How to Use Built-in Automatic Antenna Tuner in FT-710

 My FT-710 radio has a built-in automatic antenna tuner which can tune up to an SWR of 3:1. It is quite handy as my antennas being homebrewed, do not have exact match from one end of the amateur radio band to the other end. So having a low range built-in antenna tuner makes it comfortable to work the whole extent of the band without any mismatch. But if I want to tune a long wire or to a band for which the antenna is not meant, I need an external antenna tuner with range at least 10:1 of SWR.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Six Button Wireless Mouse vs Three Button Mouse

Image
 When I started using computers long back, mouse had only two buttons, a left and a right button. Then came three button mouse with an extra scroll button. I have read that there was also a single button mouse, but I have not seen one. Now here is a six button mouse, that too a wireless mouse with a USB-A Nano Dongle and 2.4 Ghz wireless connection. In the earlier era, mouse had a rolling ball which would gather dirt and sometimes stop functioning well. Now we have optimal mouse which uses a red light source and an optical sensor instead of the rolling ball. The wireless mouse works on a single 1.5 V, AA battery with a projected battery life of one year!
Read more

Debut Ham Radio Technical Discussion Net on 7065 kHz, 1:45 am UTC (7.15 am IST)

Image
Started by calling CQ on 7065 kHz using my automated CQ call which I had described yesterday. VU3RFT joined first followed by VU2EHA. Had a good discussion on Center Fed and End Fed Dipole Antennas. VU2EHA and VU3RFT participated. All of us were using inverted V dipole antennas. VU2EHA had 40 and 20m dipoles on same mast. VU3RFT was using 1:1 current balun. I mentioned that I am using 40/10m center fed dipoles with 1:1 current balun. VU2EHA asked about 15m dipole. I suggested that the 40m dipole will work well on 15m as it is an odd harmonic. He mentioned a problem because his IC-718 does not have an autotuner. We lost propagation at around 7.35 am IST. Wonder whether there was a geomagnetic storm? Number of waterfalls on 40m band decreased very much at that time. Planning to try again tomorrow at the same time. SWLs can monitor at  http://vu3wew.ddns.net:8073/ , the OpenWebRX by VU3WEW, located about 10km from here and likely to pick up my signals very well. Being a WebSDR, it can be
Read more

Building a Tape Measure Yagi for LEO Satellite Operations

Image
 The Moxon Yagi which I have been using for my LEO Satellite operations had a Moxon rectangle for VHF and five UHF Yagi elements which were passively coupled to the VHF Moxon driven element. The gain was not that high when I thought of working SO-121 QRP satellite. VU2TEK had good success with his Tape Measure Yagi which motivated me to go for one. But I don't expect the same success as he was operating outdoors, pointing the Tape Measure Yagi in the direction of the satellite pass. I am planning to use only in a mast mounted fashion which will limit its usability for satellite passes to a short period of about 4 minutes. I have chosen the DK7ZB design which I have been looking at for a quite a long time. That design has 5 elements for VHF and 8 elements for UHF with a boom length of about 1.5m. First step was to get a wooden reaper to use as the boom. Earlier it used to be available in all electrical wiring accessories shops. But now with the usage of PVC channels for wiring, I w
Read more