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

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1. - E0A08

What does SAR measure?

Select	Answer
A	The rate of RF energy reflected from stationary terrain
B	The rate at which RF energy is absorbed by the body
C	Signal Amplification Rating
D	Synthetic Aperture Ratio of the human body

2. - E1A06

Where must the carrier frequency of a CW signal be set to comply with FCC rules for 60 meter operation?

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

3. - E1B05

What is the National Radio Quiet Zone?

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

4. - E1C01

What is the maximum bandwidth for a data emission on 60 meters?

Select	Answer
A	170 Hz
B	1.5 kHz
C	60 Hz
D	2.8 kHz

5. - E1D04

Which of the following is required in the identification transmissions from a balloon-borne telemetry station?

Select	Answer
A	Call sign
B	The station's six-character Maidenhead grid locator
C	All these choices are correct
D	The output power of the balloon transmitter

6. - E1E02

Who does Part 97 task with maintaining the pools of questions for all U.S. amateur license examinations?

Select	Answer
A	The VECs
B	The VEs
C	The FCC
D	The ARRL

7. - E1F11

Which of the following best describes one of the standards that must be met by an external RF power amplifier if it is to qualify for a grant of FCC certification?

Select	Answer
A	It must exhibit a gain of 0 dB or less over its full output range
B	It must produce full legal output when driven by not more than 5 watts of mean RF input power
C	It must satisfy the FCC's spurious emission standards when operated at the lesser of 1500 watts or its full output power
D	It must be capable of external RF switching between its input and output networks

8. - E2A08

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

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

9. - E2B09

What hardware, other than a receiver with SSB capability and a suitable computer, is needed to decode SSTV using Digital Radio Mondiale (DRM)?

Select	Answer
A	A special front end limiter
B	A special IF converter
C	A special notch filter to remove synchronization pulses
D	No other hardware is needed

10. - E2C12

What technique do individual nodes use to form a mesh network?

Select	Answer
A	Acting as store-and-forward digipeaters
B	Discovery and link establishment protocols
C	Custom code plugs for the local trunking systems
D	Forward error correction and Viterbi codes

11. - E2D01

Which of the following digital modes is designed for meteor scatter communications?

Select	Answer
A	WSPR
B	APRS
C	Hellschreiber
D	MSK144

12. - E2E05

Which of these digital modes does not support keyboard-to-keyboard operation?

Select	Answer
A	MFSK
B	RTTY
C	PACTOR
D	PSK31

13. - E3A01

What is the approximate maximum separation measured along the surface of the Earth between two stations communicating by EME?

Select	Answer
A	2000 miles, if the moon is at apogee
B	12,000 miles, if the moon is visible by both stations
C	5000 miles, if the moon is at perigee
D	500 miles, if the moon is at perigee

14. - E3B06

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

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

15. - E3C05

What orientation of Bz (B sub z) increases the likelihood that incoming particles from the sun will cause disturbed conditions?

Select	Answer
A	Southward
B	Eastward
C	Northward
D	Westward

16. - E4A05

What is the purpose of the prescaler function on a frequency counter?

Select	Answer
A	It amplifies low-level signals for more accurate counting
B	It prevents oscillation in a low-frequency counter circuit
C	It divides a higher frequency signal so a low-frequency counter can display the input frequency
D	It multiplies a higher frequency signal so a low-frequency counter can display the operating frequency

17. - E4B01

Which of the following factors most affects the accuracy of a frequency counter?

Select	Answer
A	Temperature coefficient of the logic
B	Input attenuator accuracy
C	Decade divider accuracy
D	Time base accuracy

18. - E4C07

What does the MDS of a receiver represent?

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

19. - E4D03

How can intermodulation interference between two repeaters occur?

Select	Answer
A	When the repeaters are in close proximity and the signals cause feedback in the final amplifier of one or both transmitters
B	When the signals from the transmitters are reflected in phase from airplanes passing overhead
C	When the repeaters are in close proximity and the signals mix in the final amplifier of one or both transmitters
D	When the signals from the transmitters are reflected out of phase from airplanes passing overhead

20. - E4E02

Which of the following types of noise can often be reduced with a digital signal processing noise filter?

Select	Answer
A	Power line noise
B	Broadband white noise
C	Ignition noise
D	All these choices are correct

21. - E5A11

What is the half-power bandwidth of a resonant circuit that has a resonant frequency of 7.1 MHz and a Q of 150?

Select	Answer
A	315.6 Hz
B	23.67 kHz
C	157.8 Hz
D	47.3 kHz

22. - E5B05

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

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

23. - E5C07

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

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

24. - E5D11

What is the power factor of an RL circuit having a 60-degree phase angle between the voltage and the current?

Select	Answer
A	1.414
B	0.5
C	1.73
D	0.866

25. - E6A04

What is the name given to an impurity atom that adds holes to a semiconductor crystal structure?

Select	Answer
A	Donor impurity
B	N-type impurity
C	Acceptor impurity
D	Insulator impurity

26. - E6B07

What is the failure mechanism when a junction diode fails due to excessive current?

Select	Answer
A	Excessive inverse voltage
B	Excessive junction temperature
C	Insufficient forward voltage
D	Charge carrier depletion

27. - E6C09

What is a Programmable Logic Device (PLD)?

Select	Answer
A	A logic circuit that can be modified during use
B	Programmable equipment used for testing digital logic integrated circuits
C	A type of transistor whose gain can be changed by digital logic circuits
D	A programmable collection of logic gates and circuits in a single integrated circuit

28. - E6D09

What devices are commonly used as VHF and UHF parasitic suppressors at the input and output terminals of a transistor HF amplifier?

