US Amateur Radio - Amateur Extra (Element 4, 2020-2024) Practice Test

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1. - E0A08

What does SAR measure?

Select	Answer
A	Synthetic Aperture Ratio of the human body
B	The rate at which RF energy is absorbed by the body
C	The rate of RF energy reflected from stationary terrain
D	Signal Amplification Rating

2. - E1A04

With your transceiver displaying the carrier frequency of phone signals, you hear a DX station calling CQ on 3.601 MHz LSB. Is it legal to return the call using lower sideband on the same frequency?

Select	Answer
A	Yes, because the DX station initiated the contact
B	Yes, because the displayed frequency is within the 75 meter phone band segment
C	No, U.S. stations are not permitted to use phone emissions below 3.610 MHz
D	No, the sideband will extend beyond the edge of the phone band segment

3. - E1B03

Within what distance must an amateur station protect an FCC monitoring facility from harmful interference?

Select	Answer
A	1 mile
B	10 miles
C	3 miles
D	30 miles

4. - E1C04

What is meant by IARP?

Select	Answer
A	A forecast of intermittent aurora radio propagation
B	The internal amateur radio practices policy of the FCC
C	An indication of increased antenna reflected power
D	An international amateur radio permit that allows U.S. amateurs to operate in certain countries of the Americas

5. - E1D01

What is the definition of telemetry?

Select	Answer
A	One-way transmission of measurements at a distance from the measuring instrument
B	One-way transmission that initiates, modifies, or terminates the functions of a device at a distance
C	Two-way transmissions of data
D	Two-way transmissions in excess of 1000 feet

6. - E1E07

What should a VE do if a candidate fails to comply with the examiner's instructions during an amateur operator license examination?

Select	Answer
A	Allow the candidate to complete the examination, but invalidate the results
B	Immediately terminate the candidate's examination
C	Warn the candidate that continued failure to comply will result in termination of the examination
D	Immediately terminate everyone's examination and close the session

7. - E1F06

Under what circumstances might the FCC issue a Special Temporary Authority (STA) to an amateur station?

Select	Answer
A	To provide temporary operation while awaiting normal licensing
B	To provide for experimental amateur communications
C	To allow regular operation on Land Mobile channels
D	To provide additional spectrum for personal use

8. - E2A13

Which of the following techniques is normally used by low Earth orbiting digital satellites to relay messages around the world?

Select	Answer
A	Multi-satellite relaying
B	Node hopping
C	Digipeating
D	Store-and-forward

9. - E2B05

Which of the following describes the use of vestigial sideband in analog fast-scan TV transmissions?

Select	Answer
A	The vestigial sideband carries the audio information
B	Vestigial sideband reduces bandwidth while allowing for simple video detector circuitry
C	The vestigial sideband contains chroma information
D	Vestigial sideband provides high frequency emphasis to sharpen the picture

10. - E2C07

What is the Cabrillo format?

Select	Answer
A	A standard for submission of electronic contest logs
B	The rules of order for meetings between contest sponsors
C	A method of exchanging information during a contest QSO
D	The most common set of contest rules

11. - E2D04

What technology is used to track, in real time, balloons carrying amateur radio transmitters?

Select	Answer
A	APRS
B	Bandwidth compressed LORAN
C	Doppler shift of beacon signals
D	Ultrasonics

12. - E2E04

What is indicated when one of the ellipses in an FSK crossed-ellipse display suddenly disappears?

Select	Answer
A	The mark and space signal have been inverted
B	Selective fading has occurred
C	One of the signal filters is saturated
D	The receiver has drifted 5 kHz from the desired receive frequency

13. - E3A08

When a meteor strikes the Earth's atmosphere, a cylindrical region of free electrons is formed at what layer of the ionosphere?

Select	Answer
A	The F2 layer
B	The F1 layer
C	The D layer
D	The E layer

14. - E3B12

What is the primary characteristic of chordal hop propagation?

Select	Answer
A	Signals reflected back toward the transmitting station
B	Successive ionospheric refractions without an intermediate reflection from the ground
C	Propagation across the geomagnetic equator
D	Propagation away from the great circle bearing between stations

15. - E3C12

How does the maximum range of ground-wave propagation change when the signal frequency is increased?

Select	Answer
A	It increases
B	It decreases
C	It peaks at roughly 14 MHz
D	It stays the same

16. - E4A06

What is the effect of aliasing on a digital oscilloscope caused by setting the time base too slow?

Select	Answer
A	Excessive blanking occurs, which prevents display of the signal
B	All signals will have a DC offset
C	A false, jittery low-frequency version of the signal is displayed
D	Calibration of the vertical scale is no longer valid

17. - E4B08

Which of the following can be used to measure the Q of a series-tuned circuit?

