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Old 10-04-2011, 11:01   #1
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Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Well, Winlink really. The Love part's ok- 'got some pills...

My repeated efforts to send emails on my hf rig and PII-usb with p3 have just been dismal. I have connected once or twice in hundreds of attempts. Everything seems to be fine with the rig. It's a Furuno FS1503EM and phone works fine. I get good signal reports on multiple bands. Airmail terminal window controls the rig and offsets the frequncy fine. It is putting out nearly 100 watts on some of the bands and the SWR is less than 2. I hear other station's pactor transmissons. The only thing I don't get is any kind of monitoring of the other stations id's on the bottom bar.

What's up? Ghosts?
Thanks in advance Friends,
Dennis
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St. Petersburg, Fl.
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Old 12-04-2011, 21:47   #2
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Re: Help Can't connect in Love nor Pactor

The signal reports don't mean a lot unless they're on the same band and come from stations near the RMS station you're trying to connect to.

With my mast down, I'm pretty much restricted to 20-meters right now, which tends to open up in the late morning or early afternoon. So, I have to find a station using 20-meters that's around 6-800 miles away, in an area where I have propagation. I've spoken up to around 3k in the evenings, but haven't had pac3 work at that distance yet.

The MMSN, 14300, is a great place to listen and checkin to figure out where the band's open. Once you get an idea, pull up the propagation page and find an RMS station using Pac3 on 20 meters and give it a try.

I'm not always successful either, so don't feel too bad about it. Once I get the mast up and get out of the yard and onto the water, I hope things will clear up a bit.

hth, 73...
don
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Old 13-04-2011, 03:15   #3
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Re: Help Can't connect in Love nor Pactor

I use stations that are not close to areas with a lot of boaters who would be using Winlink. Ensure that you are using the proper frequency for the time of day and that it will transmit the necessary distance. It is also important to reduce your output to 50% or less. I usually transmit later in the evening and have some difficulty but not a lot.


160 meters, 1.8 - 2.0 mHz, night
80 meters, 3.5 - 4.0 mHz, night and local day
40 meters, 7.0 - 7.3 mHz, night and local day
30 meters, 10.1 - 10.15 mHz, CW and digital
20 meters, 14.0 - 14.350 mHz, world wide day and night
17 meters, 18.068 - 18.168 mHz, worldwide day and night
15 meters, 21.0 - 21.450 mHz, primarily a daytime band
12 meters, 24.890 - 24.990 mHz,primarily a daytime band
10 meters, 28.0 - 29.70 mHz, daytime during sunspot highs

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Old 13-04-2011, 05:56   #4
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Thanks Don and Jim,
I have used multiple bands and I do consult the prop chart included with Airmail. I appreciate the feedback that it can just be hard to connect sometimes.

When you suggest 50% power, what do you mean Jim? The recommended fsk settings for the Furuno are 1500/1700. That gives me anywhere from 20 to 100 watts on my swr meter, depending on band. Should I lower those to 50%? Is "clipping" the issue?

By the way, I have tried with agc and nb both on and off. Any suggestions there?

Thank you for your help. I'm a brand new ham and thus far not to sharp on it.
Yours,
Dennis
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Old 13-04-2011, 06:05   #5
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Do you happen to be located in a marina? I never had much luck connecting to the Sailmail stations with a bunch of masts surrounding the antenna.
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Old 13-04-2011, 07:31   #6
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Btw, in all likelihood, they probably aren't using omnidirectional antennas anyway. In fact, some stations use beams, so the propagation charts may not help a lot unless they're pointed in your direction.

Also, Hud makes a good point. When I look south, all I see are really tall masts, which helps explain why I contact stations in that direction. It's like being in a faraday cage.
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Old 13-04-2011, 07:47   #7
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Hud hit my first reaction right off the bat. Get out of the marina and try again. Listen to WWV and get the sunspot numbers and plug them into the prop tool in Airmail. Once you actually make a connection Airmail will pick up the numbers automatically from the connect header.

Look carefully at your ground and counterpoise. I have seen more issues associated with bad grounds than anything else.
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Old 13-04-2011, 08:25   #8
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Too late to edit my post. Should have been "can't contact stations [looking south]".
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Old 13-04-2011, 08:40   #9
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Hi Friends,
Thanks but I'm not in a marina. There's one boat nearby. I'll be heading to Isla Mujeres for a quick vacation in a week and a half so I'll be able to try off shore and at night. I was mostly concerned, being a novice, that I wasn't doing something obviously wrong. Take as an example the FSK settings. I guess for Icom radios their in the 140's or so. That barely budged my swr meter. When I finally figured that out, I got some power out. It's the simple things that I don't even know.
I'm getting a lot of great ideas here.
Thanks,
Dennis
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Old 13-04-2011, 08:51   #10
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Dennis -

Those fsk/psk drive levels seem very high, though the Furuno may want them. Try cutting them in half and see what happens.

If your transmitter is a 100 watt unit, and you have it set for max output, you should only see 100 watts during the initial handshaking (which is P1) and CW id at the end. If it gets to P3 after making a connection, you'll only see about 40 to 50 watts average output.

The AGC only affects your receiver, I would not turn it off. The ALC is what can clip your signal on transmission, so you need to keep drive levels below the level at which this happens for best results. Some Ham radios will indicate ALC action, I bet few marine radios do, so i would use average power output as a guide.
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Old 14-04-2011, 14:00   #11
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Re: Help: Can't Connect in Love nor Pactor

Try connecting with a P2 station. Also make sure you don't have a problem with your noise reduction settings (especially a notch filter on) or have a shift on the audio.

Not sure about your rig but on some of the rigs the microphone stays hot even when you are running digital modes. If you are in a noisy environment (loud music?) this can cause some minor problems.

I connect to stations in FL all the time from my site in Texas. If need be we can set up a schedule and see if we can go peer-to-peer.

Cheers,
Mike
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