF most evenings. just trying to figure out if im wasting time sending paper cards when LoTW does the same job basically.

so this has been driving me nuts for a couple weeks now. my 857 was working great, i was running it mobile and everything was fine, then one day i keyed up and my SWR meter barely moved. radio shows full power on the display but im maybe getting 5-10 watts out on a good day, usually less. receive is totally normal, sensitivity hasnt changed at all that i can tell. i swapped antennas and coax thinking maybe a connector went bad, no change. tried it on dummy load same deal. the final amp section is where my head is going but i wanted to see if anyone else has run into this before i start poking around in there with a meter. i did notice once or twice in the last month before it died it would kind of hiccup mid transmission, like a brief dropout, not sure if thats related or i was just imagining things. radio hasnt been dropped or anything, just normal mobile use. mounts been solid. wondering if maybe a driver transistor is on its way out or if theres something stupid im missing before i go down the rabbit hole on this

60-65% is honestly pretty solid for a first build, dont beat yourself up over it. Class E is great on paper but getting it right requires pretty careful component matching and the switching waveforms need to be really clean or you just end up with a hot transistor and a mess on the spectrum. ive seen guys with way more experience than either of us struggle to break 75% reliably in a hand-built rig. for backpacking where every gram counts the efficiency does start to matter more just because of battery weight, but at 4 watts out with 60% you're pulling maybe 6-7 watts from the battery which on a 3ah pack gives you a decent operating window depending on your duty cycle. if you're doing CW and not hammering it constantly you're probably fine. i'd spend more time on antenna work honestly — that'll do more for your contacts per milliamp than squeezing another 20% out of the PA stage.

sounds like you might have some via bureau confirmations mixed in there which is totally fine for DXCC as long as the QSO details match your log. the different callsigns thing though - if its a special event station or something operating under a different call that could still be valid but you need to make sure its the same DXCC entity. LoTW is definitely the way to go these days, much faster and you can see your confirmed count update in real time. i switched to mostly electronic confirmations years ago and never looked back

I upgraded after 6 months as a Tech and wish I'd done it sooner! The General exam covers more in-depth knowledge like calculating AC circuits and RMS voltage. If you're comfortable with basic electronics, focus on propagation theory and band plans - that's where most Techs struggle.

New General here, finally ready to dive into CW but I'm drowning in specs! Every paddle manufacturer lists different contact ratings, tension adjustments, magnetic vs spring returns. What really matters for a beginner paddle? I'm looking at the CWMorse pocket paddle vs something heavier like the N3ZN. Budget is around $100-150. Will be using it with my IC-7300's built-in keyer. Really don't want to buy twice - what should I prioritize as someone learning to send clean code?

Standard rule is 3kHz bandwidth for HF transmission, giving audio fidelity from 0-3000Hz. Most rigs default to 2.7kHz but why not maximize to 3kHz for improved sound quality. Beyond 3kHz you risk complaints and interference issues with adjacent stations.

Performance tip: If you experience lag with Log4OM, try using the SQLite database instead of the default and ensure your antivirus isn't scanning the database files during operation. Also disable some of the real-time cluster processing if you don't need it - makes a huge difference on older hardware.

congrats on the first build, that's a great feeling when it just fires up and works. i built mine about four years ago now and yeah the first real contact on QRP hits different for sure. on the antenna question, i switched from random wire to an EFHW a while back and honestly dont think i'd go back. with a random wire you kinda need a tuner to make it behave and even then depending on the length you can get some weird RF hot spots on the coax shield which is annoying when youre portable and running on battery. the EFHW with a decent 49:1 unun is pretty close to resonant on multiple bands without needing much tuning, packs down small, and if you can get it up at a decent angle it really does work well. only thing is the matchbox adds a tiny bit of weight and complexity but not enough to matter really. lots of guys wind their own ununs which is not hard at all if you have a couple toroids lying around. what band are you mostly operating on, that might change the advice a bit

ok so i passed my general a few weeks ago and ive been trying to figure out where i can actually transmit on 40 meters. i know theres a chart somewhere but every time i look it up i get a different answer or the chart is from like 2009 and i dont know if its still current. somebody at the club told me generals can use 7.225 to 7.300 for phone but then i saw something about 7.175 being ok too and now im just lost. also whats the deal with the band edges, like can i literally transmit right at 7.300 or is that considered bad practice. sorry if this is a dumb question im still figuring all this out

honestly i think people way overthink this. the boring truth is signal strength still matters a lot, not just your technique. ive seen guys with stacked yagis and a kilowatt crack pileups that i couldnt touch with my 100w and a wire, same technique, same timing, everything. that said your point about reading the operator is the one thing that levels the playing field a bit for us normal humans with normal antennas one thing i havent seen mentioned much is if the DXpedition is posting their listening range on the cluster dont just go to the middle of it, go to the edges, specifically the upper edge in my experience. everyone reads 5 to 10 and goes to 7.5, so go to 9.5 and see what happens. worked for me on a couple rare ones. not every time but often enough that its my first move now

just got my general last month and have been lurking on 6m trying to figure out when to actually transmit lol. this thread is helpful, didnt realize sporadic-e openings were this unpredictable. is there like a good website to check if an opening is happening before you sit down at the radio or do you just have to watch the waterfall yourself

10m being open like that is so good to hear, ive been meaning to get my dipole sorted out for that band for months now and keep putting it off. maybe this is the kick i needed lol. as for the Icom stuff i think there was a post on eham or reddit about it but i cant remember which, might be worth checking both. someone usually does a decent writeup eventually.

After three years running both battery types in field operations, here's what I've observed with actual amp-hour measurements. Bioenno 20Ah LiFePO4: Consistently delivers 18.5Ah usable at 50% duty cycle SSB, maintains voltage under 100W load. Weight: 5.1 lbs. Odyssey PC925 AGM 28Ah: Delivers 14Ah usable to 11.8V cutoff, noticeable voltage sag above 75W. Weight: 18.2 lbs. LiFePO4 advantage: 3.6x lighter, consistent voltage, deeper discharge capabilityAGM advantage: $180 vs $420 cost, no BMS failure risk, cold weather performanceBoth handle Field Day abuse well, but the weight difference is game-changing for portable ops. Anyone seeing different results with other brands?

Perfect timing for POTA! Those low geomagnetic indices mean the ionosphere should be stable. I always check both before contests or DXpedition planning. The A-index was 118 and the K-index was 8. I usually shut down my radio when the K-index goes above 5 - but your current readings are ideal for HF work. Have a great activation!