The Extra Class License
Since the FCC stopped issuing Advanced Class licenses, I’ve been telling everyone that the reason I haven’t upgraded to Extra is that I want to be the last living Advanced Class licensee in the U.S. My resolve is weakening, though, for several reasons:
- Vanity. Lately, a couple of new guys in our club have not only gotten their licenses, but have now passed the Extra Class test. I do get some mileage out of this by joking with them when they ask me questions by saying, “Well, how should I know? I’m only an Advanced.” But even so, it’s kind of bizarre that they should have more operating priviledges than I do.
- 40m DX.Lately, there have been some band openings in the evenings on 40m. While I’ve worked a few Euros above 7.025 MHz, there are more of them down at the bottom of the band.
- I’m going to get it whether I like it or not. It looks like the FCC is going to do away with the Advanced class and issue us all Extra class licenses anyway. That being the case, I might as well take the test, so that I can say that I passed it. Not only that, who knows when the FCC will take this action? I might as well go for it now so that I can operate in the Extra Class subbands sooner rather than later.
I guess I’ll start reading the license manual.
