Practice Exam

E9C14

1. How does the radiation pattern of a horizontally-polarized antenna mounted above a long slope compare with the same antenna mounted above flat ground?

• A. The horizontal beamwidth increases in the uphill direction
• B. The main lobe takeoff angle decreases in the downhill direction
• C. The main lobe takeoff angle increases in the downhill direction
• D. The horizontal beamwidth decreases in the downhill direction

E7A01

2. Which circuit is bistable?

• A. A bipolar amplifier
• B. A flip-flop
• C. An OR gate
• D. An AND gate

E5D04

3. Why are short connections used at microwave frequencies?

• A. To reduce noise figure
• B. To reduce phase shift along the connection
• C. To increase compensating capacitance
• D. To increase neutralizing resistance

E2D09

4. What type of modulation is used by JT65?

• A. QAM
• B. PSK
• C. RTTY
• D. Multitone AFSK

E5B02

5. What letter is commonly used to represent susceptance?

• A. Y
• B. X
• C. G
• D. B

E0A04

6. When evaluating a site with multiple transmitters operating at the same time, the operators and licensees of which transmitters are responsible for mitigating over-exposure situations?

• A. Each transmitter that produces 5 percent or more of its MPE limit in areas where the total MPE limit is exceeded
• B. Each transmitter operating with a duty cycle greater than 50 percent
• C. Each transmitter operating with a duty cycle greater than 25 percent
• D. Each transmitter that produces 20 percent or more of its MPE limit in areas where the total MPE limit is exceeded

E6F10

7. What is the most common material used in power-generating photovoltaic cells?

• A. Selenium
• B. Silicon
• C. Cadmium sulfide
• D. Indium arsenide

E8C09

8. Which digital code allows only one bit to change between sequential code values?

• A. Extended ASCII
• B. Binary Coded Decimal Code
• C. Gray code
• D. Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code

E7H08

9. Which of the following components can be used to reduce thermal drift in crystal oscillators?

• A. NP0 capacitors
• B. Wirewound resistors
• C. Non-inductive resistors
• D. Toroidal inductors

E4E09

10. What undesirable effect can occur when using a noise blanker?

• A. Received audio in the speech range might have an echo effect
• B. The audio frequency bandwidth of the received signal might be compressed
• C. FM signals can no longer be demodulated
• D. Strong signals may be distorted and appear to cause spurious emissions

E7C09

11. What is a crystal lattice filter?

• A. A filter using lattice-shaped quartz crystals for high-Q performance
• B. A power supply filter made with interlaced quartz crystals
• C. An audio filter made with four quartz crystals that resonate at 1 kHz intervals
• D. A filter for low-level signals made using quartz crystals

E9E11

12. What is the purpose of using multiple driven elements connected through phasing lines?

• A. To allow single-band antennas to operate on other bands
• B. To prevent harmonic radiation from the transmitter
• C. To create a low-angle radiation pattern
• D. To control the antenna's radiation pattern

E6C02

13. What happens when the level of a comparator's input signal crosses the threshold voltage?

• A. The feedback loop becomes unstable
• B. The comparator changes its output state
• C. The reference level appears at the output
• D. The IC input can be damaged

E4C11

14. Why does input attenuation reduce receiver overload on the lower frequency HF bands with little or no impact on signal-to-noise ratio?

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

E2E13

15. Which of these digital modes has the highest data throughput under clear communication conditions?

• A. MFSK16
• B. PACTOR IV
• C. 170 Hz shift, 45 baud RTTY
• D. FT8

E5C08

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

• A. Faraday grid
• B. Maidenhead grid
• C. Polar coordinates
• D. Elliptical coordinates

E7E02

17. What is the function of a reactance modulator?

• A. Produce PM or FM signals by varying a resistance
• B. Produce PM or FM signals by varying a capacitance
• C. Produce AM signals by varying an inductance
• D. Produce AM signals by varying a resistance

E8A10

18. What is the purpose of a low-pass filter used at the output of a digital-to-analog converter?

• A. All these choices are correct
• B. Improve accuracy by removing out-of-sequence codes from the input
• C. Lower the input bandwidth to increase the effective resolution
• D. Remove spurious sampling artifacts from the output signal

E7D01

19. How does a linear electronic voltage regulator work?

• A. The control element duty cycle is proportional to the line or load conditions
• B. It has a ramp voltage as its output
• C. It eliminates the need for a pass transistor
• D. The conduction of a control element is varied to maintain a constant output voltage

E9D10

20. How does radiation resistance of a base-fed whip antenna change below its resonant frequency?

• A. Radiation resistance decreases
• B. Radiation resistance increases
• C. Radiation resistance becomes imaginary
• D. Radiation resistance does not depend on frequency

E3C07

21. Which of the following indicates the greatest solar flare intensity?

• A. Class Z
• B. Class A
• C. Class M
• D. Class X

E6D11

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

• A. Brass
• B. Ceramic
• C. Aluminum
• D. Ferrite

E4A06

23. What is the effect of aliasing on a digital oscilloscope when displaying a waveform?

• A. The waveform DC offset will be inaccurate
• B. Excessive blanking occurs, which prevents display of the waveform
• C. A false, jittery low-frequency version of the waveform is displayed
• D. Calibration of the vertical scale is no longer valid

E5A06

24. What is the magnitude of the circulating current within the components of a parallel LC circuit at resonance?

• A. It equals 1 divided by the quantity 2 times pi, times the square root of (inductance L multiplied by capacitance C)
• B. It is at a maximum
• C. It is at a minimum
• D. It equals 2 times pi, times the square root of (inductance L multiplied by capacitance C)

E1B02

25. Which of the following is an acceptable bandwidth for digital voice or slow-scan TV transmissions made on the HF amateur bands?

