In a box of stuff recently donated to WA2HOM, our amateur radio station at the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum, there was a book by Doug DeMaw, W1FB, titled W1FB’s Help for New Hams. This book hits on just about all the topics that a new ham in the late 1980s would want to know about, and W1FB does a great job of walking the new ham through these topics.
Of course, being 25 years old, some of it, is out-of-date, and it doesn’t cover some questions that a new ham today would ask. So, I’m thinking of writing my own Help for New Hams. Mine would probably be a little less HF-centric and include advice on joining clubs and how to use a computer in the shack. Or, maybe I should write two separate versions: an HF version and a VHF version.
At any rate, the outline of the W1FB version is shown below. If you have any comments about this outline, and what I should perhaps include in my version, I’d love to hear from you.
- The Newly Licensed Amateur
- First things first
- What about homemade equipment?
- Transmitter power
- Surplus radio equipment
- Used gear
- Equipment features
- Digital or analog aeadout?
- KISS
- Station accessories
- HF antennas
- VHF FM equipment
- Exotic modes
- Your New Equipment—Getting Acquainted
- Your friend, the operating manual
- The front panel and those many knobs!
- Tuning up
- SWR and the solid-state transmitter
- Dial-settings chart
- CW operation
- The sidetone level
- SSB operation
- What about speech processing?
- SSB and VOX controls
- The woes of transmitter misadjustment
- Getting to know your receiver
- RF gain or attenuator
- Noise blanker
- Using the notch filter
- S-meters in general
- Receiver AGC
- Normal and narrow SSB and CW filters
- IF shift and width controls
- Your RIT controls
- Receiver RF gain controller
- Using a linear amplifier
- Amplifiers can cause problems
- Amplifier switches
- ALC circuit
- Tuning your amplifier
- Safety first!
- Equipment malfunction
- Avoiding unwanted RF currents
- Earth ground and station locations
- Some antennas cause RF problems
- How to use your SWR meter
- How to use a transmatch
- Transmatches with balun transformers
- Outboard balun transformers
- Constructing and Using Antennas
- Locating your antennas
- How high is too high?
- A closer look at antenna-height effects
- Where is true ground?
- Artificial grounds
- Choosing your feed line
- Balanced feed lines
- Grounding your station for safety
- Building dipole antennas
- Inverted-V antennas
- The half-sloper antenna
- Multiband dipoles
- Multiband trap dipoles
- Vertical antennas
- Big loop antennas
- What about horizontal loops?
- Directional beam antennas
- Multiband trap Yagis
- Do you really need a rotary beam antenna?
- Bringing feeders and control lines into your shack
- Station Layout and Safety
- Radio room location
- Keep your antennas near the shack
- Ham shack lighting
- Your operating desk or table
- Increasing the surface area of your office desk
- Arranging your equipment
- Cable arrangement
- Your station ground and AC line filters
- The chair in your stations
- Avoid stacking your equipment
- TVI and RFI—Strange Bedfellows
- Your first responsibility
- How to use your transmitter
- AC line filtering
- Filter selection and ratings
- Antenna precautions
- Transmitter low-pass filter
- TV high-pass filtering
- The VCR monster
- Telephone interference
- CATV interference
- Neighborhood diplomacy
- QRP vs. interference
- Operating Problems and Fears
- Inability to copy the other station
- Honesty in signal reporting
- On-the-air topics
- Getting on frequency
- Split-frequency operation
- Don’t be afraid of QRM
- The break-in operator
- Problems with spelling
- Don’t be afraid of keyers and keyboards
- Multiple comebacks—what to do?
- How to deal with DX
- On-the-Air Conduct and Procedures
- Calling CQ
- Specific CQs
- Directional CQs
- Answering a CQ
- Operating via a repeater
- When to ID
- The fiber of a QSO
- Avoid cliches
- The “here, there” syndrome
- Joining a QSO in progress
- QSK and VOX operation
- The “ah” syndrome
- Taboo language
- How to use your speech processor
- Transmitter output power
- Station Accessories—What to Buy?
- Bugs, paddles, and keyers
- Advantages of keyer use
- Keyboard keyers
- Microphones
- Antenna tuners, or transmatches
- Automatic antenna tuners
- SWR indicators
- Outboard audio filters
- Antenna rotators
- Do you need a tower?
- Phone patches
- Dummy antenna
- External speaker
- Antenna switch
- 24-hour clock
- Linear amplifier
- DX and Contest Operating
- Equipment needs
- Your receiving setup
- Receiver IF filters
- Using an audio filter
- Split-frequency operation
- How to snag the DX station
- Answering the CQ of a DX station
- The DX ragchew
- Avoid certain topics
- The business of contesting
- How to operate
- Contest logging
- Certificate hunting
- Logging, QSL Cards, and Record Keeping
- The 24-hour time system
- Logging the DX
- Another logbook advantage
- Dealing with QSL cards
- Tips for obtaining confirmation
- The outgoing QSL service
- QSL managers
- Sending QSL cards to ARRL HQ
- Other records you may want to keep
- Obtaining Accurate Information
- Using reference books
- ARRL direct information services
- Some tips about your technical inquiries
- The importance of QST and ARRL membership
- Other ARRL periodicals
- W1AW bulletins
- Attend technical seminars
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