[CQ-Contest] Antenna Switching

[AB2E Darrell]

Hi Lee,
At my old QTH 7yrs ago, I had a Sixpak hooked up using an A/B switch.
For the secondary antenna on the Sixpak, probably the cheapest (and easy) solution is something like a Top Ten Devices A/B switch.
These were $100 new, but I see them occasionally $50-60 used.
You would need to power it with a small toggle switch and remember to change it manually when needed.

A nice antenna switch out there that would do it almost automatically (builtin band decoder) is the Ameritron RCS-12 antenna switch.
8 antennas, autotracks with the rig's band via a radio interface cable from the RCS-12, which I am currently using.
The first antenna per band shows a solid LED for 1-8.
You select a secondary antenna by holding that button. For instance, Ant1 is your primary, Ant2 is your secondary for 20m, and could be multiband, doesn't matter.
Ant2 will blink if you had most recently selected Ant1.
Just tap Ant2 quickly to switch to that antenna, and tap 1 to go back again.

Not for SO2R, since this is a single radio at a time switch.
73
Darrell AB2E


________________________________
From: CQ-Contest <cq-contest-bounces+ab2e=hotmail.com at contesting.com> on behalf of Lee Hiers <lee.hiers at gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, September 18, 2023 11:23 AM
To: CQ-Contest Reflector <cq-contest at contesting.com>
Subject: [CQ-Contest] Antenna Switching

Hi Folks,

I've got an old Array Solutions SixPak antenna switch.  I'm thinking about
using band decoders (or however it's done these days, depending on the rig)
to have the antenna switch automatically follow the radios' bands.

The question I have is, if I'm on my main 20m antenna and want to change to
a SE tribander, say, how is that generally implemented?  Presumably I'd
want to be able to select that secondary antenna from either radio.  How
are folks doing the auto-antenna-switch override?

73 de Lee, AA4GA
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