Welcome to the new FlexRadio Community! Please review the new Community Rules and other important new Community information on the Message Board.
If you are having a problem, please refer to the product documentation or check the Help Center for known solutions.
Need technical support from FlexRadio? It's as simple as Creating a HelpDesk ticket.

Single antenna operation

Gary Schulz
Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
edited March 2020 in FLEX-6000 Signature Series
Apologies for what seems to be a very **** and basic question but how do you use a Flex (6700 in this case) radio with a single antenna?  I have one off center fed dipole and I need to use it for both TX and RX but that seems to be not possible??  When I configure the TX and RX on the same antenna the radio just drops out (RX goes dead) like there is no antenna connected at all.  How do you configure things to use the same antenna for both TX and RX.

I guess I am used to radios where you just connect an antenna to a port and it just works for TX and RX seamlessly.

Up until now the radio has been used as SWL only...

Thanks

«1

Answers

  • George KF2T
    George KF2T Member ✭✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Should work exactly as you imagine. Start with one panadapter and slice open; that should be the default state. If that doesn't work, a hardware reset will probably cure the matter.

  • Peter Porschenova
    edited April 2019
    Gary, No **** questions we're all learning!  Is the Flag set to Ant 1 on both RX & TX, and is your OCF using Ant 1 on the Flex.

    Peter
    W2JV
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    OCF is connected to Ant1.  When I switch the TX (red flag) to also use Ant1 the RX drops the antenna connection.  I hear it clicking when this happens.  The RX only receives when I have the RX set on Ant1 and the TX on Ant2 or XVTR.
  • K1DLM
    K1DLM Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Gary - Make sure you’re not using the RX Antenna input. Just connect your antenna to the Ant 1 port. That way it can be used for both RX and TX.
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    It is on the Ant 1 port
  • K1DLM
    K1DLM Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Then as long as you’re within a ham band, and you’ve selected Ant 1, you should be able to transmit.
  • K1DLM
    K1DLM Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Also make sure you’re not running under “split” mode.
  • Earl
    Earl Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Only one  radio at a time via a transmission line switch  (or manually change  transmission lines)..   A  "balun" "a is recommenced for use with your center-fed wire antennas.
    73m
    Earl - N1VP 
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited May 2019
    So my radio is broken since I can't put both the TX and the RX on "Ant 1"?  I am getting even more confused...  I just want to connect my antenna to the "Ant 1" port and be able to use the transmitter and the receiver.  Seems that this is somehow not working.

  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    I don't understand what you mean by "only one radio at a time via transmission line switch"?  It is only one radio...
  • K0FLY
    K0FLY Member ✭✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Gary:

    The radio should operate as you are trying to use it.

    As George KF2T recommended, perform a hardware reset, others have had similar or worse problems corrected by the reset.  Many time the error  is due to a  corrupted profile. If you have more than one  TX or Global profile stored, you might want to try a different profile to see if the radio will recover.    The reset procedure is in the SSDR manual.  If you start a Help Desk ticket, the first thing the Flex representative will ask you to do is a Reset.  A reset will erase your profiles.


    Gayle K0FLY
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Thank you for confirming that the radio should work this way.  I just did a reset by holding down the OK button while pressing the power button until I saw calibration (white LED) then let go of the OK button.  Radio appears to do the same thing unless I haven't reset it correctly?
  • N9VC
    N9VC Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Hi Gary,

    I have a 6700 here. I attached a pic to show you my settings.
    Make sure they match and your antenna is connected on antenna 1.
    Look at antenna selection box at the left. Make sure the Loop A
    is NOT selected. At the lower right, make sure the AGC-T slider
    is not on 0. Mine has med (medium) selected and the slider is
    halfway. For the heck of it, match my sliders and settings visible
    and see if you hear anything.
    Maybe a full reset would be in order should you still have problems.



    73, Jim N9VC

  • Andreas Junge
    Andreas Junge Member
    edited April 2019
    Gary,

    can you attach a screen shot that shows the slice you are using?