Select	Answer
A	The bandwidth of the circuit's frequency response
B	The resonant frequency of the circuit
C	The inductance to capacitance ratio
D	The frequency shift

18. - E4C11

Why can an attenuator be used to reduce receiver overload on the lower frequency HF bands with little or no impact on signal-to-noise ratio?

Select	Answer
A	Signals are attenuated separately from the noise
B	Atmospheric noise is generally greater than internally generated noise even after attenuation
C	The attenuator has a low-pass filter to increase the strength of lower frequency signals
D	The attenuator has a noise filter to suppress interference

19. - E4D08

What causes intermodulation in an electronic circuit?

Select	Answer
A	Positive feedback
B	Nonlinear circuits or devices
C	Too little gain
D	Lack of neutralization

20. - E4E04

How can conducted and radiated noise caused by an automobile alternator be suppressed?

Select	Answer
A	By installing a high-pass filter in series with the radio's power lead and a low-pass filter in parallel with the field lead
B	By connecting the radio's power leads directly to the battery and by installing coaxial capacitors in line with the alternator leads
C	By installing a noise suppression resistor and a blocking capacitor in both leads
D	By installing filter capacitors in series with the DC power lead and a blocking capacitor in the field lead

21. - E5A13

What is an effect of increasing Q in a series resonant circuit?

Select	Answer
A	Parasitic effects are minimized
B	Fewer components are needed for the same performance
C	Internal voltages increase
D	Phase shift can become uncontrolled

22. - E5B12

What is admittance?

Select	Answer
A	The turns ratio of a transformer
B	The inverse of Q factor
C	The inverse of impedance
D	The term for the gain of a field effect transistor

23. - E5C02

How are impedances described in polar coordinates?

Select	Answer
A	By real and imaginary parts
B	By phase angle and magnitude
C	By Y and G values
D	By X and R values

24. - E5D12

How many watts are consumed in a circuit having a power factor of 0.2 if the input is 100 VAC at 4 amperes?

Select	Answer
A	80 watts
B	400 watts
C	50 watts
D	2000 watts

25. - E6A10

In Figure E6-1, what is the schematic symbol for an N-channel dual-gate MOSFET?

Select	Answer
A	5
B	6
C	4
D	2

26. - E6B05

What characteristic of a PIN diode makes it useful as an RF switch?

Select	Answer
A	Extremely high reverse breakdown voltage
B	Ability to dissipate large amounts of power
C	Reverse bias controls its forward voltage drop
D	Low junction capacitance

27. - E6C09

What is a Programmable Logic Device (PLD)?

Select	Answer
A	Programmable equipment used for testing digital logic integrated circuits
B	A logic circuit that can be modified during use
C	A programmable collection of logic gates and circuits in a single integrated circuit
D	A type of transistor whose gain can be changed by digital logic circuits

28. - E6D06

What core material property determines the inductance of an inductor?

Select	Answer
A	Reactivity
B	Thermal impedance
C	Permeability
D	Resistance

29. - E6E10

What advantage does surface-mount technology offer at RF compared to using through-hole components?

Select	Answer
A	Components have less parasitic inductance and capacitance
B	Shorter circuit-board traces
C	All these choices are correct
D	Smaller circuit area

30. - E6F09

What is the efficiency of a photovoltaic cell?

Select	Answer
A	The relative fraction of light that is converted to current
B	The open-circuit voltage divided by the short-circuit current under full illumination
C	The output RF power divided by the input DC power
D	Cost per kilowatt-hour generated

31. - E7A04

How many flip-flops are required to divide a signal frequency by 4?

Select	Answer
A	8
B	4
C	1
D	2

32. - E7B09

Which of the following describes how the loading and tuning capacitors are to be adjusted when tuning a vacuum tube RF power amplifier that employs a Pi-network output circuit?

Select	Answer
A	The loading capacitor is set to maximum capacitance and the tuning capacitor is adjusted for minimum allowable plate current
B	The loading capacitor is adjusted to minimum plate current while alternately adjusting the tuning capacitor for maximum allowable plate current
C	The tuning capacitor is set to maximum capacitance and the loading capacitor is adjusted for minimum plate permissible current
D	The tuning capacitor is adjusted for minimum plate current, and the loading capacitor is adjusted for maximum permissible plate current

33. - E7C10

Which of the following filters would be the best choice for use in a 2 meter band repeater duplexer?

Select	Answer
A	A crystal filter
B	An L-C filter
C	A DSP filter
D	A cavity filter

34. - E7D12

What is the dropout voltage of an analog voltage regulator?

