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

2. - E1A01

Which of the following carrier frequencies is illegal for LSB AFSK emissions on the 17 meter band RTTY and data segment of 18.068 to 18.110 MHz?

Select	Answer
A	18.110 MHz
B	18.068 MHz
C	18.107 MHz
D	18.100 MHz

3. - E1B10

What frequencies are authorized to an amateur station operating under RACES rules?

Select	Answer
A	Specific segments in the amateur service MF, HF, VHF and UHF bands
B	Military Auxiliary Radio System (MARS) channels
C	Specific local government channels
D	All amateur service frequencies authorized to the control operator

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 must not operate until approval is received
B	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
C	Operators may not operate until a test signal has been transmitted in coordination with the local power company
D	Operations may commence immediately, and may continue unless interference is reported by the UTC

5. - E1D09

Which UHF amateur bands have frequencies authorized for space stations?

Select	Answer
A	33 cm and 13 cm
B	70 cm only
C	70 cm and 33 cm
D	70 cm and 13 cm

6. - E1E11

What must the VE team do if an examinee scores a passing grade on all examination elements needed for an upgrade or new license?

Select	Answer
A	Issue the examinee the new or upgrade license
B	Three VEs must certify that the examinee is qualified for the license grant and that they have complied with the administering VE requirements
C	All these choices are correct
D	Photocopy all examination documents and forward them to the FCC for processing

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 be capable of external RF switching between its input and output networks
C	It must produce full legal output when driven by not more than 5 watts of mean RF input power
D	It must satisfy the FCC's spurious emission standards when operated at the lesser of 1500 watts or its full output power

8. - E2A06

What are Keplerian elements?

Select	Answer
A	Phase reversing elements in a Yagi antenna
B	High-emission heater filaments used in magnetron tubes
C	Encrypting codes used for spread spectrum modulation
D	Parameters that define the orbit of a satellite

9. - E2B11

What is the function of the Vertical Interval Signaling (VIS) code sent as part of an SSTV transmission?

Select	Answer
A	To provide vertical synchronization
B	To lock the color burst oscillator in color SSTV images
C	To identify the SSTV mode being used
D	To identify the call sign of the station transmitting

10. - E2C11

How should you generally identify your station when attempting to contact a DX station during a contest or in a pileup?

Select	Answer
A	Send only the last two letters of your call sign until you make contact
B	Send your full call sign and grid square
C	Send your full call sign once or twice
D	Send the call sign of the DX station three times, the words this is,then your call sign three times

11. - E2D09

What type of modulation is used for JT65 contacts?

Select	Answer
A	Multi-tone AFSK
B	RTTY
C	IEEE 802.11
D	PSK

12. - E2E08

Which of the following HF digital modes can be used to transfer binary files?

Select	Answer
A	Hellschreiber
B	RTTY
C	PACTOR
D	AMTOR

13. - E3A07

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

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

14. - E3B03

What is the best time of day for transequatorial propagation?

Select	Answer
A	Noon
B	Late at night
C	Morning
D	Afternoon or early evening

15. - E3C14

Why does the radio-path horizon distance exceed the geometric horizon?

Select	Answer
A	Downward bending due to density variations in the atmosphere
B	E-region skip
C	Due to the Doppler effect
D	D-region skip

16. - E4A08

Which of the following measures SWR?

Select	Answer
A	A spectrum analyzer
B	An antenna analyzer
C	A Q meter
D	An ohmmeter

17. - E4B02

What is the significance of voltmeter sensitivity expressed in ohms per volt?

Select	Answer
A	When used as an ohmmeter, the reading in ohms divided by the ohms per volt rating will determine the voltage applied to the circuit
B	When used as an ammeter, the full scale reading in amps divided by ohms per volt rating will determine the size of shunt needed
C	The full scale reading of the voltmeter multiplied by its ohms per volt rating will indicate the input impedance of the voltmeter
D	When used as a galvanometer, the reading in volts multiplied by the ohms per volt rating will determine the power drawn by the device under test

18. - E4C08

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

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

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 minimum difference in dB between the levels of two FM signals that will cause one signal to block the other
C	The difference in dB between the noise floor and the level of an incoming signal that will cause 1 dB of gain compression
D	The difference in dB between the noise floor and the third-order intercept point

20. - E4E02

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

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

21. - E5A16

What is the resonant frequency of an RLC circuit if R is 33 ohms, L is 50 microhenries and C is 10 picofarads?

Select	Answer
A	7.12 MHz
B	23.5 MHz
C	7.12 kHz
D	23.5 kHz

22. - E5B04

What is the time constant of a circuit having two 220-microfarad capacitors and two 1-megohm resistors, all in parallel?

Select	Answer
A	440 seconds
B	55 seconds
C	110 seconds
D	220 seconds

23. - E5C06

What does the impedance 50-j25 represent?

Select	Answer
A	50 ohms resistance in series with 25 ohms capacitive reactance
B	50 ohms resistance in series with 25 ohms inductive reactance
C	25 ohms resistance in series with 50 ohms capacitive reactance
D	25 ohms resistance in series with 50 ohms inductive reactance

24. - E5D15

What is the power factor of an RL circuit having a 45-degree phase angle between the voltage and the current?

