[NLRS] [NTMS] FlexWire interface for the Flex-1500

[Al Ward]

John

I am sure I can help you as I use the K3TUF board as well with my 5000. We should probably chat on the phone. I can talk better than I can type.

73

Al W5LUA

 

From: ntms-request at texans.net [mailto:ntms-request at texans.net] On Behalf Of John Toscano
Sent: Friday, September 09, 2016 8:48 PM
To: NLRS Reflector; RMG; ntms at texans.net
Subject: [NTMS] FlexWire interface for the Flex-1500

 

Several years ago, I bought the K3TUF kit for interfacing a Flex-1500 via its FlexWire interface to external relays for my transverters. I never got around to using it. I'm not ready to heat up the soldering iron yet, but while enduring this intolerable delay in getting the concrete foundation poured for my tower, I am trying to use the down time to "get all my ducks in a row" with respect to everything else I need to prepare for my re-incarnated station (move from Minnesota to Texas).

 

I understand that the interface board provides 16 open collector outputs and how to connect relays to such outputs, but I don't understand what value is entered where on the transverter page of PowerSDR to select which relay(s). My configuration is going to be complex, because I am planning to eventually use the Flex-1500 on at least 6 bands, 902 through 10368, and possibly 10 bands if I choose to also use it for 50/144/222/432. There is not going to be a simple 1:1 correspondence between a band and a single relay. For example, if I run 2 meters on the Flex-1500, I will select the 2 meter transverter plus the 2 meter power amplifier, but if I select the 1296 band, I will need to connect the Flex to the enabled 2 meter transverter, but instead of going to a 2 meter power amplifier, the 2 meter transverter will connect to an enabled 1296 transverter instead. If I include the 4 lower bands also, it gets even more complicated because the Flex-1500 would either be talking to a single transverter on one of the low bands or to the 2 meter transverter and then the higher band transverter. I suspect it's something simple, just not written down in the documentation of the K3TUF board nor in the user manual for PowerSDR. Is the "UCB Address" on the transverter page simply a bitmapped value with ones in each position where a relay is to be activated? Or is it not possible for one transverter selection to activate multiple relays at the same time? (While annoying, that wouldn't be terrible, I'd just have to use one low-power DC relay's contacts to activate as many coaxial RF relays as necessary for a particular band...)

 

Thanks in advance

John Toscano, WØJT/5

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