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

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1. - E0A01

What is the primary function of an external earth connection or ground rod?

Select	Answer
A	Reduce received noise
B	Reduce RFI to telephones and home entertainment systems
C	Reduce RF current flow between pieces of equipment
D	Lightning protection

2. - E1A14

Except in some parts of Alaska, what is the maximum power permitted on the 630 meter band?

Select	Answer
A	100 watts PEP
B	5 watts EIRP
C	1 watt EIRP
D	50 watts PEP

3. - E1B08

What limitations may the FCC place on an amateur station if its signal causes interference to domestic broadcast reception, assuming that the receivers involved are of good engineering design?

Select	Answer
A	The amateur station must cease operation on all frequencies above 30 MHz
B	The amateur station must cease operation
C	The amateur station must avoid transmitting during certain hours on frequencies that cause the interference
D	The amateur station must cease operation on all frequencies below 30 MHz

4. - E1C04

What is meant by IARP?

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

5. - E1D06

What is the maximum permitted transmitter output power when operating a model craft by telecommand?

Select	Answer
A	2 watts
B	100 watts
C	1 watt
D	5 watts

6. - E1E12

What must the VE team do with the application form if the examinee does not pass the exam?

Select	Answer
A	Maintain the application form with the VEC's records
B	Return the application document to the examinee
C	Destroy the application form
D	Send the application form to the FCC and inform the FCC of the grade

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. - E2A08

Why should effective radiated power to a satellite that uses a linear transponder be limited?

Select	Answer
A	To avoid reducing the downlink power to all other users
B	To prevent creating errors in the satellite telemetry
C	To prevent the satellite from emitting out-of-band signals
D	To avoid interfering with terrestrial QSOs

9. - E2B05

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

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

10. - E2C07

What is the Cabrillo format?

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

11. - E2D05

What is one advantage of the JT65 mode?

Select	Answer
A	Uses only a 65 Hz bandwidth
B	Permits fast-scan TV transmissions over narrow bandwidth
C	The ability to decode signals which have a very low signal-to-noise ratio
D	Easily copied by ear if necessary

12. - E2E09

Which of the following HF digital modes uses variable-length coding for bandwidth efficiency?

Select	Answer
A	MT63
B	RTTY
C	PACTOR
D	PSK31

13. - E3A10

Which type of atmospheric structure can create a path for microwave propagation?

Select	Answer
A	The jet stream
B	Dust devil
C	Wind shear
D	Temperature inversion

14. - E3B04

What is meant by the terms "extraordinary" and "ordinary" waves?

Select	Answer
A	Independent waves created in the ionosphere that are elliptically polarized
B	Refracted rays and reflected waves
C	Extraordinary waves describe rare long-skip propagation compared to ordinary waves, which travel shorter distances
D	Long-path and short-path waves

15. - E3C06

By how much does the VHF/UHF radio horizon distance exceed the geometric horizon?

Select	Answer
A	By approximately four times the distance
B	By approximately 15 percent of the distance
C	By approximately twice the distance
D	By approximately 50 percent of the distance

16. - E4A07

Which of the following is an advantage of using an antenna analyzer compared to an SWR bridge to measure antenna SWR?

Select	Answer
A	Antenna analyzers do not need an external RF source
B	Antenna analyzers display a time-varying representation of the modulation envelope
C	All these choices are correct
D	Antenna analyzers automatically tune your antenna for resonance

17. - E4B03

Which S parameter is equivalent to forward gain?

Select	Answer
A	S11
B	S21
C	S12
D	S22

18. - E4C08

An SDR receiver is overloaded when input signals exceed what level?

Select	Answer
A	One-half the maximum sample rate
B	The reference voltage of the analog-to-digital converter
C	The maximum count value of the analog-to-digital converter
D	One-half the maximum sampling buffer size

19. - E4D12

What is the term for the reduction in receiver sensitivity caused by a strong signal near the received frequency?

