[TenTec] Re: #253 AutoTuner (revisited)

[Chuck (Jack) Hawley]

Brian Short wrote:

""I'm stuck between building a small "box" to connect to
 the remote control jack (15 pin Molex) and selling it?
 Very nice tuner, but I need it only for 80m...

 Anyway, I just got back from the parts store where I
 purchased a mating 15 pin Molex connector to begin the
 building of the "box."

 The plan is to use the band select lines for several
 preset spots of the 80m band...to allow QSY across the
 entire band without tuning and just flip switch to select
 preset/pretuned band portions...

 I am interested in what others have built for this type
 of purpose? I also plan to wire remote LEDs for the control
 indicators as the tuner is on my top shelf and I'd just
 like a small control "box" right by the radios (FT-1000d
 and FT-1000mp).""

That is exactly what I did. I used a 2 pole 10 pos switch, and used 8
pos on it. There are 8 mems actually because "no line selected" counts
as one. I used the other pole as an LED indicator. I program one pos to
be straight thru so that when I turn the thing on, I can go to that pos,
let it select straight thru (no roller inductor going to do this), and
then back to the pos I want to use. Note that if you turn the thing off
on one pos, and then turn the power back on with a different pos
selected, the roller will most likely run and the cpu will lose the
position of the roller. Then you have to do the realignment thing. This,
and the requirement of cycling the address after turn on are the biggest
bugs. The other bug is that the memory chip "fills up" according to TT.
At least it does not work for all addresses and has to be replaced. TT's
fix for this is to put in a socket for this......  I have noticed that
it does not need to be replaced as often if you do not do the autotune
thing as often. Just switching around with the switch box does not seem
to "fill up" the mem chip.

I like the thing for the most part. I wish that TT would have fixed the
bugs, but it seems like whoever designed the thing left town. Then they
discontinued it. So I guess it's a done deal.

Chuck.
--
Charles (Jack) Hawley
Chuck....Ham Radio KE9UW
AKA "Jack" BMW Motorcycles, MOA #224 K100RS
Wife rides...Viki, MOA #18120 K100RS
President IBMWR
c-hawley@uiuc.edu
Sr. Research Engineer Emeritus
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign



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