US Amateur Radio - Amateur Extra (Element 4, 2016-2020) Practice Test

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1. - E1A05

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

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

2. - E1B05

What is the National Radio Quiet Zone?

Select	Answer
A	An area in New Mexico surrounding the White Sands Test Area
B	An area in Florida surrounding Cape Canaveral
C	An area surrounding the National Radio Astronomy Observatory
D	An area in Puerto Rico surrounding the Arecibo Radio Telescope

3. - E1C02

What is meant by automatic control of a station?

Select	Answer
A	Remotely controlling a station's antenna pattern through a directional control link
B	The use of a control link between a control point and a locally controlled station
C	A station operating with its output power controlled automatically
D	The use of devices and procedures for control so that the control operator does not have to be present at a control point

4. - E1D07

Which amateur service HF bands have frequencies authorized for space stations?

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

5. - E1E09

What may be the penalty for a VE who fraudulently administers or certifies an examination?

Select	Answer
A	All of these choices are correct
B	A fine of up to $1000 per occurrence
C	A sentence of up to one year in prison
D	Revocation of the VE's amateur station license grant and the suspension of the VE's amateur operator license grant

6. - E1F08

Which of the following types of amateur station communications are prohibited?

Select	Answer
A	Communications that have a religious content
B	Communications transmitted for hire or material compensation, except as otherwise provided in the rules
C	Communications in a language other than English
D	Communications that have a political content, except as allowed by the Fairness Doctrine

7. - E2A08

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

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

8. - E2B17

What is the approximate bandwidth of a slow-scan TV signal?

Select	Answer
A	2 MHz
B	6 MHz
C	3 kHz
D	600 Hz

9. - E2C02

Which of the following best describes the term self-spotting in regards to HF contest operating?

Select	Answer
A	A manual technique for rapidly zero beating or tuning to a station's frequency before calling that station
B	The generally prohibited practice of posting one's own call sign and frequency on a spotting network
C	An automatic method for rapidly zero beating or tuning to a station's frequency before calling that station
D	The acceptable practice of manually posting the call signs of stations on a spotting network

10. - E2D14

What is one advantage of using JT65 coding?

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

11. - E2E06

What is the most common data rate used for HF packet?

Select	Answer
A	48 baud
B	1200 baud
C	300 baud
D	110 baud

12. - E3A07

Atmospheric ducts capable of propagating microwave signals often form over what geographic feature?

Select	Answer
A	Bodies of water
B	Mountain ranges
C	Urban areas
D	Forests

13. - E3B14

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

Select	Answer
A	They become elliptically polarized
B	They become phase-locked
C	They are bent toward the magnetic poles
D	Their polarization is randomly modified

14. - E3C01

What does the term ray tracing describe in regard to radio communications?

Select	Answer
A	Modeling a radio wave's path through the ionosphere
B	Determining the radiation pattern from an array of antennas
C	The process in which an electronic display presents a pattern
D	Evaluating high voltage sources for X-Rays

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

16. - E4B09

What is indicated if the current reading on an RF ammeter placed in series with the antenna feed line of a transmitter increases as the transmitter is tuned to resonance?

Select	Answer
A	There is more power going into the antenna
B	There is an impedance mismatch between the antenna and feed line
C	The transmitter is not properly neutralized
D	There is possibly a short to ground in the feed line

17. - E4C07

What does the MDS of a receiver represent?

Select	Answer
A	The meter display sensitivity
B	The minimum discernible signal
C	The multiplex distortion stability
D	The maximum detectable spectrum

18. - E4D02

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

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

19. - E4E11

Which is the most likely cause if you are hearing combinations of local AM broadcast signals within one or more of the MF or HF ham bands?

Select	Answer
A	Nearby corroded metal joints are mixing and re-radiating the broadcast signals
B	The broadcast station is transmitting an over-modulated signal
C	Your station receiver IF amplifier stage is defective
D	You are receiving sky wave signals from a distant station

20. - E5A04

What is the magnitude of the impedance of a circuit with a resistor, an inductor and a capacitor all in parallel, at resonance?

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

21. - E5B03

What happens to the phase angle of a reactance when it is converted to a susceptance?

Select	Answer
A	The susceptance phase angle is the inverse of the reactance phase angle
B	The sign is reversed
C	It is shifted by 90 degrees
D	It is unchanged

22. - E5C13

What coordinate system is often used to display the resistive, inductive, and/or capacitive reactance components of impedance?

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

23. - E5D06

In what direction is the magnetic field oriented about a conductor in relation to the direction of electron flow?

Select	Answer
A	In the same direction as the current
B	In all directions; omni-directional
C	In a direction determined by the left-hand rule
D	In a direction opposite to the current

24. - 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	Beta cutoff frequency
B	Alpha cutoff frequency
C	Alpha rejection frequency
D	Corner frequency

25. - E6B06

Which of the following is a common use of a hot-carrier diode?

Select	Answer
A	As a variable capacitance in an automatic frequency control circuit
B	As a constant voltage reference in a power supply
C	As balanced mixers in FM generation
D	As a VHF/UHF mixer or detector

26. - E6C13

Which of the following is an advantage of BiCMOS logic?

Select	Answer
A	Its simplicity results in much less expensive devices than standard CMOS
B	It has the high input impedance of CMOS and the low output impedance of bipolar transistors
C	All of these choices are correct
D	It is totally immune to electrostatic damage

27. - E6D03

Which of the following is an aspect of the piezoelectric effect?

