17 Mar 2023

FT-710 and FT8

As our visitor arrived earlier than expected, I was unable to do the firmware update until Friday AM. I am taking things in easy stages. The CAT now works correctly. FT8 RX works correctly. The PC is doing (yet another!!) Windows update and I will try FT8 TX next.

My brain is like treacle with things that would have been so easy in the past now being unbelievably hard.

Stations spotting my FT8 TX with
10W from the FT-710 on 10m today
UPDATE 1451z: Now working on FT8 on TX and RX. For some reason it refused to work on TX with RTS selected (as they say do), but works when CAT selected in WSJT-X. Odd. 144 stations have already spotted me!


UPDATE 1506z:
OK I am lazy!  My TX is currently set to "fix TX frequency" in WSJT-X, meaning I rarely go after others. With 271 stations spotting me, I have not been called by a single station.  ALC is very low and I am running about 10W.

UPDATE 1528z: So far today on 10m FT8  with about 10W spotted by 317 unique stations using the FT-710. May try 12m.

UPDATE  1758z: My 2m big-wheel and coax match on my FT-710, so I am giving 4m a try. I am on 70.154 MHz with about 10W of FT8, although there seems some uncertainty about the 4m FT8 frequency.

UPDATE 1827z:  No spots of me (or others) on 4m FT8. I hope I am on the right spot.

UPDATE 2101z: I gave up on 4m for several reasons: not sure of FT8 frequency, poor antenna, low activity. Now on 6m FT8 and being spotted by quite a few. Furthermost on 6m FT8 is MI0BOT (478km). The convention in the UK is to TX evens, but of course more UK stations will spot you on "odd" periods as they are listening then. Judging by the number of stations on RX (none at all!) I guess most people are just on RX.
Stations spotting me
tonight on 6m FT8 TX
UPDATE 2211z:   QRT now. 14 spots of me on 6m FT8 TX.

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