hpr-knowledge-base/hpr_transcripts/hpr2668.txt

Episode: 2668
Title: HPR2668: Explaining the controls on my Amateur HF Radio Part 3
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr2668/hpr2668.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-19 07:13:30

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This is HBR episode 2668 entitled, explaining the controls on my amateur HF radio part 3 and in part on the series HAM Radio QSK.
It is hosted by MrX and in about 18 minutes long and carrying an explicit flag.
The summary is, in this episode I cover the main slash sub-disclay meter memory and handkey on the TS914.
This episode of HBR is brought to you by an honest host.com.
Get 15% discount on all shared hosting with the offer code HBR15. That's HBR15.
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Hello and welcome hacker public radio audience. My name is MrX and welcome to this podcast.
I'd like to start by thanking the people at HBR for making this service available to us all.
HBR is a community-led podcast created for the community and by the community.
That means you can contribute to just pick up a microphone, hit the record button and give it a go.
You can use your mobile phone, an MP3 player, a dedicated audio recording device, a computer if you've got one.
A tablet, phone, do I mention phone? No, no.
Anyway, should I have something interesting to say?
So this episode is part three on my, on explaining the controls on my amateur HF TS914TS
radio and as I said previously I was, I said to split the recording up because it was getting too
long completed and there's actually, I think at the beginning I say that there's three sections to
radio but there's really four. First section is to do with the transmitter, the next sections to do
with tuning in modes and such like the third section is actually to do with modes and memories and
controlling the displays and whatnot. I kind of can't miss that out when I was talking
with it in the very first part and the final sections that receive section. So we're doing the
third section today. This is the dealing with memories and the vehicles and displays and such
like. So a bit of a hot spot covers the main sub displays, meters, memory and ban keys of the
TS940S. There's rolls of the tongue doesn't it? So sit back and enjoy.
I'll briefly cover the display. Well the main display here because it's a sub display.
So the main display, as I said before, I'm sure it's not LED, it's some other kind of, I
wish I could explain this. But anyway, it's currently telling me I'm on VFOB. There's a V3
next to the, a bit along from the VFOB symbol, a VFOB legend I should say. I don't know what the
3 means. Maybe that's memory 3 or something like that. And the display is displaying 7.176.97KHZ
killerhertz. And then there's two zeroes and killerhertz next to that. I don't know what that's for.
Never used that either. Of course, I may as much as the studio I haven't used.
Yeah, so I'm on 7.7MHz, 176KHZ, and 97HZ. That's about right, 970HZ I should say.
Below the frequency to do, there's a scale that ties to emulate an old-fashioned,
as I've explained to you earlier, a little fashioned radio that used to have a needle that spun
up and down as you turn the tuning knob on the radio. There's that kind of, um, we
radicals that go from zero to a thousand. And, uh, it's sitting somewhere between 700 and 800
to 750-ish. So what does that mean? Let's just see 7. Oh, I, so I'm, it's giving an indication how many,
tens of killerhertz, 700 hertz. Oh, I 700 hertz, that's what it's telling me, yes. So if I go to
down here, so 7.1, 7.1MHz, 100 hertz. It's basically an idea to give you an idea how far up the
band you are, um, so near the, so if we're starting at 7.1MHz, then at a glance, if I spin it
at 500, that's half up the band. So I'm 7.151, what's it saying? So at a glance, without having to
really look at the, the flickering, uh, display, as you're turning the big main dial,
you can see how far up the band you are very easily. So you get the best of both worlds,
you know, with, with an analog radio, with an analog, um, uh, display, it's very good, very easy to see
where you are on the band, uh, but it's not very accurate, because the digital display with, with,
with flickering numbers, it's very difficult to monitor what's where you actually are if you're moving
up the band or down the band, um, it's a bit like the old analog and digital, um, meters. If you've
got an old, an old Avo, you're measuring a, um, a fluctuating voltage, it's, it's very good to see,
because you can see the meter swaying up and down and see what it's actually doing,
whereas if it's, if it's a digital meter, just flickering up and down, you can't tell what the heck's
happening, um, so it's a bit like that really, it's, it's kind of handy. I'll, uh, just put that back
to them again. So, um, next to the main display, um, there's, um, there's a meter.
And the meter, um, has one, two, three, four, five scales on it. The first, uh, scale is to do
with signal strength and it starts at one and goes up to plus 60 dB, such as a, you can, an
indication of how strong a signal is, is that you're receiving. The next scale is the power
scale and that goes from zero to 150. I think they do, you can actually do a little bit more than
a hundred watts, but as I say, I never go past about 70. Um, the next scale is SWR, standing wave
ratio. So when the meter is in the SWR position, um, and you transmit it, it, it gives an indication
what your SWR is at and it goes from one to infinity. Um, next one there's from that is IC,
so input current and it goes from zero to 16 amps. Where that sits, I have no idea.
Um, next one down from that is comp and that goes from zero, uh, 0, 10, 20, and that's not actually,
it doesn't actually say what the, what's at the end of the scale, there's no number there,
whether that's theatre or what I don't know, but it's decibels anyway. So it's a minute of compression
that you're adding in and I, you would get that if you put it in the comp position.
And, uh, ALC, so if you put the meter into the ALC position and start talking, you make sure you don't
go, um, is that into the, into the, it's funny because it seems to be auto-limiter control.
You've got a red section and a white section and the white section says 26, 28, 30 volt, no,
it's white section says 20 dB in the, uh, red section says 10 dB.
Yeah, it's perhaps, I should really know that, I shouldn't tie.
