I am using a KAT500 with an IC-7610, switching among three antennas. I have similar problems, as follows:
On each band, I use only one of the antennas; on several bands there is only one antenna with a reasonable match within the KAT500's capability. I am relying on the KAT500's frequency sensing to switch antennas and tuner settings, with the KAT500 in Manual mode. When I switch between bands that use the same antenna, there seems to be no problem. The KAT500 detects the new band with one or two transmitted dits and switches tuner settings to match the remembered setting for the new frequency. When changing bands that involve an antenna change, to switch antennas I have to transmit at least briefly, even if I only want to receive on the new band. However, when I switch between bands that use different antennas, some combinations do not seem to work, i.e. the KAT500 does not change antennas or tuner settings when the transmitter transmits on the new band. My workaround is to make two band changes in rapid succession. In some cases I have to switch to another intermediary band that uses the same antenna as the first band and transmit a dit or two on that band to cause the KAT500 to switch to the intermediary band, followed by another switch to the desired second band, while in other cases switching to an intermediary band that uses the same antenna as the second band works, followed by a second switch to the intended band. What appears to me to be happening is that when the match between the previous tuner settings and the new antenna on the new band is very poor, the KAT500's frequency-sensing circuit sometimes seems to be unable to determine the new frequency, and it doesn't switch antennas. Using a different band as an intermediary, one where the match is not quite as bad, appears to allow the KAT500 to detect the frequency correctly and make the switch. A better solution than my two band change workaround would be to write some software to read UDP radio info messages from rig control software (in my case, either N1MM+ or DXLab Suite Commander) and issue BN commands to the KAT500 through its serial port connection. Regardless of whether the band change was initiated from the software or from the radio's front panel, this ought to cause the KAT500 to change antennas and tuner settings without requiring any transmitting. I haven't tried this yet. 73, Rich VE3KI W2ECK wrote: In the KAT 500 Utility – Configuration- Antennas- Band- 17M; I have Antenna 3 checked as Enabled and Antenna 3 as Preferred. No other antennas are selected for 17 m. This configuration has been applied and saved. Setup is Flex 6600, KAT500, KPA500 & win 10 pc. The problem I am having is: with radio on 17 M, when I run a "tune" sequence, the KAT does not switch to Ant 3, in fact it will not let me manually switch to ant 3. I occasionally have the same issue with the tuner not switching on other bands, to the selected antenna as set up in the utility. Any suggestions on what may be causing this ? 73 Paul w2eck ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to arch...@mail-archive.com
