Hello and welcome to my homepage, thanks for stopping by ! Here is a little info about myself , My name is Frank, my QTH is Summerville, SC. I am happily married to my lovely wife of 14 years Sarah, who holds a general class ticket and the call KG4NKG. I have one daughter, Samantha, age 19 who also holds a general class ticket. I was first licensed on June 20th, 2000 after a couple years of studying for my tech off and on. Yep, I was and still am a procrastinator!
It's often wondered how people become ham operators' well heres my story. I had been interested in radio and computers for a couple of years prior to becoming a ham. I think that my first actual interest in the wide world of radio was when I had the ability to talk mobile to mobile with my wife on CB (who was BTW at the time my girlfriend). Like most folks these days, I tinkered around with CB for a few years made lots of friends and generaly had a good time for the most part. But as time wore on, CB got very boring. There was lots of undesirables doing everything from well, you know. In a quote from my favorite movie Forrest Gump, "Thats all that I have to say about that".
I decided that I wanted more...much more; I decided to get my ticket once and for all. For Christmas one year, I asked my loving wife to buy me a copy of Look whos talking from radio shack. Well, Santa brought me the book and man...I found out that there was a world of radio and electronics out there that I never even had a clue about. I studied this book off and on for a year or so and decided to get the new and updated question pool. My wife Sarah and I happened to be in our local Barnes & Noble one day shopping and I could not find anything on ham radio, so I asked for help. What I got was a poor confused teenage employee that had no clue what it was that I was talking about. By chance, there happened to be an older gentleman who overheard me ask about the ham radio books and introduced himself to my wife and I.
Long story short, he put me in contact with KC4ED Ed Frank (SK). I talked to Ed on the phone and it just so happened that there was a testing session the next day so I went and took the tech test and lo and behold, I passed with flying colors! Since then, I have passed my 5 wpm code test, the general have moved on to extra class thanks to all the help I got from my good friend and elmer, Alex KR1ST. I have to say, the extra was the hardest test I have ever taken but it was well worth the effort in the end.Since becomming a ham, I have joined the ARRL, which I feel every US ham should at least be affiliated with if not a member.
Some of my other interests include photography, camping, contesting, and experimenting with new wire antennas. I am a member of the Low Country Contest Club, and can be found in most of the bigger contests throughout the year. Most of the time, I try to represent the QRP side of the club as most of our guys run 100 watts or more during contests. One of my favorite things to do is to collect vintage radio ads and antique radios. I have been collecting now for about eight years now and have a wide variety of ads and tube radios. More recently in the past couple of years, I have taken on the challenge of doing some restoration to these old sets, both electronic and cabinet work. In the near future, I will be posting some of my projects for all to see. I hope that you enjoy my website, feel free to look around and post you comments or suggestions in my blog and I would love to have you sign the guestbook.
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