I got my SignalStick! It's working great now and is a lot better than the rubber duck antenna that comes with the ID50.

I'll be logging everything so hopefully I get a few people in my logs, so I can upload them to World Radio League, QRZ, ClubLog and POTA. It's all simplex FM, so I'll be grabbing grid squares as well. I'm gonna go scout the park on Wednesday to decide where exactly I'm going to work.

After an hour and a half or so, I'll move onto 70cm, announcing on the VK4RMC repeater (439.975 MHz) and go to the simplex frequency (439.000 MHz) and spend about another hour or so on 70cm and hopefully I get the activation. Later this week it'll just be 2m testing, still announced via repeater.

It'll be cool to have the difference between the rubber duck antenna and the Signal Stick manifest itself. On the big day, I'll be calling out on the VK4RMC repeater (146.650 MHz) on 2m before I go to the simplex call frequency (146.500 MHz).

I'm slowly making plans to activate #POTA at Mount Coot-tha (AU-10071) on 2m and 70cm FM for a couple of hours sometime in the next few weeks. I'll probably do a test run for an hour or so later this week. The reason for the big day in a few weeks is that I'm going to buy a Signal Stick from the US.

Couldn't for the life of me figure out why I couldn't hit repeaters. Turns out Repeaterbook's ID52 export was backwards when it come to duplex frequencies. I had to set all the DUP+ to DUP- which was pretty easy with Excel. I can hit most of the repeaters around Brisbane now, which is nice.

Redfest 25 Ham Radio Festival - 9am Saturday 12th April at Deception Bay North State School on Old Bay Road, Deception Bay. $5 admission.

I ended up getting myself an Icom ID-50A HT for VHF/UHF work on the D-STAR repeaters up here in Brisbane. Set me back $700 though.

BTW, I'll be at the Redcliffe and Districts Radio Club (VK4RC) Redfest 25 at Deception Bay North State School on Saturday, the flyer for which is attached to this post.

Attempted to join my first net but they didn't leave the space for me to break in after the regulars all showed up. Just a little disappointed. Also didn't get my new HT due to stock issues.

That's the plan! Going to my local radio shop to pick myself up an Icom ID-52A in about an hour, so excited for that.

Thanks, I'm really happy about finally getting it, been studying for 5 years or so as well as listening via KiwiSDR.

Thanks, I got 96% on the theory and passed the practical with flying colours too.

Thanks, I intend to!

Thanks, intend on it!

Thanks, appreciate it.

Well this is unexpected. I'm apparently today's featured ham on QRZCQ.com. Nice.

Probably going to buy an Icom ID-52A for my first HT. A local store has it marked down from AU$925 to AU$830ish. I've got the money saved away, so that's not an issue. Just thinking about accessories at the moment. Shame it's not the 52A Plus but c'est la vie, right?

Passed my ham radio exam on Sunday, and got my callsign on Monday. Connected to the Redcliffe repeater (VK4RRC) via echolink and tested last night.

Got way too many folks on my pseudonymous account following for ham, so moved it all here.

Didn't know bluesky had such a large ham community. Nice.