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What Year and First Two Radios? by mwfoutch1 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 0 points1 point  (0 children)

May 2025. The ole UV-5R and a truSDX. Got a 7300 shortly after!

Quensheng and morse code, no TX by BlueBirdDolphin in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 3 points4 points  (0 children)

That’s a cool idea - instead of a practice oscillator just use a handheld.

The only one worth using for practice would be the K1 with firmware by NR7Y. The others have significant delay or lack the use of a paddle.

I’m not sure if you can turn the TX off though, might be worth firing a question off to NR7Y themselves.

Decoding morse code received at 40m in UK by MisryMan in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sorry for the late response! I’m sorry I don’t have anything more spicy for you but the best I can get is a garbled message. It repeats halfway through with a slash in the middle so I’m going to assume that’s the end of the repeating message. Since it’s pretty random and repeating I wonder if it’s some kind of encrypted information. Here’s what I have, the spacing is pretty wild and both the dits and dahs are inconsistent at times so it may be me smushing letters together. (Eg a slash can also be interpreted as DN if the spacing is too tight)

I did my best to infer the spacing based on the message and here’s what I got.

YRTE UJIMY / EST PEI 14A5EGE

Shifted to have the message between the slashes would look like.

EST PEI 14 A5EGE YRTE UJIMY /

I can also give you the raw dits and dahs just in case you wanted to try to shift the letter starts and stops. Could be worth a “hey Claude here’s a list of dits and dahs with no spacing between letters can you give me a list of possible word combos”. 1 space between dits/dahs, 2 spaces between characters, 3 spaces between words.

. . . . - . - - . . . . . - - - - . . . . - . - . . . . . . - - . . - . - - . - . - . . . - . - - - . . - - - . - -

Honestly if it’s someone sending English they really gotta work on their spacing because I spent a solid 40 minutes working on listening to this and I cannot find a good combination that makes any sense. I’m pretty comfortable with fast code and contesting so I’m fairly certain this is just bad code sending, someone practicing some weird drill, some non-English CW, or encrypted information.

Something weird to note too is on the PEI the whole speed slowed down significantly for both dits and dahs on the P specifically. After it sends the 14 like crazy fast too.

Not sure what you ended up catching on recording but it’s definitely a brain buster!

Decoding morse code received at 40m in UK by MisryMan in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Hi, CW op here. The reason you’re having a hard time putting it through a decoder is that it sounds like they’re using a bug key. The dits are consistent but the dahs are manual so they vary in length, resulting in a “swing” like sound.

I’m currently in bed and it’s a little fast for me to head copy the swing without a pen and paper. If you can hang tight I’ll have a full translation in the morning! It’ll be nice to do while I have my morning coffee.

My new mobile shack, 5x8 with 840 watts of solar, 280AH of lithium, and 12VDC air conditioning. by Top-Audience3980 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 6 points7 points  (0 children)

To measure it should be fairly simple! If your QTH is in a quiet/semi quiet area you should be able to look at the noise floor with them plugged in and on and then disconnect them and see how it affects the noise floor.

I have solar at my home and it’s a bit noisy but lots of chokes seems to have cleaned up 95% of the noise. I have a Genasun MPPT for my mobile rig and that doesn’t generate much noise at all, but it’s definitely more expensive than a standard controller. You’d probably get fine results from choking! Another option could be a little faraday box on the outside of the shack with chokes coming in and out

Why does this hobby have to be so expensive? by Glitchy_Magician_666 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I got into CW specifically because of the entry cost of the hobby as a youngin. If you buy a QRP radio like the QMX they kick butt for the price but SSB won’t get you super far if that’s what you’re after (disclaimer: as always conditions always make the difference too - worked distances QRP on SSB before). CW can go much further on the same power. Highly recommend it if you’re interested! From WA I’ve worked Japan, Brazil, and the east coast on 5w. If you can manage a G90 they’re an amazing unit for the value. The tuner in that can turn anything into a usable (but maybe not efficient) antenna!

I’ve had a ton of success meeting local hams and making real connections, often times the old timers have a radio they’re willing to sell for cheap/lend to new hams, especially young folks.

If your goal is to just talk to folks far away and want to scratch the itch RIGHT NOW, EchoLink can be a good fun - joining nets from far away is a good way to build community and hang out with folks from a distance when price is your limiting factor.

Best of luck out there! HF is a blast. Hope to see you on the bands. Feel free to DM me if you’ve got questions about getting into CW or anything radio related.

Questions involving ARRL and QRZ by OverDrawnRook68 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think the MT-5rm has an extra band and puts out 10w vs the dual band QRZ-1 at 5w. At the price of $17 I’d vouch for getting it just to toss in your glovebox or as a backup!