By the way, my best gauge about the ALC, um, we've also looked at that.
So that's, that's the main meter section covered, um, I'm all over the place here. I
noticed it below the main display, there's, there's one, two, three, four, five, um, lights,
one's on air, so that's a very old fashioned, on air, transmitting, you know, these days,
you probably say TX, uh, but for transmit, but on air, there's an on air light, there's 80 antenna
tuning, there's a tune light, a split light, and a notch light, um, but we'll, uh, we'll cover
split, that's working split frequency between transmitting receive, um, and, um,
notch will cover later, a tune will cover later, a, a, a, T will cover that later, antenna
tune will cover that later. So if I go further along to the right, to the next section of the
radio, um, there's buttons to do with, uh, controlling the sub display, um, it's a kind of green
LCD, um, type of fear, and at the moment it's displaying the clock, I bet it's wrong.
Um, but anyway, it says 1145, uh, is it 1145? Not quite sure, I'll have a look and see,
it's not far out, it's 1130, I'm definitely going to have to split this, um, into multiple sections,
um, so, um, so the, this, one, two, three, four buttons, um, for adjusting the sub display here,
um, there's, I think there's, um, these, um, buttons actually have two functions to them,
one of the few buttons that have two functions. So it's either clock, the first button is either
clock or mode, um, the main functions clock, the sub function is mode, next one's a button's
graph or hour, and the next one's scroll or minute, and the last one which only has one function,
it is set, and it's basically for adjusting the clock, that's what that's, these are basically for,
um, the graph one is, um, I think that's used for, um, to do this, a CW filter, which I'll cover later on,
um, so that's those four buttons, the next one down from that, um, is it, well there's, there's
one, two, three, four, um, five, six, seven, eight, the group of, can it eight buttons,
I mean, they say memory function, and that, these, these are basically, to deal with memories,
memory set, programs set, hold, memory clear, VFO, I mean, such between VFO and memories,
memories, take, take to memory and put it into the VFO, um, memory in, enter. So it allows you to jump
between, um, allows you to set up memories on the radio and allows you to jump between the,
the, the variable frequency wherever you, wherever you happen to be, and jump straight to a memory,
or put the memory into a VFO so you can move off that frequency if that makes sense.
Um, I don't tend to use these keys very much, uh, below that band keys, and these are with two
functions, these band keys, they can either, that there's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight,
nine, ten, ten band keys, and you can either use them for a, the second function of those is,
to be used for memory channels, so you can, each button's got a number above it, so one to ten,
one to, one to nine and a zero, so you could jump to any one of these ten memories basically,
just by pushing the button, um, if you're in memory mode, um, but if you're in VFO mode, um,
the main function of these keys, certainly on each key, as, as a, as a number, so the first one's
1.5, next one's 3.5, then 7 and 10 and 14, 18, 20, 20, 24.5, 28 and 29, these are amateur radio bands,
and so you can jump very quickly to one of these bands, by pushing single push to that button,
so I'll go 3.5, the radio is just jumped, it's now actually doing 3.620, I'm guessing that's
where I must have been, last time I was on the 80 meter band, the 3.5 megahertz is the 80 meter band,
um, it remembers where you were last on that band, um, when you push these buttons, you hear
really is clunking and clicking inside because of the, this is because of the age of the radio,
so if we go back to 7, got to click, there you go, click in a beep, so that's me on back on the 40 meter
or 7 megahertz band, quite handy, although because I tend to just sit in 40 meters, it's, um,
it's, I don't use some great deal, um, there's also another way to, to, to quickly jump
up and down frequencies, rather than jumping to a band, um, you can step up it, there's an up and
down button, and that jumps the radio up by a megahertz, um, so eight megahertz, nine megahertz,
ten megahertz, nine, eight, seven, now I'll actually back a seven again, I think actually the,
the, um, main control, the main tuning control that I've previously covered, um,
is speed sensitive, so if you turn it slowly, uh, it moves it in a very slow, you know, very,
um, small increments, um, because it is a digital, although it's, it feels all unlogy and smooth,
it is actually digital, and so that, if you move it slowly, the, the, the steps are very,
very smooth and small, but if you fly it around that, you know, quick, then the steps increase,
so you're jumping a bigger jump, so I think so, you can, you can, you can move about the band quickly,
doing it that way as well, of course, um, so next to the up and down keys, there's an
AT.T key, and that stands for antenna tuner, and if your antenna isn't tuned properly, and it's
a lot, and not, then you can enable this AT-T key, and there's a couple of motors and capacitors
and stuff in here, and it makes a right-old grinding noise, is it, um, is it tries to tune
your antenna and bring the SWR down, it's, it's quite, it's quite, um, it's quite interesting to
hear, um, I'm not going to do that just now because, um, um, on me is, I do, on occasions,
causing to fears to the television downstairs, so I won't, I won't actually do that at this
point in time, but Tim, it's a very handy feature, and I think it may have came as an option,
option extra, and obviously the person who bought it, um, did that, and I actually used that,
when I won 40 meters, uh, the antenna tuners, uh, active in all the time. If I move too far,
say to the top end of the 40 meter band or the bottom end, and I've got to reach in the antenna,
um, it doesn't cover the whole, the whole, um, the whole band, um, so, um, that's that, antenna tuner.
Okay, so I hope you enjoyed this podcast, uh, I'll leave it at that, I think I've got anything else
to say, I hope I've bored you too much, um, if you want to contact me, I could be contacted at
mrx at hpr at googlemail.com, that's mrxathtpr, the at symbol googlemail.com, so until next time,
thank you, and goodbye, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen, listen,
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