Select	Answer
A	Cross-modulation interference
B	Desensitization
C	Squelch gain rollback
D	Quieting

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 installing filter capacitors in series with the DC power lead and a blocking capacitor in the field lead
C	By connecting the radio's power leads directly to the battery and by installing coaxial capacitors in line with the alternator leads
D	By installing a noise suppression resistor and a blocking capacitor in both leads

21. - E5A05

What is the result of increasing the Q of an impedance-matching circuit?

Select	Answer
A	Matching range is increased
B	Matching bandwidth is increased
C	Matching bandwidth is decreased
D	It has no effect on impedance matching

22. - E5B10

What is the relationship between the AC current through an inductor and the voltage across an inductor?

Select	Answer
A	Current leads voltage by 90 degrees
B	Voltage leads current by 90 degrees
C	Voltage and current are 180 degrees out of phase
D	Voltage and current are in phase

23. - E5C11

Which point in Figure E5-1 best represents the impedance of a series circuit consisting of a 300-ohm resistor and an 18-microhenry inductor at 3.505 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	Point 1
B	Point 7
C	Point 3
D	Point 8

24. - E5D14

What is reactive power?

Select	Answer
A	Power consumed in wire resistance in an inductor
B	Power lost because of capacitor leakage
C	Wattless, nonproductive power
D	Power consumed in circuit Q

25. - E6A05

How does DC input impedance at the gate of a field-effect transistor compare with the DC input impedance of a bipolar transistor?

Select	Answer
A	An FET has higher input impedance
B	An FET has lower input impedance
C	They are both low impedance
D	They are both high impedance

26. - E6B09

What is a common use for point-contact diodes?

Select	Answer
A	As a constant voltage source
B	As a high-voltage rectifier
C	As an RF detector
D	As a constant current source

27. - E6C11

In Figure E6-3, what is the schematic symbol for the NOT operation (inverter)?

Select	Answer
A	2
B	4
C	6
D	5

28. - E6D10

What is a primary advantage of using a toroidal core instead of a solenoidal core in an inductor?

Select	Answer
A	Toroidal cores have lower Q characteristics
B	Toroidal cores exhibit greater hysteresis
C	Toroidal cores confine most of the magnetic field within the core material
D	Toroidal cores make it easier to couple the magnetic energy into other components

29. - E6E03

Which of the following materials is likely to provide the highest frequency of operation when used in MMICs?

Select	Answer
A	Gallium nitride
B	Silicon nitride
C	Silicon dioxide
D	Silicon

30. - E6F04

What is the photovoltaic effect?

Select	Answer
A	The conversion of light to electrical energy
B	The conversion of voltage to current when exposed to light
C	The tendency of a battery to discharge when exposed to light
D	The conversion of electrical energy to mechanical energy

31. - E7A02

What is the function of a decade counter?

Select	Answer
A	It produces 10 output pulses for every input pulse
B	It produces one output pulse for every 10 input pulses
C	It decodes a decimal number for display on a seven-segment LED display
D	It decodes a binary number for display on a seven-segment LED display

32. - E7B10

In Figure E7-1, what is the purpose of R1 and R2?

Select	Answer
A	Self bias
B	Feedback
C	Load resistors
D	Voltage divider bias

33. - E7C02

Which of the following is a property of a T-network with series capacitors and a parallel shunt inductor?

Select	Answer
A	It is a high-pass filter
B	It is a band-pass filter
C	It is a notch filter
D	It is a low-pass filter

34. - E7D08

What type of circuit is shown in Figure E7-2?

Select	Answer
A	Linear voltage regulator
B	Grounded emitter amplifier
C	Switching voltage regulator
D	Monostable multivibrator

35. - E7E09

What occurs when an excessive amount of signal energy reaches a mixer circuit?

Select	Answer
A	Spurious mixer products are generated
B	A beat frequency is generated
C	Mixer blanking occurs
D	Automatic limiting occurs

36. - E7F05

How frequently must an analog signal be sampled by an analog-to-digital converter so that the signal can be accurately reproduced?

