Like any hobby, ham radio involves a fair amount of jargon. To a newcomer (or an experienced ham starting a new activity) the jargon can make it harder to get going and make contacts. This chapter helps explain some of the more common terms.

Spoken Q-signals

In theory, these abbreviations are just supposed to be used in Morse operation. In practice, however, hams use spoken versions on voice which can be confusing. The meanings are often a little different than the formal definition, as well. (A full list of common Q-signals can be found in Chapter 8.)

• Kyew-are-emm (QRM): Any kind of interference. Local QRM refers to audio noise bothering the speaker: “I’m getting some local QRM from the TV.”
• Kyew-are-eks (QRX): A request to stop talking, “Can you QRX for a minute?”
• Kyew-are-zed (QRZ): What was that call sign? “Zed” is a phonetic for Z as well as its British pronunciation.
• Kyew-so (QSO): “In contact with,” as in “I’m in QSO with NØAX right now.”
• Kyew-ess-ell (QSL): Often means “I agree!”
• Q-Street: QST magazine, “I read that in Q-street.”

Contesting or Radiosport

In the fast-paced world of a contest, knowing the terms helps you get up to speed and feel at home handing out contacts. A full contest glossary is available from Contest University (CTU) at contestuniversity.com/attachments/Contesting_Terminology.pdf. CTU is a full day of training and lectures held at the Dayton Hamvention every year.

• Exchange: Information exchanged during a contest contact.
• Serial (number): Sequence number of the contact in the contest for you. The serial number of your 10th contact is 10.
• Zone: Either CQ zone (www.cqww.com/resources.htm) or IARU zone (www.iaru.org/regions.html), depending on the contest.
• Run: Stay on one frequency and call CQ.
• Search and pounce (S&P): Tune the band looking (searching) for stations calling CQ and calling (pouncing on) them.
• Cabrillo: A standard format for submitting contest logs to the sponsor by email or web upload. See the sponsor’s website for instructions.

Antenna Varieties

You’ll hear all kinds of references to antennas — from Chapter 12 you already know beam, Yagi, dipole, and so forth. Here are a few more:

• Quad: A type of Yagi beam with elements that are square one-wavelength loops.
• J-pole: Half-wavelength VHF/UHF vertical with the base section giving it a “J” shape (they’re easy to build!).
• Rhombic: Diamond-shaped horizontal loop one wavelength or more on a side (called a “leg”).
• Log: Log-periodic antenna that looks like a Yagi but has many elements close together, often slightly V-shaped.
• Doublet: Similar to a dipole but not designed to be a resonant half-wavelength on the operating frequency(s).
• Zepp: Wire antenna fed at one end, refers to the Zeppelin airships that used this kind of “trailing wire” antenna.
• Squalo: Horizontal VHF/UHF loop in the shape of a square.

Feed Lines

There are almost as many terms for feed lines as there are antennas!

• Heliax: Trade name for solid-shield coax with the center insulator made from a strip of plastic wound around the center conductor.
• Foam: Coaxial cable (either flexible or hard-line) with center insulation made of foamed plastic.
• Direct burial: Feed line that can be buried without any protective conduit.
• Ladder line, window line, twin-lead, open-wire line: All used as generic terms for parallel-conductor feed line.
• Balun: Short for “balanced-unbalanced,” allows an unbalanced, coaxial feed line to be connected to a balanced load such as a dipole antenna or parallel-conductor feed line. Baluns may or may not change impedances from one value to another.

Antenna Tuners

Unless you get lucky and your antenna and feed line presents the transmitter with an impedance close to 50 ohms, you’ll need an antenna tuner. Antenna tuners are referred to by several names:

• Impedance Matcher: This is what the antenna tuner actually does. Remember that an antenna tuner doesn’t really tune your antenna, it just changes the impedance presented to your transmitter.
• Matchbox: Originally a model name for an E.F. Johnson antenna tuner.
• Transmatch: Name of a tuner design described in a popular 1960s QST construction article and became a generic term for tuners.
• Balanced tuner: An antenna tuner designed to be connected to parallel-conductor feed line. It usually includes a balun (see previous section) so that coaxial cable can be used between the tuner and the transmitter.
• Auto-tuner: Microprocessor-controlled antenna tuner that makes adjustments automatically. If your web browser can run Java applets, check out the online tuner simulator by W9CF at fermi.la.asu.edu/w9cf/tuner/tuner.html. You can enter impedance values and watch the tuner adjust itself or you can operate it manually.

Repeater Operating

With repeater operation so common, it would be surprising if there wasn’t any jargon! Here are some of the more common terms you’ll hear and there are many regional variations:

• Flutter or mobile flutter: Rapid variations in strength of a mobile station’s signal due to reflections as the vehicle moves.
• Picket-fencing: A flutter that sounds like a stick being dragged along a picket fence.
• Scratchy: Intermittent or low-level static in the audio of a weak signal.
• Machine: Reference to the repeater station. Making the machine or hitting the machine means a signal strong enough to open the repeater’s squelch and activate the transmitter.
• Cans: Resonant cavities that allow the repeater’s receiver and transmitter to share a single antenna. Also referred to as a duplexer, although that’s somewhat technically incorrect.
• Sub-audible or PL: Low-frequency control tones (see Chapter 8).
• Kerchunk: Pressing the PTT switch momentarily without identifying to see if the signal is heard by the repeater.
• Squelch tail: Time during which the repeater is still transmitting after the input signal has ceased.
• Timeout: Transmit long enough to activate the repeater’s shut-down timer, usually about three minutes.

