How To Get Your Tech License The Easy Way

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I got my license when I was 9. As a kid the wait was way worse. I bugged the crap out of grandpa to be able to talk on the radio. Then you had to wait for the certificate and call sign to be .Gov mailed. Seemed like it took 6 months.

He taught me how to build radios back when they were Crystal's for every frequency.
 
He taught me how to build radios back when they were Crystal's for every frequency.
Bob Heil, published what he calls the pine board project. It is a vacuum tube and crystal based AM transmitter, power supply, and preamp equalizer with trebble and bass adjustments. You can find it either at the ham nation site or the QST magazine.

It seems that vacuum tubes are making somewhat of a comeback in terms of high performance audio and radio equipment. I guess it has something to do with the higher quantum noise present in FETs. The article made me curious enough to actually look into how does one even design or analyze circuits with them.
 
Yes, plus they make more contacts from the OM. (Old men).

This year our club is going to have a married couple run the GOTA station. She's the more enthusiastic ham and I think will make many contacts. We also have a 13-14(?) yo girl that participates with her dad and she does really well. Last year we tried getting my wife to call CQ but she wouldn't. She has her license but rarely gets on the air. One guy recorded one of the girls calling CQ into a macro on his radio and used that and when the OM would respond they'd get the middle aged dude. One guy made a comment about that being bait and switch.

I guess for a contest, I don't really get it, because your not getting more than club call sign, class, and state. :oops:
 
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Does anyone have a link for a current study guide? That one expired in June :(
 
Does anyone have a link for a current study guide? That one expired in June :(
Posted links. I just took the practice exams over and over until I regularly got in the 90s. Review the details of the ones you miss. After you master the tech exam, work on the general, one price for the test session, might as well take a shot. I did, and passed general as well.
 
Posted links. I just took the practice exams over and over until I regularly got in the 90s. Review the details of the ones you miss. After you master the tech exam, work on the general, one price for the test session, might as well take a shot. I did, and passed general as well.

I'm a bit time poor lately, so I will see how much time this eats up.
 
What he said... Better retention if you don't overdo it at any one session.
 
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I downloaded a phone app to while away dead time with. And yeah short bursts will stick better than cramming for sure.
 
Lol... I am just using baeofeng ht to hit local repeaters for now. I will post when I get a hf rig. We can see who wears out their welcome first
 
Lol... I am just using baeofeng ht to hit local repeaters for now. I will post when I get a hf rig. We can see who wears out their welcome first

I'm waiting on a programming cable that works so I can see about lurking and listening a bit while I study.
 
Of course you are not saying how old they are!! lol
Our (female) turn out ranged from 13 to mature adult with several in between. At one point we had girls operating all of our stations.
 
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So after getting that Baofeng a while back (https://www.carolinafirearmsforum.c...5r-uhf-vhf-dual-band-two-way-ham-radio.48394/ you guys are a bad influence!), I finally decided to take the test!

I just wanted to make sure that this was the current study guide: https://www.kb6nu.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/2018-no-nonsense-tech-study-guide-v1-1.pdf ?
Yes, that guide is good for exams until 2022.

https://www.eham.net/ is another resource, you can take exams there no cost unlimited attempts to help you prepare for your license exam.
 
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I got my first license 30 years ago maybe? Couldn't afford a rig but some of the locals used 2m to talk to each other all the time. One of the more knowledgeable people that worked in some sort of comm job maintained their antennae/receiver I believe. Definitely couldn't afford a 2m rig. Played around with older tube radios some to try to repair. Built my own antennae's and stuff. Went over to a friends house that dragged me into doing it and played on bands to talk across the pond. Also did a bit of morse chat. Remember one of the guys had hooked up his morse paddle (left right kind, which I thought was way cool to use) to a serial connection to his pc. Good memories. Since I had previously been in military for comm equip and was working as a computer repair person at the time I looked at many low power tuna can, pringle can, etc kind of hiking rigs to do low power morse and skipping. Interesting stuff back then. Due to challenges being able to afford anything being young, wife and baby I clearly remember telling everyone N5NLO was 'no luck operating'.
I eventually took the test for the next tier. Don't know why I still remember both call signs. Good times.
Haven't done any of that anymore and I know my licenses are not valid. Figure these days why would people still do ham stuff. No offense intended.
 
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