The Wheaton Community Radio Amateurs VE Team conducts examinations for Amateur Radio licenses typically on a Thursday of every month at the Helen M. Plum Memorial Library in Lombard, Illinois. The exam session begins at 6:30 pm and ends at 8:30 pm. Pre-registration is not necessary and "walk-ins" are always welcome. WCRA volunteer examiners are accredited by the ARRL VEC.
| 2011 Upcoming Exam Dates and Results | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Date | Elements Passed |
New Hams |
Upgrades |
| January 23 (Sunday) WCRA Mid-Winter Hamfest 2011 |
12 | 3 | 9 |
| February NO TESTING | - | - | - |
| March NO TESTING | - | - | - |
| April 14 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| May 26 | 7 | 3 | 3 |
| June 30 | 5 | 1 | 3 |
| July 28 | 4 | 3 | 1 |
| August 23 - Tuesday | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| September 29 | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| October NO TESTING | - | - | - |
| November 17 | 4 | 1 | 3 |
| December 22 | 4 | 2 | 2 |
| 2012 Exam Dates | |||
| January 22 (@ WCRA HamFest) | 9 | 5 | 4 |
| January 26 | 3 | 2 | 0 |
| February 23 | |||
| March 22 | |||
If you've studied the ARRL license manuals and are comfortable with the questions in the question pool, then you are probably ready to take the test. If, on the other hand, you have been passing on-line practice exams and doing little else in the way of preparing, then it has been the team's experience that you are likely not sufficiently prepared to pass the written exam. This is not a blanket indictment of on-line test sites, just our observation that students who fail the written tests, especially the entry-level Technician test, often state that they can't understand why they failed since they "always pass" the on-line test.
The Question and Answer Pools are in the public domain, per FCC regulation, but these provide no background material to help future hams actually understand the answers. There are many study guides available that do provide this background and the team has made some recommendations below.
The exam is a 35-question, multiple-choice exam. Questions are drawn from a pool of over 500 questions. The subject breakdown is covered in the next table.
Rather than try to memorize the pool, the WCRA VE Team recommends the following ARRL study guides for people interested in obtaining a Technician-class license:
For candidates studying for the General- and Amateur Extra-class licenses, the team recommends the following ARRL study guides:
General
Class License Manual
As reference material, particularly for the Technician exam, the team
recommends
ARRL's
FCC Rule Book: Complete Guide to the FCC Regulations
| Technician Exam Breakdown | ||
|---|---|---|
| Sub Element | Subject | Number of Questions on Exam (Total 35) |
| T1 | FCC Rules | 5 |
| T2 | Methods of Communication | 2 |
| T3 | Radio Phenomena | 2 |
| T4 | Station Licensee Duties | 3 |
| T5 | Control Operator Duties | 3 |
| T6 | Good Operating Practices | 3 |
| T7 | Basic Communications Electronics | 3 |
| T8 | Good Engineering Practice | 6 |
| T9 | Special Operations | 2 |
| T0 | Electrical, Antenna Structure and RF Safety Practices | 6 |
Successful Technician candidates should be familiar (very familiar) with the following:
FCC Amateur Service Rules (47 CFR 97), especially amateur radio band allocations.
Basic station operation and RF safety
Basic radio wave propagation (D/E/F layers, tropospheric effects, etc)
Ohm's Law and other basic electronics
Formulae like "468 / f" and "300 / f"
Tests for the theory elements (Elements 2, 3 and 4) are multiple choice and hand graded, so pencil or pen are permitted. Bring two! Simple electronic calculators are permitted, although the volunteer examiners may ask you to demonstrate that any memories have been cleared. For 2012, the ARRL VEC fee for participating in the test session is $15 (for one attempt at all three license elements). This fee covers costs associated with preparing the exams and transmitting the data to the FCC. It covers all exam elements that a candidate passes in a given test session. If a candidate fails an element at an exam session and wants to re-test for the same element, an additional fee will be required.
One form of identification, one of which must be a picture ID, will be needed. A driver's license is ideal. If you are already an Amateur Radio Operator and you are upgrading, you'll need to bring your FCC license (original and copy), as well any Certificate of Successful Completion of Examination (CSCE - also original and copy). Make sure you bring copies of all licenses and CSCEs to the exam session! These must be transmitted to the FCC, and we will not send the originals.
Form 605: If you'd like to speed up your test session, consider obtaining an NCVEC Form 605 (Instructions for Form 605). This is the form that all VECs, ARRL VEC included, use to collect candidate information in preparation for transmission to the FCC. Complete Section 1 only and leave any confusing boxes blank until the night of the exam.
Note: The FCC requires licensees to register in their Universal Licensing System before a license can be issued. The ARRL VEC will handle this task for candidates, but candidates will need to incude their TIN, or Taxpayer Identification Number, on the Form 605. Since the TIN is a candidate's Social Security Number, candidates who wish to further protect their privacy may wish to pre-register in the ULS and then enter their assigned FRN ("FCC Registration Number") on Form 605. Current licensees may have their FRN printed on their license; if not, FRNs can be determined by visiting an online callsign server.
The Helen M. Plum Memorial Library
110 W Maple Street
Lombard, Illinois 60148
is located on the
NW corner of S Park and W Maple Streets in Lombard. Public parking is
available on Maple Street and in the lot on the NE corner of Park and
Maple Streets.
This event is not sponsored by or endorsed by the Helen M.
Plum Memorial Library.
The ARRL maintains a database of upcoming exams in Illinois as well as the rest of the country.
Once a new candidate has successfully passed an examination the WCRA VE team completes the necessary paperwork and sends the results to the ARRL VEC. The ARRL VEC verifies the paperwork and forwards the information to the FCC. The FCC then grants the Amateur licensees. Once a candidate's information and callsign appear in the the FCC database, the license is considered legally granted and the candidate may begin to operate immediately! If an existing Amateur Radio operator passes an exam to a higher class license (i.e. Technician upgrading to General), that new license privilege is effective immediately. In both cases, a paper copy of the granted license normally follows several weeks later. A variety of databases are available on the net where candidates may check to see if the FCC has acted on their application.
K9MUF, W9GMR, NE9ET, AE9JG and K9HK
K9HK - Harry Kamer - Volunteer Exam Team Coordinator NE9ET - George Greene W9GWR - George Reichert AE9JG - Janie Gallina K9MUF - Don Webster