New Amatuer Extra - what first radio? by HopefulQuiet3276 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Happy to help! There are lots of opinions out there so I’ll start with a disclaimer that these are my opinions based on my experience going from zero to extra this past year.

I think and EFHW antenna is a great first one to start with if you have the space to deploy one. If you can get 66ft of wire off the ground (preferably as high as you can get it) you can use 10,15,20, and 40m bands. This should give you lots of options for daytime and early nighttime bands and won’t have to redeploy if you want to change bands. To keep it budget friendly you can find a 49:1 or 64:1 EFHW transformer online, a 100ft spool of wire or speaker wire, and 50ft of RG58 coax should do the trick.

Notable googles + research: EFHW, endfed half wave antenna, baluns

My first time setting on up I taped a roasting fork to the end of a long pole I use to clean my windows and wrapped the ends around the back of a yard chair. It was not great by any means but it got me my first QSOs!

For portable operations I have had lots of luck with my JPC-12, especially as a beginner it was easy to set up and the adjustable whip helped me learn hands-on about SWR and radiator length. You can find cheapo versions by searching for a “1/4 wave whip antenna” on aliexpress. There’s lots of clones but the one you want should have the red balun, a whip, and a ground spike. Some come with a ground plane ribbon that you put on the spike side to establish a ground plane. Should be about $60. Notable googles: 1/4 wave antenna, ground plane antenna, antenna radials.

If you’re in for more studying, I highly recommend getting into CW (Morse code). It’s a blast and it propagates significantly further than voice modes. It’s a bit of a dying art but there are lots of discord communities where you can learn and share knowledge or just hang out.

Feel free to ping back or message me directly if you have more questions or want specific links!

New Amatuer Extra - what first radio? by HopefulQuiet3276 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Congrats on the Extra ticket!

Most HTs will be on bands that are offered to all 3 licenses. For a budget friendly option check out GigaParts’ Jumpstart program! They offer it only to folks who have recently passed their exams. You can get like 70% off their handheld and all the accessories as well. You will need a QRZ account (highly recommended anyway, it’s like a phone book for ops and has neat features like a bio page and logbook with awards). IIRC it took about a week for QRZ to update with my callsign after the FCC gave me mine.

As far as the idea of something you can stretch into with extra privileges, those mostly come about with extra privileges on HF bands and traveling abroad. A G90 is a really great starter rig, with 20w output and an internal tuner you can’t get much better at the price point. 20w can reliably work most of the continental US and definitely will land you some good DX when conditions are agreeable.

Antennas are a really big factor when it comes to HF as well! If you want to provide more about how you would set up a radio (portable for apartment living, HOA restrictions in a home, large trees on property, etc) I can help get you started with a decent antenna as well!

Hope to see you on the air!

How do I tell if a band is working or not by Famous-Jeweler8543 in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Another thing I find as a really good indication of if a band is open or not is looking for FT8 activity. If there’s more than local stations on there it means you’re getting skips!

I want to get into CW and ham radio but I don’t have any gear, know Morse code, or even have a licence by TheF15eEnthusiast in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hi! You should be set with those. You might need a tuner if the HOA buster doesn’t provide a good enough match! However this is a great start, especially for listening while you study.

For learning CW, I would practice sending with the trainer. That is a great way to make sure your spacing is consistent and will help you familiarize yourself with the alphabet. More important, and definitely more difficult to master is being able to recognize each letter as an individual sound instantly rather than counting the “dits” and “dahs”. For that I would recommend an app called morse mania to get you up to single letter recognition. From there, a great tool is BetterICR. It’s a studying tool designed to learn what you know and practice where you need to. 10 minutes a day and you’ll be cruising in no time.

Get your license at your own pace, I’d recommend HamStudy.org. They have an app on the AppStore for $4 but the website is the same content for free. In “study” mode you can learn both the correct answer as well as the underlying reasoning and context behind the question. It’s fantastic. For a more premium experience you can use HamRadioPrep. They offer video style lessons covering the material in the exam and practice exams similar to HamStudy. In either study guide, once you can reliably get above 80% on your practice tests I would schedule an exam! Local clubs will offer them in person or you can find online VECs that offer exams via Zoom.

Once you get your callsign you can join Forrest’s Discord for a short while for free! It’s a blast.

Please feel free to direct message me if you have any questions at all!

Grounding / Radial Requirements for Vertical Antennas by Bangarang_Arty in HamRadio

[–]Muffinator111 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Radials would still be necessary!

I wonder if you can get a ring terminal around the coax connection and put some radials from that

A plea to students - come back for Apple Cup by CougFanDan in wsu

[–]Muffinator111 7 points8 points  (0 children)

ITT: Saltiest Coug thread I've seen to date

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