[TenTec] Working the Weak Ones

[Rick - NJ0IP / DJ0IP]

Toby, I had an Argonaut 515 until about half a year ago.
It incorporated the Triton IV RX.
I ran it side by side with the Omni VI+ and Orion, as well as K2 and TS-480
for many years.
I could almost always hear just as well with it as I could with any of the
others....but not during big contests.

I replaced the Argonaut with the FT-900 because it has more bands and a
general coverage RX.
Sometimes I think it was a downgrade, but most of the time I am enjoying its
features which the Argonaut did not have.

The Omni VII (or K3) will be my contest rig.
Most of the time it will be off and I'll be using the FT-900.
It doesn't need bells and whistles - just a good RX.

My gut feeling is that the K3 will be better for that, but if I only had one
rig, for sure I would rather it be the Omni VII.

73
Rick

-----Original Message-----
From: tentec-bounces at contesting.com [mailto:tentec-bounces at contesting.com]
On Behalf Of Toby Pennington
Sent: Sunday, April 25, 2010 8:20 AM
To: Ten Tec List
Subject: [TenTec] Working the Weak Ones

Rick wrote>>>> But what if I need a real weak one in the contest, and there
is lots of
QRM....
The K3 beats about anything except the high end rigs. >>>>>>>>>>

I have recently bought an old Triton 4 with matching power supply and
external VFO.  I have been doing A/B comparisons with the Icom 7700 in
regards to hearing the weaker signals.  

I was totally blown away when I found out the Triton 4 could hear the weaker
ones better.  The Triton is very quiet and you can hear a pin drop with it.
I have line noise,  and found out the Triton 4 noise blanker actually worked
better with no distortion on the received signal.  I would put the Triton up
against any rig as far as sensitivity and selectivity is concerned.  And
speaking of cost,  just a few hundred bucks will set you up with this old
rig. ( IF you can find one )  But,  In heavy QRM the K3 or the Omni 7 would
be better as the Triton uses audio filtering.  No passband tuning either. 

Of course I know the newer rigs have lots of other features in their feature
set especially all that comes with DSP.  But for a 35 year old rig I can say
I am totally impressed!  

Rick,  I know this is of no help at all,,,,but is simply pointing out that
you can't always go by specs.   I believe W8JI made this comment,  if you
have a 2 tone IMD at 2khz of somewhere in the 80s,  this will be sufficient
95% of the time. 

Do you really need the specs which the K3 offers?  IF you do,  then that is
the rig to buy.  It certainly offers many ways to load it up with varying
prices as you have pointed out.  

Good Luck with your decision!    Toby  W4CAK



  






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