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

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1. - E0A05

What is one of the potential hazards of operating in the amateur radio microwave bands?

Select	Answer
A	Microwaves often travel long distances by ionospheric reflection
B	Microwaves are ionizing radiation
C	The extremely high frequency energy can damage the joints of antenna structures
D	The high gain antennas commonly used can result in high exposure levels

2. - E1A08

If a station in a message forwarding system inadvertently forwards a message that is in violation of FCC rules, who is primarily accountable for the rules violation?

Select	Answer
A	The control operator of the packet bulletin board station
B	The control operator of the originating station
C	The control operators of all the stations in the system
D	The control operators of all the stations in the system not authenticating the source from which they accept communications

3. - E1B07

To what type of regulations does PRB-1 apply?

Select	Answer
A	Use of wireless devices in vehicles
B	Homeowners associations
C	State and local zoning
D	FAA tower height limits

4. - E1C12

On what portion of the 630 meter band are phone emissions permitted?

Select	Answer
A	Only the top 3 kHz
B	None
C	The entire band
D	Only the bottom 3 kHz

5. - E1D07

Which HF amateur bands have frequencies authorized for space stations?

Select	Answer
A	Only the 40, 20, 17, 15, 12, and 10 meter bands
B	Only the 40, 30, 20, 15, 12, and 10 meter bands
C	All HF bands
D	Only the 40, 20, 17, 15, and 10 meter bands

6. - E1E10

What must the administering VEs do after the administration of a successful examination for an amateur operator license?

Select	Answer
A	They must collect and send the documents to the NCVEC for grading
B	They must collect and submit the documents to the coordinating VEC for grading
C	They must collect and send the documents to the FCC according to instructions
D	They must submit the application document to the coordinating VEC according to the coordinating VEC instructions

7. - E1F06

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

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

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

9. - E2B12

What signals SSTV receiving software to begin a new picture line?

Select	Answer
A	Specific tone frequencies
B	Elapsed time
C	A two-tone signal
D	Specific tone amplitudes

10. - E2C01

What indicator is required to be used by U.S.-licensed operators when operating a station via remote control and the remote transmitter is located in the U.S.?

Select	Answer
A	/R# where # is the district of the remote station
B	/ followed by the ARRL Section of the remote station
C	No additional indicator is required
D	/ followed by the USPS two-letter abbreviation for the state in which the remote station is located

11. - E2D02

Which of the following is a good technique for making meteor scatter contacts?

Select	Answer
A	15-second timed transmission sequences with stations alternating based on location
B	Use of special digital modes
C	Short transmissions with rapidly repeated call signs and signal reports
D	All these choices are correct

12. - E2E01

Which of the following types of modulation is common for data emissions below 30 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	Spread spectrum
B	Pulse modulation
C	DTMF tones modulating an FM signal
D	FSK

13. - E3A02

What characterizes libration fading of an EME signal?

Select	Answer
A	The returning echo is several hertz lower in frequency than the transmitted signal
B	A fluttery irregular fading
C	A gradual loss of signal as the sun rises
D	A slow change in the pitch of the CW signal

14. - E3B06

Which of the following amateur bands most frequently provides long-path propagation?

Select	Answer
A	20 meters
B	6 meters
C	10 meters
D	80 meters

15. - E3C14

Why does the radio-path horizon distance exceed the geometric horizon?

Select	Answer
A	E-region skip
B	D-region skip
C	Downward bending due to density variations in the atmosphere
D	Due to the Doppler effect

16. - E4A01

Which of the following limits the highest frequency signal that can be accurately displayed on a digital oscilloscope?

Select	Answer
A	Sampling rate of the analog-to-digital converter
B	All these choices are correct
C	Q of the circuit
D	Amount of memory

17. - E4B10

Which of the following methods measures intermodulation distortion in an SSB transmitter?