Grid Squares

With the ARRL’s International Grid Chase operating event in 2018, there is a new interest in the VHF/UHF Century Club (VUCC) award. Both require you to know about grid squares. You can find out everything you need to know about grid squares at www.arrl.org/grid-squares and www.vklogger.com/grid_squares_info.php, but here are the common terms:

• Grid circling: Operating while driving around a point at which four grids come together at a corner.
• Water grid: Grid square without any land.
• Maidenhead: Location in England where the grid system was defined, grid squares are part of the Maidenhead Locator System.
• Grid field: 20° (longitude) × 10° (latitude) rectangle identified by just two letters, such as FN, EM, or DM.
• Grid square: 2° (longitude) × 1° (latitude) rectangle identified by two numbers after the grid field designator, such as FN01, EM48, or DM03.
• Grid sub-square or locator: 5’ (longitude) × 0.25’ (latitude) rectangle identified by two letters after the grid field, such as FN01ah, EM48ss, or DM03pt.
• Locator: Any grid reference; field, square, or sub-square.

Interference and Noise

Like drivers and traffic, there are many ways to describe the various disturbances to contacts. Since they often refer to specific problems, knowing the terms can also lead to a solution.

• Hum versus buzz: True hum is a low tone at the frequency of the local AC power grid, 60 Hz in the U.S. It is usually caused by magnetic fields from AC wiring or motors. Buzz has a sharper, higher tone and is caused by power supplies that rectify the AC power to produce DC power. Sometimes hum is used to refer to any power-related noise. Line noise is a type of buzz caused by arcing on the power lines.
• Popcorn or shot noise: Sharp, irregular pops and crackles that sound a bit like popcorn popping or shotgun pellets being spilled onto a surface. Often caused by erratic connections.
• White noise and pink noise: White noise is random noise over a wide range of frequencies. Pink noise is random noise over the audio range. Both sound like hiss to the human ear.
• Buckshot or splatter: Distortion caused by speaking too loudly or over-modulating a transmitter, causing intermittent signals to appear on adjacent channels.
• Ignition noise: Sharp snapping noise that varies with engine speed, caused by the ignition system sparks.
• Alternator whine: Mid- to high-pitched audio tone that varies with engine speed, caused by the vehicle battery charging system.

Connector Parts

There are lots of different types of connectors (see Chapter 15), but many of them have similar parts with similar names:

• Plug and receptacle: Plugs have prongs or pins that extend from the body of the connector. Receptacles have sockets recessed into the body of the connector. Plugs are usually installed on the end of cables whereas receptacles are wall- or panel-mounted.
• Body and shell: The part of the connector that holds the pins and sockets. Some types of connectors have a shell that can be removed.
• Barrel connector: Connector used to join two cables together. Usually refers to RF connector families such as the common UFH-series PL-258 that joins a PL-259 plug with another PL-259.
• Reducer: Type of adapter that lets a small-diameter cable be used with a plug designed for thicker cable.
• Bulkhead connector: Like a barrel connector but long enough to extend through a thick panel or a wall.
• Crimp connector: RF connector installed by crimping or compressing a sleeve or tube over a coaxial cable shield.
• Crimp terminal: Pre-formed contact for a single wire installed by stripping the wire and crimping the contact sleeve over it. Different types of terminals include ring, fork, and spade.
• Tip-ring-sleeve (TRS): The three terminals of a stereo phone plug/jack. Tip is the contact at the very end of the plug. Sleeve refers to the barrel of the plug and ring (if present) is the contact between the tip and sleeve.

Solar and Geomagnetic Activity

Events on the Sun have a great deal to do with HF and lower-VHF radio wave propagation here on Earth. Satellites and telescopes combine to give us a good idea of what’s happening on the Sun that affects radio propagation. For more information, tutorials, and real-time data and images, check out the Spaceweather website (www.spaceweather.com). The following measurements are used to describe spaceweather conditions:

• Solar flux: Light energy coming from the Sun as microwaves, visible light, ultraviolet, and X-rays that create the ionosphere. Measured in solar flux units (SFU) with a minimum value of 65.
• A and K indices: Measures of disturbances of the Earth’s geomagnetic field. Higher values indicate greater disruption and generally poorer propagation.
• Solar flare: Sudden, large release of visible light, UV, and X-rays from the surface of the Sun.
• Coronal Mass Ejection (CME): Release of charged particles from the Sun’s outer layers; it takes about 36 hours to travel from the Sun to the Earth. The charged particles enter the ionosphere above the Earth’s geomagnetic poles and help create the aurora.
• Geomagnetic field: The Earth’s magnetic field, which interacts with both HF radio signals and solar phenomena.