Silly noob questions

[KD0GIV]

I'm fairly new to HF and very new to digital. I'm trying to make contacts on 40m using Mixw BPSK31. Everything seems to be working but no responses.

I'm using TS-430S, Versa Tuner II, inverted vee antenna (VSWR 1.2:1), SignaLink, and no CAT or other interfaces. I tune freq manually.

My question is when I'm looking at the waterfall and I see three red lines and I put the flag with the red and blue arrows on one, I see them calling CQ. The freq on the toolbar on the bottom will say 1.600KHz. I assume I'm adjust the RX and TX tone to get that one station.

I try to call back and get no response. I did this 50 times Saturday and Sunday and no QSO's. Is there any other tuning I need to do?

Thanks,

Pete
KD0GIV

[KL7AJ]

I'm fairly new to HF and very new to digital. I'm trying to make contacts on 40m using Mixw BPSK31. Everything seems to be working but no responses.

I'm using TS-430S, Versa Tuner II, inverted vee antenna (VSWR 1.2:1), SignaLink, and no CAT or other interfaces. I tune freq manually.

My question is when I'm looking at the waterfall and I see three red lines and I put the flag with the red and blue arrows on one, I see them calling CQ. The freq on the toolbar on the bottom will say 1.600KHz. I assume I'm adjust the RX and TX tone to get that one station.

I try to call back and get no response. I did this 50 times Saturday and Sunday and no QSO's. Is there any other tuning I need to do?

Thanks,

Pete
KD0GIV

Greetings.

Are you absolutely sure you don't have RIT or XIT enabled on your transceiver?

Just because you see YOUR trace on the waterfall, doesn't mean that's where you're actually transmitting! Also be sure you're on the correct sideband....PSK31 shouldn't care (or at least it figgers it out on its own), but you want to be sure anyway.

Eric

[KD0GIV]

Good idea but RIT is off, notch is off, and NB is off. I tried it with speech processor on and speech processor off too. ALC meter doesn't move either way so I'm thinking it shouldn't be distorted. Mic gain is set to 2.

I might have it on the wrong sideband but it is receiving very well. I'll double check that, thanks!

Pete

[KL7AJ]

Good idea but RIT is off, notch is off, and NB is off. I tried it with speech processor on and speech processor off too. ALC meter doesn't move either way so I'm thinking it shouldn't be distorted. Mic gain is set to 2.

I might have it on the wrong sideband but it is receiving very well. I'll double check that, thanks!

Pete

Next step is to set up a sked with a local station and see how you sound to him.

eric

[K7JBQ]

1) Make sure you're on upper sideband.

2) Turn the compressor off. Period.

3) Turn on the computer speaker and see if you can hear your own tones. They should sound the same way they do when you listen to other stations.

4) If you don't have split turned on, or RIT. and you line up so you can decode the other person, he should be able to do the same for you.

5) Make sure you have power out showing on the meter.

6) If all else fails, do what Eric suggested.

73,
Bill

[KD0GIV]

So, the sound coming from the monitor jack had some hash on it. I could hear PBSK31 tones but it sounded like hash bursting in every quarter second or so. No matter what the levels were it would make that repeating hash sound.

The manual said those jacks are not isolated and might not sound like what is going to the radio. I connected my PC speakers to the mic output and the hash was there too. I put SignaLink on my newer PC and it sounded great. Both running XP one is desktop 3GHz P4 the other is a laptop PIII 1GHz.

I check all the settings and driver version (USB generic) which they are the same. Thinking it might be RFI I tried putting on some ferrite chokes which made no difference. I tried grounding the laptop and SignaLink but no change. I'm starting to think it's dirty USB power from the old PC but I'm not sure.

I'm so close. Any ideas?

Thanks!

Pete

[K7JBQ]

Pete,

20 meters is wide open this morning, and I'm seeing all kinds of PSK signals. Set your freq to 14,070 and your psk signal to 1500 and transmit. I'll see if I can pick up your signal.

73,
Bill

[KD0GIV]

Pete,

20 meters is wide open this morning, and I'm seeing all kinds of PSK signals. Set your freq to 14,070 and your psk signal to 1500 and transmit. I'll see if I can pick up your signal.

73,
Bill

Thanks Bill that would be great! I'm sure it's not going to work though. After emailing Tigertronics it turns out it is not compatible with USB 1.0 which is what my laptop is. SignaLink is compatible with 1.1 or 2.0.

I did order a PCMCIA USB 2.0 card so maybe Monday I'll be up and running!

Thanks again!

Pete

[W4PG]

I'm using TS-430S, Versa Tuner II, inverted vee antenna (VSWR 1.2:1), SignaLink, and no CAT or other interfaces. I tune freq manually.

My question is when I'm looking at the waterfall and I see three red lines and I put the flag with the red and blue arrows on one, I see them calling CQ. The freq on the toolbar on the bottom will say 1.600KHz. I assume I'm adjust the RX and TX tone to get that one station.

The problem may be that you are not on the same frequency as you are receiving. I note that you are not using a CAT interface and tune manually. I think this is the problem.

Example:

For 20 meters, you tune to 14.070 mHz USB. With a 3 kHZ filter, you will see stations on the waterfall from 14.070 to 14.073 (about). When you click on on and see the "1.600 kHz" show up on the toolbar, it means you "tuned" 1.600 kHz above 14.070 TO LISTEN. Unless you have a CAT interface, when you transmit, you will be transmitting on 14.070 and the station will NOT hear you.

You will need to configure the software you are using so you XMIT and receive on the same frequency. You don't want to see "1.600 kHz" but instead ZERO kHz.

One way around this would be to first tune to 14.070, click on the waterfall EXACTLY on 14.070 then manually tune the rig and don't click on any station's waterfall, but manually move the frequency on the rig until the cursor on the waterfall exactly matches the received station's waterfall.

Then again this could be all wrong depending on how your software works.

As an aside, does your rig show output when you transmit?

............Bob

[KD0GIV]

The rig shows output it's just the sound from the SignaLink was garbled.

I got it working. Turns out the problem was that it wasn't compatible with the USB 1.0 on my old old laptop. I got a PCMCIA card with USB 2.0 and now it works perfectly. I've now upgraded to an Asus Eee PC which works even better.

THanks!

Pete
KD0GIV