I guess the posters of this diatribe that see nothing wrong with these "trashy" Chinese-like assembled ciruits of impurity ethier have never put one of them on a spectrum analyzer or don't understand the concept of spectural purity and how it obiterates the spectrum. As stated hams should always strive for clean signals at any expense not settle for trash just because it is affordable.
Bob

FT-1000 Mark V has one lousy noise blanker and the Inrad roofing filter is a must. I owned one sold it and for some reason bought another made the same mods and sold it again.Bought a Kenwodd TS-2000X with a noise blanker that really works and have a new Ten Tec Omini VII on order. Yaesu radios are that last radio I would buy. There are too many superior radios out there. Look and see how many FT-2000 are suddenly for sale. It was just introduced a few months ago. ANd there are just as many Mark V for sale as well.
FWIW
Bob

A $2000 radio would be incentive to buy a brand spanking new one as opposed to a used one. TS-2000, FT-1000 Mark V even Ten Tec sells used Orion I for around that.

A very good radio can be purchased for $1000 at that. I would be wary. At least if he were a ham it wouldn't be to hard to find some character witnesses.
Bob

Like Tom N6AJR I too have owned both the FT-847 and now have a TS-2000X. Both radios are good satellite rigs. Other than the fact the 847 is much older and discontinued would steer me towards the TS-2000 and I might add that the HF section of the 847 is not that good I don't think and there are 2 ceramic Murata filters in the 847 that have pretty broad skirts.

The fact that the TS-2000 has adjustable filtering is a plus. My advice is if your wallet can produce the TS-2000 I would buy it over the FT-847 but again the 847 is a very good radio as well.Your HF section of the 847 would improve as one could improve the antenna for HF it just depends on your station like in a rural setting as opposed to urban.
Bob KA0MR
Kansas City

Just a guess but I would be lookng at Mercury or Sodium streetlights or walpaks on commercial buildings firing up at sunset. If you have a bad ballast in those after they come up to operating tempature the laminations on transformer begin to soften and if they are at the end of their life they begin to microarc.

I am a railroad electrician and change ballast routinly along BNSF right of way and yards and use a hadheld scanner set to AM mode to find many that way. Look for blinking on and off in cycles as well because if they contine to blink on and off the ballast is soon to die because of the rapid refiring.

So if you have streetlights or a barnlight if you live in the country.

Bob KA0MR

All you have to do is notify your credit card company of the dispute and I am sure it will be cleared up. Vertex will have to show what they have chrge and your bill will reflect what has been charge and they will compare.

Your treatment by the staff does not degrade Vertex's fine equipment. Deal with the staff not the product.
Bob

If my memory serves me the 148 is cut for the FM portion of 2m and the 144 is cut for the SSB end. I have the owners manual for the 148-20T if you need it on PDF.
Bob

Do you have you Lat/Long correctly stated in your beacon statement and the other parameters associated with position.

As you know your position must be entered as you have no regular updating being handled by the program from a GPS source.

This would include any other beacon type transmsission such a LT etc.

The D700 uses Tasco AX.25 protocol and it is bit different than the usual.

Bob

I am always amused on these electronics posts how an old chap such as N6AJR in this case makes an honest post and instantly he is picked apart because of his spelling, punctuation.

Have you critics not noticed how easy it is to miskey something and at times make a technical error of some sorts.

Notice that the rate at which people are posting questions on here seem to be less and less and days go by. Maybe it's because so many are ready to pounce at clerical errors instead of promoting idea exchange and lessons learned in the world of amateur radio.

What difference does it make if one mispells something particularly those that have a bit of trouble with the english language.

Bob

I have one and I have learned more about DSP with this little gadget since I have. I ahve compared it sensitivity to my Pegasus and I can hear things the Ten-Tec doesn't hear and the Spectrum Analyzer Display is a real added feature.

The fact that direct conversion image problems are now overcome by softare filtering rather than passive filtering so you maintain the lowest discernable signal and it is not lost by the mechanical filtering that so plagues todays methods.

The key of this little gizmo is it's simplicity of hardware and limitless software capabilities rendering this SDR 1000 limited only by imagination.

But to bring the SDR-1000 into it's real world it is necessary to use a 24-bit soundcard. I have used the Creative Labs Audigy 2 and the Turtle Beach and the Turtle Beach is superior vs the Audigy for this particular application.

For audio recording and playback musicwise the Audigy 2 is superior so don't waste the money on the Audigy go for the Turtle Beach because the Audigy is overkill.

I have not regretted once buying this SDR-1000 from Fleex-Radio.

Bob KAØMR

I had a standing order of Rohn Tower sections and misc. through another vendor the order seemed to be stalled for no apparent reason. I discovered that Rohn had quietly filed for bankruptcy.

The vendor I had the order with graciously agreed to refund my money but while I waited for it to come and tower deadline rapidly approching I frantically called all over for Rohn parts noe to be found but WB0W had what I needed but was told they would go fast due to the circumstances and everyone was trying to get parts as well suffering the same delima.

On a particular Staurday last fall was the only day possible for me to drive and pick it up but they were not going to be there due to a hamfest commitment however they had one of their workers come to their place in St. Joseph, Mo. on his regular day off and I drove 5 hours one way to retrieve these allusive parts.

This is service second to none. How can you not shop with them knowing they go to such lengths to help someone out.

Bob KA0MR
Moundrdige, Kansas

I had a standing order of Rohn Tower sections and misc. through another vendor the order seemed to be stalled for no apparent reason. I discovered that Rohn had quietly filed for bankruptcy.

The vendor I had the order with graciously agreed to refund my money but while I waited for it to come and tower deadline rapidly approching I frantically called all over for Rohn parts noe to be found but WB0W had what I needed but was told they would go fast due to the circumstances and everyone was trying to get parts as well suffering the same delima.

On a particular Staurday last fall was the only day possible for me to drive and pick it up but they were not going to be there due to a hamfest commitment however they had one of their workers come to their place in St. Joseph, Mo. on his regular day off and I drove 5 hours one way to retrieve these allusive parts.

This is service second to none. How can you not shop with them knowing they go to such lengths to help someone out.

Bob KA0MR
Moundrdige, Kansas

I was amused at your excitment. We all have been there.
Ain't it great. Have fun and hope to work you.
Bob KAØMR

Just run a (insulated)ground wire then run another wire 10% longer and then a third 10% longer than the last (3 wires total) all connected parallel only at the ends.

By doing this it will ensure a non-resonant ground because each wire is of a different length.

Bob

                      Subpart C--Special Operations
 
Sec. 97.221  Automatically controlled digital station.

    (a) This rule section does not apply to an auxiliary station, a
beacon station, a repeater station, an earth station, a space station,
or a space telecommand station.
    (b) A station may be automatically controlled while transmitting a
RTTY or data emission on the 6 m or shorter wavelength bands, and on the
28.120-28.189 MHz, 24.925-24.930 MHz, 21.090-21.100 MHz, 18.105-18.110
MHz, 14.0950-14.0995 MHz, 14.1005-14.112 MHz, 10.140-

[[Page 573]]

10.150 MHz, 7.100-7.105 MHz, or 3.620-3.635 MHz segments.
    (c) A station may be automatically controlled while transmitting a
RTTY or data emission on any other frequency authorized for such
emission types provided that:
    (1) The station is responding to interrogation by a station under
local or remote control; and
    (2) No transmission from the automatically controlled station
occupies a bandwidth of more than 500 Hz.