Amateur Radio
My first contact with ham radio was when my father, W2AOF, was telephoned by the local RACES group to help provide communication support for the annual South Plainfield Labor Day parade. Up to that point I thought the hobby was the dusty old Heathkit HW-32A in the corner of the basement-- it never occured to me that ham radio technology had progressed so far. I knew the minute I saw that little handheld that this was a hobby I could really enjoy.
I was licensed in South Plainfield, NJ on November 14, 1996 as a Technician class operator with callsign KC2AEI.
After I got my license, I took quickly to VHF/UHF public service, that being what brought me to it in the first place. I all but ignored HF work and CW in favor of tweaking my VHF station and ragchewing with the local OMs. It was like that up until moved to Baltimore MD to the University of Maryland Baltimore County. Finally around October of 1997 I joined the W3EAX club and got exposed to avid CW HF operators like NF3I who encouraged me to get on the air every week and try my code.
On August 1, 2000, shortly after I moved to Catonsville, MD, I upgraded to a General Class ticket, which I've held since.
Potential Projects
- F5OEO/rpitx: RF transmitter for Raspberry Pi
- kv4p HT - open source ham radio transceiver for your smartphone