[GreenKeys] HAL ST-8000 (New Toy)

Sat May 5 21:20:08 EDT 2018

I neglected to mention that the purpose of the grease lines was to help me tune up the radio very rapidly. Just tune until the ellipses on the CRT matched the lines.

From: greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net [mailto:greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of W2HX
Sent: Saturday, May 05, 2018 9:08 PM
To: Kevin H. Phillips; greenkeys at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] HAL ST-8000 (New Toy)

Attached is a photo of an XY scope I use when I do RTTY (yes, its been a while). I took a grease pencil and marked where the major axis of each ellipse is for 170 Hz shift. But that was over 10 years ago and my memory isn’t so good that far back.

Hope this helps
73 Eugene W2HX

From: greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net<mailto:greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net> [mailto:greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Kevin H. Phillips
Sent: Saturday, May 05, 2018 8:10 PM
To: greenkeys at mailman.qth.net<mailto:greenkeys at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] HAL ST-8000 (New Toy)

Bill,

I have an ST-8000 that I've used a lot for RTTY contesting.  I have used it to key FSK first on a Yaesu FT-1000 and now on a Yaesu FT-2000D.  I have noticed the slight tilt in the ellipses that you mention.  If I remember correctly the manual only shows examples for 850cps and maybe 425cps (??); not 170cps which is most commonly used now.  I generally tuned by ear and watching the signal strength meter on the radios.  I occasionally had a few people tell me I was off frequency so I started running the audio through my computer and watching the scope on MMTTY as a back-up method.  I tend to think that the feedback I was getting actually was due to some other problem than my tuning.  I didn't have any problem with 99.9% of the stations I worked.  Anyway, using MMTTY and getting the ellipses at perfect right angles there, I noticed that the pattern on the 8000 would become rather "small" when the ellipses were brought into those exact positions.  It's like the finer the tuning resolution, the smaller the pattern would become.

Congratulations on the acquisition.  I love my 8000 and wouldn't want to part with it.  When I become a Silent Key I'm sure my wife will be happy to pry it out of my cold dead hands and either pass it on to some other ham or, more likely, toss it in the trash.

73

Kevin

W5TTY

On 5/4/2018 4:40 PM, William Wuttke wrote:
Thanks to Joe Gilliam, I’m now the proud owner of a legendary HAL ST-8000. I never expected to be able to own one of these rare modems. I’ve spent the past few days familiarizing myself with the manuals and the unit. (A set of pdf manuals was graciously provided by Colleen at halcomm.com<http://halcomm.com>.) The only thing I really had to do was adust the CRT display centering and intensity controls. So far, I’ve tested with all 3 ITTY feeds and actually copied yesterday’s W1AW bulletin using my recently restored KWM-2 as a receiver. I copied about 99+%. During the transmission, signal varied from S7 to S1 due to fading, with a couple of complete dropouts. The only time I actually had errors was when the signal totally dropped out.

I finally got the MIC (AFSK/PTT) connector in the mail today and made up a cable for the transmit side. I need to do some testing first, but plan to get on the air soon with the ST-8000, ASR-33, and KWM-2. The ST-8000 makes it easy to use a model 33 using the regeneration feature (plus 20ma loop to RS-232 adapter) - plugs right in. I wonder how many hams still use RTTY for normal QSO’s. I guess I’ll soon find out.

For those who own ST-8000’s: I’ve never used the crossed ellipse tuning indicator before and wonder what I should be seeing. With the standard 2125/2295 45 baud signal, the ellipses are somewhat “tilted”. The MARK is a little clockwise from horizontal and the SPACE is somewhat counterclockwise from vertical. Is this normal?

Having fun with my new toy,

Bill
KE3BK

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