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

Logging in (or registering) will help the system to select questions that you need to focus on.

1. - E0A10

What toxic material may be present in some electronic components such as high voltage capacitors and transformers?

Select	Answer
A	Polyethylene
B	Polychlorinated biphenyls
C	Polytetrafluoroethylene
D	Polymorphic silicon

2. - E1A05

What is the maximum power output permitted on the 60 meter band?

Select	Answer
A	50 watts PEP effective radiated power relative to an isotropic radiator
B	50 watts PEP effective radiated power relative to a dipole
C	100 watts PEP effective radiated power relative to an isotropic radiator
D	100 watts PEP effective radiated power relative to the gain of a half-wave dipole

3. - E1B02

Which of the following is an acceptable bandwidth for Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM) based voice or SSTV digital transmissions made on the HF amateur bands?

Select	Answer
A	10 kHz
B	15 kHz
C	3 kHz
D	20 kHz

4. - E1C14

How long must an operator wait after filing a notification with the Utilities Technology Council (UTC) before operating on the 2200 meter or 630 meter band?

Select	Answer
A	Operators may not operate until a test signal has been transmitted in coordination with the local power company
B	Operators must not operate until approval is received
C	Operators may operate after 30 days, providing they have not been told that their station is within 1 km of PLC systems using those frequencies
D	Operations may commence immediately, and may continue unless interference is reported by the UTC

5. - E1D10

Which amateur stations are eligible to be telecommand stations of space stations (subject to the privileges of the class of operator license held by the control operator of the station)?

Select	Answer
A	Any amateur station so designated by the space station licensee
B	Any amateur station so designated by the ITU
C	All these choices are correct
D	Any amateur station designated by NASA

6. - E1E04

Which of the following best describes the Volunteer Examiner accreditation process?

Select	Answer
A	The amateur operator applying must pass a VE examination administered by the FCC Enforcement Bureau
B	Each General, Advanced and Amateur Extra Class operator is automatically accredited as a VE when the license is granted
C	The prospective VE obtains accreditation from the FCC
D	The procedure by which a VEC confirms that the VE applicant meets FCC requirements to serve as an examiner

7. - E1F05

Amateur stations may not transmit in which of the following frequency segments if they are located in the contiguous 48 states and north of Line A?

Select	Answer
A	222 MHz - 223 MHz
B	440 MHz - 450 MHz
C	420 MHz - 430 MHz
D	53 MHz - 54 MHz

8. - E2A02

Which of the following occurs when a satellite is using an inverting linear transponder?

Select	Answer
A	Upper sideband on the uplink becomes lower sideband on the downlink, and vice versa
B	Doppler shift is reduced because the uplink and downlink shifts are in opposite directions
C	All these choices are correct
D	Signal position in the band is reversed

9. - E2B02

How many horizontal lines make up a fast-scan (NTSC) television frame?

Select	Answer
A	525
B	30
C	60
D	1080

10. - E2C09

What type of equipment is commonly used to implement an amateur radio mesh network?

Select	Answer
A	A wireless router running custom firmware
B	An optical cable connection between the USB ports of 2 separate computers
C	A 440 MHz transceiver with a 9600 baud modem
D	A 2 meter VHF transceiver with a 1200 baud modem

11. - E2D03

Which of the following digital modes is especially useful for EME communications?

Select	Answer
A	MSK144
B	Olivia
C	JT65
D	PACTOR III

12. - E2E01

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

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

13. - E3A12

What is the cause of auroral activity?

Select	Answer
A	The interaction in the F2 layer between the solar wind and the Van Allen belt
B	The interaction in the E layer of charged particles from the Sun with the Earth's magnetic field
C	Meteor showers concentrated in the extreme northern and southern latitudes
D	An extreme low-pressure area in the polar regions

14. - E3B07

What happens to linearly polarized radio waves that split into ordinary and extraordinary waves in the ionosphere?