Select	Answer
A	Modulate the transmitter using two AF signals having harmonically related frequencies and observe the RF output with a peak reading wattmeter
B	Modulate the transmitter using two AF signals having non-harmonically related frequencies and observe the RF output with a spectrum analyzer
C	Modulate the transmitter using two RF signals having non-harmonically related frequencies and observe the RF output with a spectrum analyzer
D	Modulate the transmitter using two RF signals having harmonically related frequencies and observe the RF output with a logic analyzer

18. - E4C02

Which of the following receiver circuits can be effective in eliminating interference from strong out-of-band signals?

Select	Answer
A	A properly adjusted product detector
B	A narrow IF filter
C	A notch filter
D	A front-end filter or pre-selector

19. - E4D02

Which of the following describes problems caused by poor dynamic range in a receiver?

Select	Answer
A	Cross-modulation of the desired signal and insufficient audio power to operate the speaker
B	Oscillator instability requiring frequent retuning and loss of ability to recover the opposite sideband
C	Spurious signals caused by cross-modulation and desensitization from strong adjacent signals
D	Oscillator instability and severe audio distortion of all but the strongest received signals

20. - E4E06

What is one type of electrical interference that might be caused by a nearby personal computer?

Select	Answer
A	A whining type noise that continually pulses off and on
B	A clicking noise at intervals of a few seconds
C	A loud AC hum in the audio output of your station receiver
D	The appearance of unstable modulated or unmodulated signals at specific frequencies

21. - E5A03

What is the magnitude of the impedance of a series RLC circuit at resonance?

Select	Answer
A	Approximately equal to circuit resistance
B	Approximately equal to inductive reactance
C	High, as compared to the circuit resistance
D	Approximately equal to capacitive reactance

22. - E5B05

What happens to the magnitude of a pure reactance when it is converted to a susceptance?

Select	Answer
A	It is unchanged
B	It becomes the reciprocal
C	It is shifted by 90 degrees
D	The sign is reversed

23. - E5C07

Where is the impedance of a pure resistance plotted on rectangular coordinates?

Select	Answer
A	On the horizontal axis
B	On a horizontal line, offset vertically above the horizontal axis
C	On a line through the origin, slanted at 45 degrees
D	On the vertical axis

24. - E5D02

Why is it important to keep lead lengths short for components used in circuits for VHF and above?

Select	Answer
A	All these choices are correct
B	To increase the thermal time constant
C	To maintain component lifetime
D	To avoid unwanted inductive reactance

25. - E6A08

What term indicates the frequency at which the grounded-base current gain of a transistor has decreased to 0.7 of the gain obtainable at 1 kHz?

Select	Answer
A	Alpha cutoff frequency
B	Beta cutoff frequency
C	Alpha rejection frequency
D	Corner frequency

26. - E6B03

What type of bias is required for an LED to emit light?

Select	Answer
A	Zero bias
B	Forward bias
C	Reverse bias
D	Inductive bias

27. - E6C06

Why do CMOS digital integrated circuits have high immunity to noise on the input signal or power supply?

Select	Answer
A	Bandwidth is very limited
B	Large bypass capacitance is inherent
C	The input switching threshold is about two times the power supply voltage
D	The input switching threshold is about one-half the power supply voltage

28. - E6D11

Which type of core material decreases inductance when inserted into a coil?

Select	Answer
A	Powdered iron
B	Brass
C	Ferrite
D	Ceramic

29. - E6E09

Which of the following component package types would be most suitable for use at frequencies above the HF range?

Select	Answer
A	Axial lead
B	Surface mount
C	TO-220
D	Radial lead

30. - E6F03

What is the most common configuration of an optoisolator or optocoupler?

Select	Answer
A	A lens and a photomultiplier
B	A frequency modulated helium-neon laser
C	An amplitude modulated helium-neon laser
D	An LED and a phototransistor

31. - E7A01

Which circuit is bistable?

Select	Answer
A	An AND gate
B	A bipolar amplifier
C	A flip-flop
D	An OR gate

32. - E7B02

What is a Class D amplifier?

Select	Answer
A	An amplifier that uses drift-mode FETs for high efficiency
B	A frequency doubling amplifier
C	A low power amplifier that uses a differential amplifier for improved linearity
D	A type of amplifier that uses switching technology to achieve high efficiency

33. - E7C09

What is a crystal lattice filter?

