Well....I'm sitting here scratching my head......
My radio club runs a "Net" on Thursday nights, where we all gather around a local 2 Meter repeater, do the roll call, club officer check-ins, and swap information about upcoming events.
It's kind of like gathering around a radio-based cracker barrel, and a good way to keep in touch with friends and other club members between meetings.
Last Thursday night I tried repeatedly to respond to my call, but nothing happened.
Being a well prepared Ham, I grabbed one of my HT's (walkie-talkie to the non-hams here), and proceeded to check-in to the net.
Tonight I figured I should look into what the problems could be.
I swept the antenna with my analyzer from 144 to 148MHz, and all was well.
I connected the output of the radio to my power meter and a dummy load, and read 25 Watts output. I could also hear my audio just fine on an auxiliary receiver..
The CTCSS tone was properly set, and the "encode" function was enabled.
So, after a net for different group ended tonight, I keyed-up and called the repeater owner.
The radio sounds fine, and was "full quieting" into the repeater.
So at this point, I don't have a clue about what caused the problem last week.
Things have been running pretty smooth here lately on both the radio and computer ends of things, so maybe Murphy decided it was time to pay a house call.....
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<i>The Fisher Saga</i> Continues - Act III -
Been working on this post since right after Thanksgiving. I'm making very good progress on the Fisher, and will most likely power it up...
Sunspots. When in doubt, blame it on sunspots.
ReplyDeleteIt's the government, Jim. When in doubt, blame it on the government.
ReplyDeleteSorry, Opus.
:-)
As a fellow ham (KG4KAH) I am bumfuzzled as well. Perhaps you had the radio turned down to only 5 watts, though around here 5 watts is enough to reach pretty much any repeater. Check your ptt switch, which may be intermittantly not working?
ReplyDeleteBest wishes,
PolyKahr
Well....A few weeks ago I took the mic apart and sprayed some DeOxIt into the switch and cycled it a few times. I also cleaned the 4-pin mic connector on the cord, and spread out the split-pins on the chassis connector it mates to.
ReplyDeleteThat seemed to eliminate the "no audio" problems I'd been having, but I was *always* able to key up the repeater, even when the audio didn't get through.
And I've made no changes to any of the other settings in the radio since I set it up on this frequency, and always hit the "Lock" button so my lovely wife can't mess something up (she's a Ham, too) if she wants to use it.
The radio is a Drake TR-270, and has never missed a beat in all the time I've owned it since I bought it new on close-out from AES. It's a pretty neat radio, has a good receiver, and great audio.
If it does it again, I'll do a full bench test on it, but for now, it's working fine.
Just remember, Murphy was an OPTIMIST!!!
ReplyDelete"The Case of the Self Healing Electronics"
ReplyDeleteDrives me nuts when something similar happens. Good luck.
An an optimistic one, at that!
ReplyDelete