Foundations of Amateur Radio

The other day I looked in my diary and noticed that it was the anniversary of my first solo flight. If that's not familiar to you, it means I got in an aeroplane on my own for the first time, taxied to the end of the runway, made a radio call to warn all the other pilots, took off, flew a circuit and landed safely. All the essentials for flying a plane.

It occurred to me that there was a period of preparation associated with that flight. I did training, I practised, I got my gear in order and then after all was ready, I did the actual flight.

In a technical hobby like Amateur Radio it's easy to get stuck in any of the steps leading up to your first transmission. It's just as easy to get stuck getting ready to do a contest, activate a digital mode, climbing a SOTA peak. Each of those activities are part of our hobby and doing those can provide you with a sense of achievement, a measure of success and ultimately the confidence to continue in this hobby.

I've said before that there is a contest on pretty much every weekend, if not quite every day. People who participate in those contests do so for a variety of reasons, from testing equipment, to getting different countries in the log, to catching up with friends, to winning.

I'm a die-hard contester. I love the chase, love to improve on my performance, get better, do more, faster, etc. That's not to say that there are times when I use the opportunity of a contest to try something new.

At the moment I'm in the process of trying to figure out how I can record my voice into appropriate audio files so I can make the logging tool N1MM make all the noise on behalf of my vocal chords. Calling CQ for hours on end is not a good way to protect your voice and for those within earshot it's no way to spend a weekend listening to gibberish fill the house.

I don't know how I'll go. Admittedly I've left it a bit late for the contest at hand, but I'm going to give it a go. I doubt I'll achieve more than a dozen contacts, if any, but then that's not why I'm doing it.

My point is that you can, for any reason at all, participate in a contest. You don't need permission, you don't need to be asked, you can just decide to. When you're ready, when you feel the urge, when you think you can, or even if you think you can't, have a go. Today. Now.

Some fair warning. If you pick a busy contest, like say the CQWW, you'll find that there are plenty of other stations around. They too are having a go at what ever level they choose to. Some will be out to win and others will try to say hello and want a chat.

When you start you might feel the need to do lots of calling. Better use of your time is to have a listen and see what's happening. Check out the other operating techniques. Once you have the hang of it, try it yourself. It won't hurt, nobody will bite, though some might get testy if you jump on top of a rare station.

If that's all too much to try and it's a little too scary, find yourself a local net, a discussion, an on-air meet-up, and have a listen. Then, if the going's good, join in. Key your microphone and say your callsign. Take it from there.

Going Solo is something that every amateur you hear on air has done. It's time for you to do the same.

Now get on air and make some noise!

I'm Onno VK6FLAB