If you're lucky like I was your noise is caused by a problem with the local utility company who was willing to take the time to find it and fix it.  Here's how my noise got "cancelled":

http://www.remote.arrl.org/news/features/2003/08/10/1/?nc=1

GL -- Dino KL0S/4

My good friend Sam KT4QW had one of these articles in QST.  See:

http://www.members.cox.net/xsamo/

Dino KL0S/4

The service monitor route is a good way to go as long as you want to work below 1 GHZ.  Built signal and tracking generators make it a snap to tune receivers, filters and duplexers.  Same caveat emptor notes for service monitors....one of the big things that seem to go south are the signal generator attentuators, most especially the analog type.  The attenuator in my IFR 1500 went bad a couple of years after I got it -- they are EXPENSIVE to replace (ended up putting a digital attenuator in its place).

The Army MARS program will allow applicants who are 17 years of age with the signature of a parent or guardian.

Depending on how old your RV is it MAY be coming from the ballast(s) in any overhead flourescent lights you may have.  The company that make those (the name escapes me) acknowledged that was a problem and used ot send out a free kit of capacitors you could install to reduce/eliminate the interference.  I believe they changed the design at some point to address that issue and thus my comment on how old your rig might be.

We had a similar problem and the once I installed the caps the interference disappeared.

Former Winnebago/Itasca owner.

Dino KL0S/4

One big thing you'll notice between the two brands is the tremendous difference in weight between the units.  I used a Ham IV for many years and switched to the Yaesu G-1000SDX when we moved to the current QTH.  When the box arrived I picked it up and thought that they had forgotten to put the rotator in the box!  Sure 'nuff it was in there.  So I set it up temporarily and stood on top of the rotator to see if it would swing me around and it turned me with ease.

The rotator has been swinging about 10 square feet of antenna for seven years now with no problems at all.  I  particularly like the "Preset" feature and rotation speed control the Yaesu control box offer.  Additionally, you do not have to disengage the brake as you do with the Hy-Gain units when you turn the array.

GL -- Dino KL0S/4

Bud -- the connectors on the back of the SE-3 are RCA "phono" type (speaker and IF input from the receiver); your RX-340 IF output of course is a BNC connector.  You can either make up a special cable with BNC on one end and RCA on the other or use audio type adapters to mate whatever cable you have available.

You'll enjoy using the SE-3 with your 340.

Dino KL0S/4

Bud -- the instructions are on the addendum-errata sheet to the manual -- that should have come along with your rig (got mine back in late '01).  Here's how to do it:

"The display intensity of the RX-340 can be varied.  Press and hold the SETUP button.  While holding the button down, turn the MEMORY/SCAN knob.  The lower display will show a display intensity percentage value from 0-100% and the display can be adujsted by turning the knob."

Enjoy the new radio!

Dino KL0S/4

We're considering buying a new vehicle with an installed GPS based navigation system.  Wonder if anyone has interfaced any of these manufacturer installed systems into their APRS setup?

Dino KL0S/4

JD - I did my L7 here recently and had exactly the same question. If you're lucky like I was you'll find that those additional capacitors are already installed!!!  Look inside the box that contains the input coils and count the number of silver micas in there -- if you look at the schematic you'll see 8 caps for the domestic version and then the two export model caps marked in dotted lines.  Add them all up and you get a total of 10 -- if there are 10 inside the box then you should be ok (and if you look carefully you can see the connections in the correct orientation for those two caps).  If not bless your heart if you can do it....as I was getting help from the Drake reflector one guy told me he was able to install those caps with "...a couple of hemostats and LOTS of bad words!"

The other part of the mod is MUCH easier, just bypassing the high-pass filter...be careful to follow the instructions.  Doing that is a lot easier than replacing the entire run of coax.

Hope you're lucky like I was.

GL - Dino KL0S/4

Try:

http://www.winternet.com/~nedbalek/appleii.html

This may be what you're looking for.

Dino KL0S/4

Don -- lots of us have had good luck with the Keyspan series of USB to serial adapters.

Take a look at:

http://www.keyspan.com/products/homepage-Serial.spml

Dino KLØS/4

Bernie -- check out XPWare at:

http://www.glaswerks.com/xpware/

Works fine on my XP machine driving two PK-232's.

Dino KL0S/4

Page 46 in the TS-940S manual:

Operation with a Second Receiver.  If you prefer operating another receiver in place of the TS-940S receiver section, you may share the antenna from the TS-940S during receive-time.  Flip the rear panel RX-ANT switch to EXTERNAL, and connect the antenna input of your second receiver to the RX ANT terminal using 50 ohm coaxial cable.  Reduce the AF Gain setting on the transceiver to zero.  Mute the external receiver from pin 4 and GROUND of the remote connector.  If a linear amplifier is also used with the transceiver, diode isolate the external receiver and linear to Pin 4, and be sure combined current is less than the maximum rating for this terminal.

Operation with a Separate Receiver Antenna.  Use the XVTR port and an 8 Pin DIN Plug, Part E07-0851-05

Pin 9 -- HF Ant output from the TS-940S
Pin 5 -- RX Ant input
Pin 3 -- GND

Either wire your extra antenna to pin 5 and ground, and use the DIN plug as the connect/disconnect, or wire pins 8 and 5 and the external antenna through a SPDT switch.

Although Hy-Gain retains the word "Towers" in their company name they are not currently producing any towers. They will fabricate tower bases for those of you who have to move your tower to a new QTH. Beyond that they currently do not stock any other replacement or repair parts for their former line of towers. Hy-Gain was purchased by MFJ several years ago and I have asked them to please look at supplying at least cable replacement sets and associated hardware. Martin Jue's office (MFJ) informed me that (1) they are interested in having Hy-Gain produce towers in the future and (2) based on customer requests will consider making a first step by carrying repair parts again.

I'm sure there are lots of Hy-Gain towers out there, getting a little long in the tooth by now. So if you think you'll need repair parts in the future a note to MFJ may help them make their decision to support us.