My parents named me Keith.  The FCC calls me WH7GG, Whiskey Hotel Seven Golf Golf. 

I am an amateur radio operator (otherwise known as a “ham”) based out of Kailua, Hawaii.  I passed my Technician exam (the entry level amateur radio exam in the United States) in June 2007, got my callsign in July 2007, and got on the air with the help of a co-worker, a well-known ham here in these parts. 

Currently, I frequent the local 146.88 MHz (-) repeater here on Oahu and attend meetings of the Emergency Amateur Radio Club.

As a relatively new ham, I still have a lot to learn.  Right now I hope to get a better antenna, learn Morse Code, and eventually get my General and maybe even my Extra down the road.  Part of the reason for putting up this blog in the first place is to aid my learning and perhaps help others later on.

My current equipment consists of the following:

• Yaesu FT-7800R dual band mobile (50W max on 2m, 40W max on 70cm) as my base, connected to a Samlex SEC-1223 power supply
• Yaesu FT-60R dual band walkie with a Diamond SRH-519 after-market duck antenna
• Mobile antennas: MFJ 1724B quarter-wave dual-band (temporarily doing base duty); Workman KS1SMA quarter-wave dual-band

When I’m not on the air, I enjoy music, computers, and distance running.

And no, despite how the last two letters of my callsign (GG) are read in ITU phonetics, I’ve tried, but I just can’t hit that little white ball. My hand-eye coordination is pretty much non-existent. I just happened to be between WH7GF and WH7GH when callsigns were assigned.

If you have any helpful hints, feel free to comment on any of my entries…your comments may also help someone else later on.  Feel free to check out the rest of my site.

And if you want to learn more about ham radio, the Amateur Radio Relay League is a good place to start.

Legalese

All text copyright © 2008 Keith K. Higa. All rights reserved.

Graphic elements released under the following licenses:

• Ham with antenna: CC-BY-SA 3.0. Uses portions of the photograph UHF-Antenn.jpg by Wikimedia Commons user Vask, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:UHF-antenn.jpg.
• Pineapple background in header: CC-BY-SA 3.0. Uses a portion of the photograph Ananas comosus dsc07804.jpg by David Monniaux, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Ananas_comosus_dsc07804.jpg.