Select	Answer
A	They become depolarized
B	They become phase locked
C	They become elliptically polarized
D	They are bent toward the magnetic poles

15. - E3C11

What does VOACAP software model?

Select	Answer
A	AC voltage and impedance
B	AC current and impedance
C	VHF radio propagation
D	HF propagation

16. - E4A10

Which of the following displays multiple digital signal states simultaneously?

Select	Answer
A	Network analyzer
B	Bit error rate tester
C	Logic analyzer
D	Modulation monitor

17. - E4B08

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

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

18. - E4C08

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

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

19. - E4D01

What is meant by the blocking dynamic range of a receiver?

Select	Answer
A	The minimum difference in dB between two signals which produce third-order intermodulation products greater than the noise floor
B	The difference in dB between the noise floor and the third-order intercept point
C	The minimum difference in dB between the levels of two FM signals that will cause one signal to block the other
D	The difference in dB between the noise floor and the level of an incoming signal that will cause 1 dB of gain compression

20. - E4E08

What current flows equally on all conductors of an unshielded multi-conductor cable?

Select	Answer
A	Reactive current only
B	Differential-mode current
C	Return current
D	Common-mode current

21. - E5A10

How is the Q of an RLC series resonant circuit calculated?

Select	Answer
A	Reactance of the inductance multiplied by the reactance of the capacitance
B	Reactance of either the inductance or capacitance multiplied by the resistance
C	Reactance of either the inductance or capacitance divided by the resistance
D	Resistance divided by the reactance of either the inductance or capacitance

22. - E5B09

What is the relationship between the AC current through a capacitor and the voltage across a capacitor?

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

23. - E5C08

What coordinate system is often used to display the phase angle of a circuit containing resistance, inductive and/or capacitive reactance?

Select	Answer
A	Elliptical coordinates
B	Maidenhead grid
C	Faraday grid
D	Polar coordinates

24. - E5D05

What is the power factor of an RL circuit having a 30-degree phase angle between the voltage and the current?

Select	Answer
A	0.866
B	1.73
C	0.577
D	0.5

25. - E6A12

Why do many MOSFET devices have internally connected Zener diodes on the gates?

Select	Answer
A	To protect the substrate from excessive voltages
B	To reduce the chance of static damage to the gate
C	To keep the gate voltage within specifications and prevent the device from overheating
D	To provide a voltage reference for the correct amount of reverse-bias gate voltage

26. - E6B06

Which of the following is a common use of a Schottky diode?

Select	Answer
A	As a constant voltage reference in a power supply
B	As a rectifier in high current power supplies
C	As a variable capacitance in an automatic frequency control circuit
D	As a VHF/UHF mixer or detector

27. - E6C07

What best describes a pull-up or pull-down resistor?

Select	Answer
A	A resistor connected to the positive or negative supply line used to establish a voltage when an input or output is an open circuit
B	A resistor in a keying circuit used to reduce key clicks
C	A resistor connected to an op-amp output that prevents signals from exceeding the power supply voltage
D	A resistor that ensures that an oscillator frequency does not drift

28. - E6D05

What is one reason for using ferrite cores rather than powdered iron in an inductor?

Select	Answer
A	Ferrite toroids generally have lower initial permeability
B	Ferrite toroids generally have better temperature stability
C	Ferrite toroids generally require fewer turns to produce a given inductance value
D	Ferrite toroids are easier to use with surface mount technology

29. - E6E09

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

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

30. - E6F10

What is the most common type of photovoltaic cell used for electrical power generation?

Select	Answer
A	Copper oxide
B	Selenium
C	Cadmium Sulfide
D	Silicon

31. - E7A06

What is a characteristic of a monostable multivibrator?

Select	Answer
A	It produces a continuous square wave oscillating between 1 and 0
B	It stores one bit of data in either a 0 or 1 state
C	It maintains a constant output voltage, regardless of variations in the input voltage
D	It switches momentarily to the opposite binary state and then returns to its original state after a set time

32. - E7B15

What is one way to prevent thermal runaway in a bipolar transistor amplifier?

