CWX relay clicking

W4WHL

Yesterday while testing, I tried sending some CWX messages into a dummy load.  The radio sounds like its dieing. The relays start clicking with every dot and dash.  It sounds like the 100's of relay clicks when tuning the ATU.  Just sending my call is about 30 relay LOUD clicks.

Thinking it may be the protection circuit, I tried it again on my main antenna on low power, and the same thing.

 Is this normal?  I have listened to other 6k cw on youtube and they don't do this.  Is there an issue with my rig?

W4WHL

Al_NN4ZZ

What value do you have set for the CWX delay?

Set to zero or a low value causes clicking here.

Regards, Al / NN4ZZ  
al (at) nn4zz (dot) com


some clicking at 100

lots of clicking at 0

W4WHL

Thanks Al,  I upped my delay as you suggested and it improved greatly.  Still some clicking, but not near as bad.

Al_NN4ZZ

Good deal, at higher values (e.g. 200)  the clicking should stop completely  except for once at the end of the xmission. 

Regards, Al / NN4ZZ  
al (at) nn4zz (dot) com

Steve N4LQ

I started to reply to this but changed my mind.

Steve-N5AC

Also running the radio in QSK mode (this is based on your radio's antenna settings and capabilities) will eliminate the relay clicks entirely (there will be a click but it is a MUCH quieter relay and you'll have to work hard to hear it).  You do not actually have to operate QSK to take advantage of this, you just have to adjust the antenna setting where you get the QSK indicator in the slice flag.

The antenna setting are quite involved for the FLEX-6700 with five possible antennas and two SCU's but just so you can see the indicator, if you use one panadapter TX and RX on ANT1 this indicator should light on every radio.  There are many many other combinations, but this will allow you to see the indicator and try this mode out.  On a FLEX-6700 the QSK works even better when you are receiving on a different antenna, generally a dedicated RX antenna like RXA or RXB.

W4WHL

AH you nailed it.  I was transmitting into a dummy load.  And my receive and transmit were on different antennas.  The QSK was not lighting up.  Switching both TX and RX to the same antenna and wallah "QSK".  Nice and quiet now.  Thanks!!!

William

Steve-N5AC

In general, using one of the RX ports (not ANT1, 2) for your receiver will let you use two antennas in QSK also.  Some configurations of ANT1, ANT2 must use relays.