Select	Answer
A	Electrolytic capacitors
B	Butterworth filters
C	Steel-core toroids
D	Ferrite beads

29. - E6E12

Why are DIP through-hole package ICs not typically used at UHF and higher frequencies?

Select	Answer
A	Too many pins
B	Epoxy coating is conductive above 300 MHz
C	Unsuitable for combining analog and digital signals
D	Excessive lead length

30. - E6F11

What is the approximate open-circuit voltage produced by a fully illuminated silicon photovoltaic cell?

Select	Answer
A	0.5 V
B	0.1 V
C	12 V
D	1.5 V

31. - E7A05

Which of the following is a circuit that continuously alternates between two states without an external clock?

Select	Answer
A	Monostable multivibrator
B	J-K flip-flop
C	T flip-flop
D	Astable multivibrator

32. - E7B17

Why are odd-order rather than even-order intermodulation distortion products of concern in linear power amplifiers?

Select	Answer
A	Because they maintain the sidebands, thus causing multiple duplicate signals
B	Because they invert the sidebands causing distortion
C	Because they are relatively far in frequency from the desired signal
D	Because they are relatively close in frequency to the desired signal

33. - E7C09

What is a crystal lattice filter?

Select	Answer
A	A filter with narrow bandwidth and steep skirts made using quartz crystals
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 using lattice-shaped quartz crystals for high-Q performance

34. - E7D10

What is the primary reason that a high-frequency switching type high-voltage power supply can be both less expensive and lighter in weight than a conventional power supply?

Select	Answer
A	It uses a diode bridge rectifier for increased output
B	The high frequency inverter design uses much smaller transformers and filter components for an equivalent power output
C	It uses a large power factor compensation capacitor to recover power from the unused portion of the AC cycle
D	The inverter design does not require any output filtering

35. - E7E11

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

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

36. - E7F03

What type of digital signal processing filter is used to generate an SSB signal?

Select	Answer
A	An adaptive filter
B	A notch filter
C	A Hilbert-transform filter
D	An elliptical filter

37. - E7G02

What is ringing in a filter?

Select	Answer
A	An echo caused by a long time delay
B	A reduction in high frequency response
C	Partial cancellation of the signal over a range of frequencies
D	Undesired oscillations added to the desired signal

38. - E7H09

What type of frequency synthesizer circuit uses a phase accumulator, lookup table, digital to analog converter, and a low-pass anti-alias filter?

Select	Answer
A	A direct digital synthesizer
B	A phase-locked loop synthesizer
C	A hybrid synthesizer
D	A diode-switching matrix synthesizer

39. - E8A04

What is "dither" with respect to analog-to-digital converters?

Select	Answer
A	An abnormal condition where the converter cannot settle on a value to represent the signal
B	A method of decimation by randomly skipping samples
C	A small amount of noise added to the input signal to allow more precise representation of a signal over time
D	An error caused by irregular quantization step size

40. - E8B10

What is frequency division multiplexing?

Select	Answer
A	The transmitted signal is divided into packets of information
B	Two or more information streams are merged into a baseband, which then modulates the transmitter
C	Two or more information streams are merged into a digital combiner, which then pulse position modulates the transmitter
D	The transmitted signal jumps from band to band at a predetermined rate

41. - E8C08

How does ARQ accomplish error correction?

Select	Answer
A	If errors are detected, redundant data is substituted
B	Special binary codes provide automatic correction
C	If errors are detected, a retransmission is requested
D	Special polynomial codes provide automatic correction

42. - E8D01

Why are received spread spectrum signals resistant to interference?

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

43. - E9A02

What is the effective radiated power relative to a dipole of a repeater station with 150 watts transmitter power output, 2 dB feed line loss, 2.2 dB duplexer loss, and 7 dBd antenna gain?

Select	Answer
A	420 watts
B	286 watts
C	1977 watts
D	78.7 watts

44. - E9B01

In the antenna radiation pattern shown in Figure E9-1, what is the beamwidth?

Select	Answer
A	50 degrees
B	25 degrees
C	30 degrees
D	75 degrees

45. - E9C08

What is a folded dipole antenna?

Select	Answer
A	A half-wave dipole with an additional parallel wire connecting its two ends
B	A dipole one-quarter wavelength long
C	A type of ground-plane antenna
D	A dipole configured to provide forward gain

46. - E9D09

What is the function of a loading coil used as part of an HF mobile antenna?

Select	Answer
A	To cancel capacitive reactance
B	To lower the losses
C	To lower the Q
D	To increase the SWR bandwidth

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. - E9F09

What is the approximate physical length of a foam polyethylene dielectric coaxial transmission line that is electrically 1/4 wavelength long at 7.2 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	6.9 meters
B	5.2 meters
C	8.3 meters
D	10.4 meters

49. - E9G03

Which of the following is often determined using a Smith chart?

Select	Answer
A	Satellite azimuth and elevation bearings
B	Trigonometric functions
C	Beam headings and radiation patterns
D	Impedance and SWR values in transmission lines

50. - E9H01

When constructing a Beverage antenna, which of the following factors should be included in the design to achieve good performance at the desired frequency?

Select	Answer
A	It must be mounted more than 1 wavelength above ground
B	It should be configured as a four-sided loop
C	Its overall length must not exceed 1/4 wavelength
D	It should be one or more wavelengths long

Figure E9-1