License Exam Quiz #391

de Steve, AE8AT 

This week’s quiz is to honor a woman I suspect most will not have heard of prior to this quiz. Born 28 September 1890 in Melbourne, Australia, Florence Violet McKenzie was a signals trainer in WWII. In 1921 she was running a radio sales and repair shop, and experimented with television. She graduated from the Sydney Technical College in 1923 with a diploma in electrical engineering, probably the first woman in Australia to earn the degree. In 1924 she became the first female certified as a radio telegraphist and the first female to hold an amateur license in Australia. In 1938 she was the treasurer for the Australian Women’s Flying Club, and was training pilots in Morse code. Foreseeing the need, in 1939 she founded the Women’s Emergency Signaling Corps. By the start of WWII (3 Sept 1939 for Australia) she had trained over 1,000 women in signals, and by August of 1945 it is estimated her school trained 12,000 men and several thousand more women. Following the war she continued to train thousands of aviators and merchant marine sailors. Straying now toward the operating frequencies, it seems the Australians preferred HF due to the terrain and jungle canopy where they operated in southeast asia. Wireless Set 101 operated between 4.2 and 6.8 MHz. Wireless set 108 had three versions operating 8.5 to 8.9 MHz, 6.0 to 9.0 MHz, and 2.5 to 3.5 MHz. Set 208, Morse only, also in the 2.5 to 3.5 MHz range. And Set 19 typically installed in armored vehicles operated from 2.0 to 8.0 MHz with an additional tactical radio at 230 to 240 MHz.

T8D09 What is CW?

A. A type of electromagnetic propagation

B. A digital mode used primarily on 2-meter FM

C. Error correction for digital transmission using code words

D. Another name for a Morse code transmission

G2C03 What does it mean when a CW operator sends “KN” at the end of a transmission?

A. No US stations should call

B. Operating full break-in

C. Listening only for a specific station or stations

D. Closing station now

E8D04 What is the primary effect of extremely short rise or fall time on a CW signal?

A. More difficult to copy

B. The generation of RF harmonics

C. The generation of key clicks

D. More difficult to tune

Answers:

T8D09 = D

G2C03 = C

E8D04 = C