Select	Answer
A	Neutralization
B	Use a resistor in series with the emitter
C	All these choices are correct
D	Select transistors with high beta

33. - E7C11

Which of the following describes a receiving filter's ability to reject signals occupying an adjacent channel?

Select	Answer
A	Noise factor
B	Phase response
C	Passband ripple
D	Shape factor

34. - E7D09

What is the main reason to use a charge controller with a solar power system?

Select	Answer
A	Control of electrolyte levels during battery discharge
B	Matching of day and night charge rates
C	Prevention of battery damage due to overcharge
D	Prevention of battery undercharge

35. - E7E03

What is a frequency discriminator stage in a FM receiver?

Select	Answer
A	A circuit for filtering two closely adjacent signals
B	An FM generator circuit
C	A circuit for detecting FM signals
D	An automatic band-switching circuit

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

37. - E7G07

What magnitude of voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E73 when R1 is 10 ohms and RF is 470 ohms?

Select	Answer
A	94
B	24
C	47
D	0.21

38. - E7H13

Which of the following is a technique for providing highly accurate and stable oscillators needed for microwave transmission and reception?

Select	Answer
A	All these choices are correct
B	Use a rubidium stabilized reference oscillator
C	Use a GPS signal reference
D	Use a temperature-controlled high Q dielectric resonator

39. - E8A03

What type of wave does a Fourier analysis show to be made up of sine waves of a given fundamental frequency plus all its harmonics?

Select	Answer
A	A square wave
B	A cosine wave
C	A sawtooth wave
D	A sine wave

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 ratio of frequency deviation to modulating signal frequency
C	The type of modulation used by the transmitter
D	The bandwidth of the transmitted signal divided by the modulating signal frequency

41. - E8C01

How is Forward Error Correction implemented?

Select	Answer
A	By transmitting extra data that may be used to detect and correct transmission errors
B	By the receiving station repeating each block of three data characters
C	By transmitting a special algorithm to the receiving station along with the data characters
D	By varying the frequency shift of the transmitted signal according to a predefined algorithm

42. - E8D07

What is a common cause of overmodulation of AFSK signals?

Select	Answer
A	Ground loops
B	Bit errors in the modem
C	Excessive numbers of retries
D	Excessive transmit audio levels

43. - E9A09

What is antenna efficiency?

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

44. - E9B03

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

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

45. - E9C04

What happens to the radiation pattern of an unterminated long wire antenna as the wire length is increased?

Select	Answer
A	The lobes become more perpendicular to the wire
B	The lobes align more in the direction of the wire
C	The front-to-back ratio decreases
D	The vertical angle increases

46. - E9D10

What happens to feed-point impedance at the base of a fixed length HF mobile antenna when operated below its resonant frequency?

Select	Answer
A	The radiation resistance increases and the capacitive reactance increases
B	The radiation resistance decreases and the capacitive reactance decreases
C	The radiation resistance decreases and the capacitive reactance increases
D	The radiation resistance increases and the capacitive reactance decreases

47. - E9E05

How must an antenna's driven element be tuned to use a hairpin matching system?

Select	Answer
A	The driven element reactance must be inductive
B	The driven element radiation resistance must be higher than the characteristic impedance of the transmission line
C	The driven element reactance must be capacitive
D	The driven element resonance must be lower than the operating frequency

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	Smaller reflection coefficient
D	Lower loss

49. - E9G05

Which of the following is a common use for a Smith chart?

Select	Answer
A	Determine the gain of an antenna given the physical and electrical parameters
B	Determine the loss/100 feet of a transmission line, given the velocity factor and conductor materials
C	Determine the length and position of an impedance matching stub
D	Determine the impedance of a transmission line, given the physical dimensions

50. - E9H03

What is Receiving Directivity Factor (RDF)?

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

Figure E9-1