[Elecraft] [K144XV] [K3] Programmable memory?

[Oliver Johns]

Just finished installing a K144XV + K144RFLK in my older K3.  Had to exchange for a KXV3a also.  Went well and everything appears to work as advertised.  But, let me tell you, this exercise renewed and deepened my hatred for those TMP coax connectors.  I accept what Wayne says about their reliability.  But, they sure are a capital P in the A to plug and unplug!  Price of excellence.

Am now programming the local repeaters into the memory locations.  This is not quite as tedious as manually programming a BaoFeng UV5r, but it is really close.  And the BaoFeng can be programmed using a nice utility called CHIRP that lets you enter settings in a spreadsheet and then press a button to transfer them en bloc.

Not so for the K3.  You have to do it all by hand.  Which brings me to my point.  Could there be a couple of programmer's commands added to set the memories?  Then maybe someone could write a nice Python program to do it with a computer, or maybe port CHIRP.  Maybe something like:
ZFxxx145.3205;  (set frequency)
ZTxxx088.5+;      (set tone)
ZLxxx*W1AW;     (set label)
where the xxx stands for memory slot 000 to 099. 

Also, while I'm at it, why are there only 5 slots in the label?  After the "*", there are only four free.  Not enough for a typical call sign, or much of anything else.  Maybe that is due to memory limitations?

Taking the K3 apart and putting it back together reminded me what a lovely, precision piece of equipment it really is. Amazing what fits in that little box!

Thanks for reading this far.

Oliver
W6ODJ