Select	Answer
A	Minimum input-to-output voltage required to maintain regulation
B	Maximum output voltage drops when the input voltage is varied over its specified range
C	Minimum input voltage for rated power dissipation
D	Maximum that the output voltage may decrease at rated load

35. - E7E04

What is one way a single-sideband phone signal can be generated?

Select	Answer
A	By using a loop modulator followed by a mixer
B	By using a reactance modulator followed by a mixer
C	By driving a product detector with a DSB signal
D	By using a balanced modulator followed by a filter

36. - E7F12

Which of the following is an advantage of a Finite Impulse Response (FIR) filter vs an Infinite Impulse Response (IIR) digital filter?

Select	Answer
A	FIR filters can delay all frequency components of the signal by the same amount
B	FIR filters are easier to implement for a given set of passband rolloff requirements
C	All these choices are correct
D	FIR filters can respond faster to impulses

37. - E7G10

What absolute voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E7-3 when R1 is 1800 ohms and RF is 68 kilohms?

Select	Answer
A	38
B	0.03
C	1
D	76

38. - E7H01

What are three oscillator circuits used in amateur radio equipment?

Select	Answer
A	Colpitts, Hartley and Pierce
B	Taft, Hartley and Pierce
C	Taft, Pierce and negative feedback
D	Pierce, Fenner and Beane

39. - E8A10

What is the purpose of a low-pass filter used in conjunction with a digital-to-analog converter?

Select	Answer
A	Remove harmonics from the output caused by the discrete analog levels generated
B	Improve accuracy by removing out-of-sequence codes from the input
C	All these choices are correct
D	Lower the input bandwidth to increase the effective resolution

40. - E8B01

What is the modulation index of an FM signal?

Select	Answer
A	The ratio of modulating signal amplitude to frequency deviation
B	The type of modulation used by the transmitter
C	The bandwidth of the transmitted signal divided by the modulating signal frequency
D	The ratio of frequency deviation to modulating signal frequency

41. - E8C06

What is the bandwidth of a 170-hertz shift, 300-baud ASCII transmission?

Select	Answer
A	0.5 kHz
B	0.1 Hz
C	1.0 kHz
D	0.3 kHz

42. - E8D06

What is the advantage of including parity bits in ASCII characters?

Select	Answer
A	The signal can overpower interfering signals
B	Some types of errors can be detected
C	Faster transmission rate
D	Foreign language characters can be sent

43. - E9A10

Which of the following improves the efficiency of a ground-mounted quarter-wave vertical antenna?

Select	Answer
A	Installing a radial system
B	All these choices are correct
C	Isolating the coax shield from ground
D	Shortening the radiating element

44. - E9B04

What is the front-to-back ratio of the radiation pattern shown in Figure E92?

Select	Answer
A	28 dB
B	3 dB
C	15 dB
D	38 dB

45. - E9C12

Which of the following describes an Extended Double Zepp antenna?

Select	Answer
A	An end-fed folded dipole antenna
B	A wideband vertical antenna constructed from precisely tapered aluminum tubing
C	A center-fed 1.25-wavelength antenna (two 5/8-wave elements in phase)
D	A portable antenna erected using two push support poles

46. - E9D12

Which of the following would provide the best RF ground for your station?

Select	Answer
A	An electrically short connection to 3 or 4 interconnected ground rods driven into the Earth
B	An electrically short connection to a metal water pipe
C	A 50-ohm resistor connected to ground
D	An electrically short connection to 3 or 4 interconnected ground rods via a series RF choke

47. - E9E06

Which of these feed line impedances would be suitable for constructing a quarter-wave Q-section for matching a 100-ohm loop to 50-ohm feed line?

Select	Answer
A	450 ohms
B	75 ohms
C	62 ohms
D	50 ohms

48. - E9F02

Which of the following has the biggest effect on the velocity factor of a transmission line?

Select	Answer
A	The termination impedance
B	The line length
C	The center conductor resistivity
D	Dielectric materials used in the line

49. - E9G06

On the Smith chart shown in Figure E9-3, what is the name for the large outer circle on which the reactance arcs terminate?

Select	Answer
A	Prime axis
B	Reactance axis
C	Impedance axis
D	Polar axis

50. - E9H03

What is Receiving Directivity Factor (RDF)?

Select	Answer
A	Forward gain compared to average gain over the entire hemisphere
B	Relative directivity compared to a dipole
C	Relative directivity compared to isotropic
D	Forward gain compared to the gain in the reverse direction

Figure E6-1

Figure E7-3

Figure E9-3