Select	Answer
A	At four times the rate of the highest frequency component of the signal
B	At the same rate as the highest frequency component of the signal
C	At least twice the rate of the highest frequency component of the signal
D	At least half the rate of the highest frequency component of the signal

37. - E7G05

How can unwanted ringing and audio instability be prevented in an op-amp RC audio filter circuit?

Select	Answer
A	Restrict Q but increase gain
B	Restrict both gain and Q
C	Increase both gain and Q
D	Restrict gain but increase Q

38. - E7H02

What is a microphonic?

Select	Answer
A	Distortion caused by RF pickup on the microphone cable
B	Excess loading of the microphone by an oscillator
C	An IC used for amplifying microphone signals
D	Changes in oscillator frequency due to mechanical vibration

39. - E8A11

Which of the following is a measure of the quality of an analog-to-digital converter?

Select	Answer
A	Peak envelope power
B	Reciprocal mixing
C	Power factor
D	Total harmonic distortion

40. - E8B09

What is deviation ratio?

Select	Answer
A	The ratio of the carrier center frequency to the audio modulating frequency
B	The ratio of the highest audio modulating frequency to the average audio modulating frequency
C	The ratio of the maximum carrier frequency deviation to the highest audio modulating frequency
D	The ratio of the audio modulating frequency to the center carrier frequency

41. - E8C11

What is the relationship between symbol rate and baud?

Select	Answer
A	Baud is twice the symbol rate
B	Baud is only used for RTTY
C	Symbol rate is only used for packet-based modes
D	They are the same

42. - E8D11

What is one advantage of using ASCII code for data communications?

Select	Answer
A	It is possible to transmit both upper and lower case text
B	It uses one character as a shift code to send numeric and special characters
C	It contains fewer information bits per character than any other code
D	It includes built-in error correction features

43. - E9A01

What is an isotropic antenna?

Select	Answer
A	A spacecraft antenna used to direct signals toward Earth
B	A theoretical, omnidirectional antenna used as a reference for antenna gain
C	A grounded antenna used to measure Earth conductivity
D	A horizontally polarized antenna used to compare Yagi antennas

44. - E9B02

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

Select	Answer
A	18 dB
B	36 dB
C	14 dB
D	24 dB

45. - E9C09

Which of the following describes a G5RV antenna?

Select	Answer
A	A multi-band dipole antenna fed with coax and a balun through a selected length of open wire transmission line
B	A multi-band trap antenna
C	A wide band dipole using shorted coaxial cable for the radiating elements and fed with a�4:1 balun
D	A phased array antenna consisting of multiple loops

46. - E9D03

Where should a high Q loading coil be placed to minimize losses in a shortened vertical antenna?

Select	Answer
A	As close to the transmitter as possible
B	At a voltage node
C	Near the center of the vertical radiator
D	As low as possible on the vertical radiator

47. - E9E11

What is the primary purpose of phasing lines when used with an antenna having multiple driven elements?

Select	Answer
A	It ensures that each driven element operates in concert with the others to create the desired antenna pattern
B	It allows single-band antennas to operate on other bands
C	It prevents reflected power from traveling back down the feed line and causing harmonic radiation from the transmitter
D	It creates a low-angle radiation pattern

48. - E9F10

What impedance does a 1/8-wavelength transmission line present to a generator when the line is shorted at the far end?

Select	Answer
A	A capacitive reactance
B	Zero
C	An inductive reactance
D	The same as the characteristic impedance of the line

49. - E9G01

Which of the following can be calculated using a Smith chart?

Select	Answer
A	Impedance along transmission lines
B	Antenna radiation pattern
C	Radiation resistance
D	Radio propagation

50. - E9H04

What is an advantage of placing a grounded electrostatic shield around a small loop direction-finding antenna?

Select	Answer
A	It adds capacitive loading, increasing the bandwidth of the antenna
B	It increases signal strength by providing a better match to the feed line
C	It eliminates unbalanced capacitive coupling to the surroundings, improving the nulls
D	It eliminates tracking errors caused by strong out-of-band signals

Figure E5-1

Figure E6-3

Figure E7-1

Figure E7-2

Figure E9-1