Select	Answer
A	Mechanical deformation of material by the application of a voltage
B	Mechanical deformation of material by the application of a magnetic field
C	Increased conductivity in the presence of light
D	Generation of electrical energy in the presence of light

28. - E6E06

What characteristics of the MMIC make it a popular choice for VHF through microwave circuits?

Select	Answer
A	Plate current that is controlled by a control grid
B	Controlled gain, low noise figure, and constant input and output impedance over the specified frequency range
C	Nearly infinite gain, very high input impedance, and very low output impedance
D	The ability to retrieve information from a single signal even in the presence of other strong signals

29. - E6F14

Which of the following is true of LCD displays?

Select	Answer
A	All of these choices are correct
B	They are hard to view in high ambient light conditions
C	They only display alphanumeric symbols
D	They may be hard view through polarized lenses

30. - E7A11

What type of logic defines "1" as a high voltage?

Select	Answer
A	Positive Logic
B	Assertive Logic
C	Reverse Logic
D	Negative logic

31. - E7B18

What is a characteristic of a grounded-grid amplifier?

Select	Answer
A	Low bandwidth
B	High filament voltage
C	High power gain
D	Low input impedance

32. - E7C05

Which filter type is described as having ripple in the passband and a sharp cutoff?

Select	Answer
A	A passive op-amp filter
B	An active LC filter
C	A Chebyshev filter
D	A Butterworth filter

33. - E7D07

What is the purpose of C2 in the circuit shown in Figure E7-3?

Select	Answer
A	To provide fixed DC bias for Q1
B	To self-resonate at the hum frequency
C	It bypasses hum around D1
D	It is a brute force filter for the output

34. - E7E04

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

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

35. - E7F13

What is the function of taps in a digital signal processing filter?

Select	Answer
A	Provide access for debugging software
B	To reduce excess signal pressure levels
C	Provide incremental signal delays for filter algorithms
D	Select the point at which baseband signals are generated

36. - E7G10

What absolute voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E7-4 when R1 is 1800 ohms and RF is 68 kilohms?

Select	Answer
A	0.03
B	76
C	38
D	1

37. - E7H02

Which describes 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

38. - E8A01

What is the name of the process that shows that a square wave is made up of a sine wave plus all of its odd harmonics?

Select	Answer
A	Vector analysis
B	Numerical analysis
C	Fourier analysis
D	Differential analysis

39. - E8B05

What is the deviation ratio of an FM-phone signal having a maximum frequency swing of plus-or-minus 5 kHz when the maximum modulation frequency is 3 kHz?

Select	Answer
A	0.6
B	1.67
C	0.167
D	60

40. - E8C07

What is the necessary bandwidth of a 4800-Hz frequency shift, 9600-baud ASCII FM transmission?

Select	Answer
A	9.6 kHz
B	15.36 kHz
C	5.76 kHz
D	4.8 kHz

41. - 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 contains fewer information bits per character than any other code
C	It uses one character as a shift code to send numeric and special characters
D	It includes built in error correction features

42. - E9A03

Why would one need to know the feed point impedance of an antenna?

Select	Answer
A	To match impedances in order to minimize standing wave ratio on the transmission line
B	To measure the near-field radiation density from a transmitting antenna
C	To calculate the front-to-back ratio of the antenna
D	To calculate the front-to-side ratio of the antenna

43. - E9B16

How many elevation lobes appear in the forward direction of the antenna radiation pattern shown in Figure E9-2?

Select	Answer
A	1
B	4
C	3
D	7

44. - E9C05

What is an OCFD antenna?

Select	Answer
A	A dipole feed approximately 1/3 the way from one end with a 4:1 balun to provide multiband operation
B	A remotely tunable dipole antenna using orthogonally controlled frequency diversity
C	An eight band dipole antenna using octophase filters
D	A multiband dipole antenna using one-way circular polarization for frequency diversity

45. - E9D11

Which of the following types of conductors would be best for minimizing losses in a station's RF ground system?

Select	Answer
A	A single 12 gauge or 10 gauge stainless steel wire
B	A wide flat copper strap
C	A resistive wire, such as spark plug wire
D	A cable with six or seven 18 gauge conductors in parallel

46. - E9E02

What is the name of an antenna matching system that matches an unbalanced feed line to an antenna by feeding the driven element both at the center of the element and at a fraction of a wavelength to one side of center?

Select	Answer
A	The epsilon match
B	The delta match
C	The gamma match
D	The stub match

47. - E9F05

What is the approximate physical length of a solid polyethylene dielectric coaxial transmission line that is electrically one-quarter wavelength long at 14.1 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	20 meters
B	0.2 meters
C	3.5 meters
D	2.3 meters

48. - E9G05

What type of chart is shown in Figure E9-3?

Select	Answer
A	Smith chart
B	Azimuth angle radiation pattern chart
C	Elevation angle radiation pattern chart
D	Free space radiation directivity chart

49. - E9H08

What is the function of a sense antenna?

Select	Answer
A	It allows DF antennas to receive signals at different vertical angles
B	It increases the sensitivity of a DF antenna array
C	It provides diversity reception that cancels multipath signals
D	It modifies the pattern of a DF antenna array to provide a null in one direction

50. - E0A05

What is one of the potential hazards of using microwaves in the amateur radio bands?

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

Figure E7-3

Figure E7-4

Figure E9-2

Figure E9-3