    Andreas, N6NU
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Here is what I am seeing in a nutshell...  After defaulting the radio ( I have configured nothing), here is a screen shot of the RX signal levels when I have the TX set to "Ant 2" and RX is on the correct "Ant 1" setting...


    Now, when I put the TX on the proper "Ant 1" setting (note the config change) I see the RX signal levels tank and I hear a relay switching when I change the setting...


    When TX is switched to using the correct "Ant 1" port, the RX seems to be disconnecting from the antenna port...
  • N9VC
    N9VC Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Unselect the EQ and PHNE at the top of your radio panel so the RX port is visible.
    So we can see some of those settings.
  • Andreas Junge
    Andreas Junge Member
    edited April 2019
    Can you click on the "ANT" button, so we can see what the Loop setting are?

    What happens when you connect your antenna to the ANT 2 port? Do you have both RX and TX?

    This is bizarre indeed.

    Andreas, N6NU

  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    I am using 1.9.13 SW and I also just confirmed that if I connect the antenna to the port "Ant 2" I get exactly the same problem  The RX will not work when the TX is set to the same antenna port.  In this case the same thing happen using Ant 2! 
  • Al K0VM
    Al K0VM Member ✭✭✭
    edited April 2019
    If you did the reset to factory defaults correctly, it should come up on 14.100 with both TX & RX selected on ANT1.   
    I suspect a hardware fault.. Open a help desk ticket with Flex..

    AL, K0VM
  • Mark Erbaugh
    Mark Erbaugh Member ✭✭
    edited February 2020
    You should be able to transmit and receive on the same antenna, just like with most radios. Of course you can't receive while you are transmitting. Is that what you are trying to do? When you go into TX the radio connects the transmitter to Ant 1 and the receiver goes silent. When you end transmit, the radio should reconnect the receiver to Ant 1 and reception continues. What is happening for you?
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    As requested-

  • Andreas Junge
    Andreas Junge Member
    edited April 2019
    Your firmware version is quite a number rev's back. 

    I would upgrade to at least 2.4.9. 

    If that does not solve it then I think it' time to contact Flex. 

    73, Andreas, N6NU
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    I am not trying to transmit while receiving.  All I am doing is changing which antenna the transmitter is assigned to and it is causing the RX to behave badly.  It is not in transmit mode during these tests.
  • Andreas Junge
    Andreas Junge Member
    edited April 2019
    Looks as expected. No loop enabled. 
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    I would rather not spend $200 on an experiment to see if it fixes this situation.  I would think that the radio should work correctly on version 1.9.13.  I am just trying to make sure I am not doing something ****!
  • Bill -VA3WTB
    Bill -VA3WTB Member ✭✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Gary, it should not be working this way, I would start a help ticket right away and not waste more time.
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    I submitted a help request through Zendesk.  I presume that is the place to submit tickets?
  • Gary Schulz
    Gary Schulz Member ✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Thanks Bill...
  • K3SF
    K3SF Member ✭✭✭
    edited March 2020
    not sure what Zendesk is
    but
    here is link to use flex radio help ticket



    https://helpdesk.flexradio.com/hc/en-us/articles/202118688-How-to-Submit-a-Request-for-Technical-Sup...


    paul K3SF

  • George KF2T
    George KF2T Member ✭✭✭
    edited April 2019
    Quick thing to try - with both TX and RX on ANT1, and your OCF dipole in ANT1, try to run the automatic antenna tuner. A reset should have cleared it, but I wonder if an old ATU memory is causing this issue.

Leave a Comment

Rich Text Editor. To edit a paragraph's style, hit tab to get to the paragraph menu. From there you will be able to pick one style. Nothing defaults to paragraph. An inline formatting menu will show up when you select text. Hit tab to get into that menu. Some elements, such as rich link embeds, images, loading indicators, and error messages may get inserted into the editor. You may navigate to these using the arrow keys inside of the editor and delete them with the delete or backspace key.