Select	Answer
A	A filter using lattice-shaped quartz crystals for high-Q performance
B	A power supply filter made with interlaced quartz crystals
C	A filter with narrow bandwidth and steep skirts made using quartz crystals
D	An audio filter made with four quartz crystals that resonate at 1 kHz intervals

34. - E7D02

What is a characteristic of a switching electronic voltage regulator?

Select	Answer
A	It gives a ramp voltage at its output
B	The resistance of a control element is varied in direct proportion to the line voltage or load current
C	The controlled device's duty cycle is changed to produce a constant average output voltage
D	It is generally less efficient than a linear regulator

35. - E7E11

Which type of detector circuit is used for demodulating SSB signals?

Select	Answer
A	Phase detector
B	Phase comparator
C	Discriminator
D	Product detector

36. - E7F11

What sets the minimum detectable signal level for a direct-sampling SDR receiver in the absence of atmospheric or thermal noise?

Select	Answer
A	Reference voltage level and sample width in bits
B	Data storage transfer rate
C	Sample clock phase noise
D	Missing codes and jitter

37. - E7G11

What absolute voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E7-3 when R1 is 3300 ohms and RF is 47 kilohms?

Select	Answer
A	0.07
B	28
C	14
D	7

38. - E7H04

How is positive feedback supplied in a Colpitts oscillator?

Select	Answer
A	Through link coupling
B	Through a neutralizing capacitor
C	Through a tapped coil
D	Through a capacitive divider

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. - E8B11

What is digital time division multiplexing?

Select	Answer
A	Two or more data streams share the same channel by transmitting time of transmission as the sub-carrier
B	Two or more signals are quadrature modulated to increase bandwidth efficiency
C	Two or more data streams are assigned to discrete sub-carriers on an FM transmitter
D	Two or more signals are arranged to share discrete time slots of a data transmission

41. - E8C04

What technique minimizes the bandwidth of a PSK31 signal?

Select	Answer
A	Reed-Solomon character encoding
B	Zero-sum character encoding
C	Use of trapezoidal data pulses
D	Use of sinusoidal data pulses

42. - E8D01

Why are received spread spectrum signals resistant to interference?

Select	Answer
A	Signals not using the spread spectrum algorithm are suppressed in the receiver
B	The receiver is always equipped with a digital blanker
C	If interference is detected by the receiver it will signal the transmitter to change frequencies
D	The high power used by a spread spectrum transmitter keeps its signal from being easily overpowered

43. - E9A09

What is antenna efficiency?

Select	Answer
A	Radiation resistance divided by total resistance
B	Radiation resistance divided by transmission resistance
C	Total resistance divided by radiation resistance
D	Effective radiated power divided by transmitter output

44. - E9B03

In the antenna radiation pattern shown in Figure E9-1, what is the front-to-side ratio?

Select	Answer
A	12 dB
B	14 dB
C	24 dB
D	18 dB

45. - E9C12

Which of the following describes an Extended Double Zepp antenna?

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

46. - E9D12

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

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

47. - E9E01

What system matches a higher-impedance transmission line to a lower-impedance antenna by connecting the line to the driven element in two places spaced a fraction of a wavelength each side of element center?

Select	Answer
A	The gamma matching system
B	The delta matching system
C	The stub matching system
D	The omega matching system

48. - E9F07

How does ladder line compare to small-diameter coaxial cable such as RG-58 at 50 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	Lower velocity factor
B	Higher SWR
C	Lower loss
D	Smaller reflection coefficient

49. - E9G10

What do the arcs on a Smith chart represent?

Select	Answer
A	SWR
B	Points with constant resistance
C	Frequency
D	Points with constant reactance

50. - E9H07

Why is RF attenuation used when direction-finding?

Select	Answer
A	To narrow the receiver bandwidth
B	To compensate for isotropic directivity and the antenna effect of feed lines
C	To increase receiver sensitivity
D	To prevent receiver overload which reduces pattern nulls

Figure E7-3

Figure E9-1