• A. 10 kHz
• B. 20 kHz
• C. 15 kHz
• D. 3 kHz

E1C03

26. 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?

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

E1D09

27. Which UHF amateur bands have frequencies authorized for space stations?

• A. 70 centimeters and 13 centimeters
• B. 70 centimeters and 33 centimeters
• C. 33 centimeters and 13 centimeters
• D. 70 centimeters only

E3B06

28. On which of the following amateur bands is long-path propagation most frequent?

• A. 10 meters and 6 meters
• B. 160 meters and 80 meters
• C. 40 meters and 20 meters
• D. 6 meters and 2 meters

E2B06

29. What is vestigial sideband modulation?

• A. Narrow-band FM modulation achieved by filtering one sideband from the audio before frequency modulating the carrier
• B. A type of modulation in which one sideband is inverted
• C. Spread spectrum modulation achieved by applying FM modulation following single sideband amplitude modulation
• D. Amplitude modulation in which one complete sideband and a portion of the other are transmitted

E6E02

30. Which of the following device packages is a through-hole type?

• A. PLCC
• B. BGA
• C. SOT
• D. DIP

E9G04

31. What are the two families of circles and arcs that make up a Smith chart?

• A. Resistance and reactance
• B. Voltage and impedance
• C. Inductance and capacitance
• D. Reactance and voltage

E6A01

32. In what application is gallium arsenide used as a semiconductor material?

• A. In very low-frequency RF circuits
• B. In high-power audio circuits
• C. In high-current rectifier circuits
• D. In microwave circuits

E3A14

33. What are circularly polarized electromagnetic waves?

• A. Waves with an electric field bent into a circular shape
• B. Waves that circle Earth
• C. Waves produced by a loop antenna
• D. Waves with rotating electric and magnetic fields

E7F09

34. Why is an anti-aliasing filter required in a decimator?

• A. It removes low-frequency signal components to eliminate the need for DC restoration
• B. It removes high-frequency signal components that would otherwise be reproduced as lower frequency components
• C. It notches out the sampling frequency to avoid sampling errors
• D. It peaks the response of the decimator, improving bandwidth

E4D13

35. What is the received signal level with a transmit power of 10 W (+40 dBm), a transmit antenna gain of 6 dBi, a receive antenna gain of 3 dBi, and a path loss of 100 dB?

• A. -51 dBm
• B. -54 dBm
• C. -60 dBm
• D. -57 dBm

E9B05

36. What type of antenna pattern is shown in Figure E9-2?

• A. Near field
• B. Polarization
• C. Elevation
• D. Azimuth

E1A06

37. What is the required transmit frequency of a CW signal for channelized 60 meter operation?

• A. At the center frequency of the channel
• B. At the lowest frequency of the channel
• C. On any frequency where the signal's sidebands are within the channel
• D. At the highest frequency of the channel

E9F05

38. What is microstrip?

• A. Short lengths of coax mounted on printed circuit boards to minimize time delay between microwave circuits
• B. Precision printed circuit conductors above a ground plane that provide constant impedance interconnects at microwave frequencies
• C. Special shielding material designed for microwave frequencies
• D. Miniature coax used for low power applications

E9A11

39. Which of the following determines ground losses for a ground-mounted vertical antenna operating on HF?

• A. The standing wave ratio
• B. Take-off angle
• C. Distance from the transmitter
• D. Soil conductivity

E8B03

40. What is the modulation index of an FM phone signal having a maximum frequency deviation of 3000 Hz either side of the carrier frequency if the highest modulating frequency is 1000 Hz?

• A. 3
• B. 6
• C. 0.3
• D. 0.6

E4B04

41. Which S parameter represents input port return loss or reflection coefficient (equivalent to VSWR)?

• A. S12
• B. S22
• C. S21
• D. S11

E7B06

42. What is a characteristic of a grounded-grid amplifier?

• A. Low input impedance
• B. High electrostatic damage protection
• C. High power gain
• D. Low bandwidth

E2A01

43. What is the direction of an ascending pass for an amateur satellite?

• A. From north to south
• B. From south to north
• C. From west to east
• D. From east to west

E9H05

44. What challenge is presented by a small wire-loop antenna for direction finding?

• A. It has a bidirectional null pattern
• B. All these choices are correct
• C. It does not have a clearly defined null
• D. It is practical for use only on VHF and higher bands

E6B03

45. What property of an LED's semiconductor material determines its forward voltage drop?

• A. Intrinsic resistance
• B. Junction depth
• C. Junction capacitance
• D. Band gap

E8D03

46. Which describes spread spectrum frequency hopping?

• A. A binary bit stream is used to shift the phase of an RF carrier very rapidly in a pseudorandom sequence
• B. RF signals are clipped to generate a wide band of harmonics which provides redundancy to correct errors
• C. Rapidly varying the frequency of a transmitted signal according to a pseudorandom sequence
• D. If interference is detected by the receiver, it will signal the transmitter to change frequencies

E1F01

47. On what frequencies are spread spectrum transmissions permitted?

• A. Only on amateur frequencies above 222 MHz
• B. Only on amateur frequencies above 50 MHz
• C. Only on amateur frequencies above 144 MHz
• D. Only on amateur frequencies above 420 MHz

E7G07

48. What voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E7-3 when R1 is 10 ohms and RF is 470 ohms?

• A. 0.21
• B. 4700
• C. 24
• D. 47

E1E05

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

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

E2C12

50. What indicates the delay between a control operator action and the corresponding change in the transmitted signal?

• A. Anti-VOX
• B. Latency
• C. Jitter
• D. Hang time