[Kenwood] Kenwood TH-F6A info

Fri, 17 Jan 2003 10:49:49 -0500

Hi all.....

I really enjoy my TH-F6A.  I bought the W&W pack and drop-in charger as
soon as they were made available (Dayton 2k2) and I think they're great
gadgets!!  So far, haven't had a single problem with anything.  It
charges a little quicker than the wall charger too, so that's an added
little beny there.

Anyway, thought I'd pass my experience with it along.

73,
Doug - KF3EE

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected]
[mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Dana Luke
Sent: Friday, January 17, 2003 7:22 AM
To: [email protected]
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: [Kenwood] Kenwood TH-F6A info

Hi to all on the Kenwood reflector,

Here's some input to a request for information from David S. McCallum
W7SAC about the Kenwood TH-F6A tri-band HT.  A friend of mine (Bryce
K1GAX) has one, and as I am also considering getting one of the units, I
asked him a question about battery charging and got this response from
him... so I thought I'd share it with the group.  I hope it helps and is
useful to those who are thinking about this unit, I know it was for me.

On Mon, 13 Jan 2003 10:25:43 -0500 "Dana Luke" <[email protected]>
writes:

Bryce,

I have a question about the Kenwood triband walkie TH-F6A that you
have... is there a way to charge the lithium ion batteries when they're
not in the walkie? Does the wall wart or whatever plug directly into the
battery or is there some kind of external charging unit available?

73 de Dana KA1PK

Reply from Bryce K1GAX:

Stock, out of the box - no...  You can't charge a battery pack external
of the radio.  The wall wart plugs directly into the radio (not the
battery pack) and the Kenwood battery does not have any external
charging tabs...  Kenwood doesn't have any drop in charger for the HT.
Good news is that the charge is fairly quick - 6 hours (as opposed to 12
to 15 for most HT's charged with a wall wart).

Now, for the good news...  Yes, you can charge the battery externally...

First (what I do).  I picked up a Maha MH-C777Plus (make sure it's the
MH-C777Plus, not the older MH-C777) charger (charges Nicads, Nickel
Metal Hydride and Lithium Ion packs).  The battery can be charged
through the internal battery tabs.  The charging rate is not much faster
than the wall wart due to the special charging characteristics of the
Lithium Ion battery packs.  It works well though and will charge my
spare packs when off the radio.

Second...  W & W Associates (out of New York - the battery folks you
normally see at Hosstraders) have a third party pack for the TH-F6A that
has external charging tabs.  They also sell a drop in charger for it.
The battery pack is slightly larger (in capacity, not size).  I can't
speak for the drop in charger, but the battery pack seems to serve well.
I didn't pick up the charger as I already have the Maha charger and I
only have one of the W & W Associate packs (have a spare Kenwood pack
without the external charging tabs)...

I'm quite happy with the TH-F6A unit.  Programs easily, manual is on
line (in case you lose the original) and overall a pretty nice small HT,
with a lot of capabilities...  I like the 2 meters, 1 1/4 meter and 70
centimeter capability as there's little, if any activity on 6 meters
(that you could hit with an HT) and almost nothing on 1.2 GHz.  The only
thing that disappoints me is the programming software...  It's lacking a
few features that the Icom and Yaesu software has...  Oh well, nothing's
perfect (and the software is free to boot of the Kenwood web site)...
The stock rubber duck is painfully inefficient, so I bought a Comet
(Maldol) replacement unit (a little longer, but a heck of a lot more
efficient (especially on 222 MHz).

One other minor dislike...  With the alkaline battery case, the power
output of the unit drops to 500 mW.  Not really a big deal, but a minor
annoyance...  Otherwise, a great little HT.  I enjoy mine.  Comparing it
to the Icom IC-T81A, it's a dream to program...  The "joystick" menu
control is easy to operate (considering the T81A's is a monster).  Just
minor references to the manual to program...  I think you'll like it.

So there you have it...  Now, you know the rest of the story (have we
heard that somewhere before?)...

73, Bryce, K1GAX

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