I was first licensed as an FCC Novice Class amateur radio operator in 1971 at 15 years of age in the Seattle area. In the early 1980s, after college, I moved to the Jersey Shore and my ham radio project became development of AMTOR hardware and firmware. I was also part of the team that developed the TAPR TNC-2 packet radio controller. Fast forwarding to present time, I’m a member of the Garden State Amateur Radio Association based in Tinton Falls NJ and a life member of the ARRL.
I’m more of a radio experimenter and tinkerer than an operator. Most my ham radio time is spent at my workbench developing circuits and writing computer programs. I was off the air for about 15 years staring in 2000, but I’m becoming reacquainted with the hobby. Most of my HF on-air activity has been using the digital modes provided by FLDIGI. However I recently completed CW Academy’s advanced class, run by CWops, and that has been instrumental in getting me back on CW. I log HF contacts via LoTW but I also gladly exchange paper QSL cards, either direct or via the bureau.
Check out my Projects page to see some of the projects I’m currently working on.
As for my work life, I had the good fortune when I was in high school and college to work five summers in the central office of a small but technologically progressive independent telephone company, and then the last two summers of college as a toll test board technician for General Telephone of the NW (which later became part of Verizon). At these jobs I worked on systems as mundane as DC alarm current-loops and as interesting as MTS/ IMTS radio-telephone systems, multi-SSB-channel FM microwave radio systems (six different paths, several included passive reflectors) and T1 carrier (hey, it was the 70s). I learned a lot about electronics troubleshooting from the people I worked with during those summer jobs. After college (BSEL Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo; MS-ECE Univ of Michigan, Ann Arbor) most of my professional career was at Bell Labs in Holmdel NJ where I designed analog and digital communications equipment, DC to UHF. I’m named inventor on nine U.S. utility patents. Although I’m now retired, I’m still currently licensed as a Professional Engineer by the State of New Jersey.