Select	Answer
A	0.866
B	0.707
C	1.0
D	0.5

25. - E6A03

Why does a PN-junction diode not conduct current when reverse biased?

Select	Answer
A	Only N-type semiconductor material can conduct current
B	Only P-type semiconductor material can conduct current
C	Excess holes in P-type material combine with the electrons in N-type material, converting the entire diode into an insulator
D	Holes in P-type material and electrons in the N-type material are separated by the applied voltage, widening the depletion region

26. - E6B04

What type of semiconductor device is designed for use as a voltage-controlled capacitor?

Select	Answer
A	Zener diode
B	Varactor diode
C	Silicon-controlled rectifier
D	Tunnel diode

27. - E6C02

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

Select	Answer
A	The comparator enters latch-up
B	The feedback loop becomes unstable
C	The comparator changes its output state
D	The IC input can be damaged

28. - E6D06

What core material property determines the inductance of an inductor?

Select	Answer
A	Thermal impedance
B	Reactivity
C	Resistance
D	Permeability

29. - 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	Nearly infinite gain, very high input impedance, and very low output impedance
C	The ability to retrieve information from a single signal even in the presence of other strong signals
D	Controlled gain, low noise figure, and constant input and output impedance over the specified frequency range

30. - E6F11

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

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

31. - E7A01

Which circuit is bistable?

Select	Answer
A	An AND gate
B	An OR gate
C	A bipolar amplifier
D	A flip-flop

32. - E7B02

What is a Class D amplifier?

Select	Answer
A	A frequency doubling amplifier
B	A type of amplifier that uses switching technology to achieve high efficiency
C	A low power amplifier that uses a differential amplifier for improved linearity
D	An amplifier that uses drift-mode FETs for high efficiency

33. - 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	A Butterworth filter
C	A Chebyshev filter
D	An active LC filter

34. - E7D06

What is the purpose of Q1 in the circuit shown in Figure E7-2?

Select	Answer
A	It provides D1 with current
B	It controls the current supplied to the load
C	It provides negative feedback to improve regulation
D	It provides a constant load for the voltage source

35. - E7E09

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

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

36. - E7F06

What is the minimum number of bits required for an analog-to-digital converter to sample a signal with a range of 1 volt at a resolution of 1 millivolt?

Select	Answer
A	6 bits
B	10 bits
C	4 bits
D	8 bits

37. - E7G10

What absolute voltage gain can be expected from the circuit in Figure E7-3 when R1 is 1800 ohms and RF is 68 kilohms?

Select	Answer
A	76
B	38
C	1
D	0.03

38. - E7H08

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

Select	Answer
A	Wirewound resistors
B	NP0 capacitors
C	Toroidal inductors
D	Non-inductive resistors

39. - E8A01

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

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

40. - E8B11

What is digital time division multiplexing?

Select	Answer
A	Two or more signals are arranged to share discrete time slots of a data transmission
B	Two or more data streams share the same channel by transmitting time of transmission as the sub-carrier
C	Two or more data streams are assigned to discrete sub-carriers on an FM transmitter
D	Two or more signals are quadrature modulated to increase bandwidth efficiency

41. - E8C03

Why should phase-shifting of a PSK signal be done at the zero crossing of the RF signal?

Select	Answer
A	All these choices are correct
B	To improve carrier suppression
C	To simplify modulation
D	To minimize bandwidth

42. - E8D11

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

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

43. - E9A07

What is the effective isotropic radiated power of a repeater station with 200 watts transmitter power output, 2 dB feed line loss, 2.8 dB duplexer loss, 1.2 dB circulator loss, and 7 dBi antenna gain?

Select	Answer
A	159 watts
B	63.2 watts
C	252 watts
D	632 watts

44. - E9B09

What type of computer program technique is commonly used for modeling antennas?

Select	Answer
A	Mutual impedance analysis
B	Method of Moments
C	Calculus differentiation with respect to physical properties
D	Graphical analysis

45. - E9C12

Which of the following describes an Extended Double Zepp antenna?

Select	Answer
A	A center-fed 1.25-wavelength antenna (two 5/8-wave elements in phase)
B	A wideband vertical antenna constructed from precisely tapered aluminum tubing
C	A portable antenna erected using two push support poles
D	An end-fed folded dipole antenna

46. - E9D09

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

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

47. - E9E06

Which of these feed line impedances would be suitable for constructing a quarter-wave Q-section for matching a 100-ohm loop to 50-ohm feed line?

Select	Answer
A	450 ohms
B	62 ohms
C	75 ohms
D	50 ohms

48. - E9F11

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

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

49. - E9G03

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

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

50. - E9H06

What is the triangulation method of direction finding?

Select	Answer
A	A fixed receiving station plots three headings to the signal source
B	Antenna headings from several different receiving locations are used to locate the signal source
C	A fixed receiving station uses three different antennas to plot the location of the signal source
D	The geometric angles of sky waves from the source are used to determine its position

Figure E7-2

Figure E7-3