[OKDXA] RTTY Elmer?

[John Geiger]

Hi Charlie,

Your experience sounds very similar to mine.  I made about 90 QSOs in the RTTY Ru as it was a busy weekend here also and lots of good football on TV. I am also pretty new to N1MM logging software.  I now only use it for RTTY as I still prefer NA for other contests, but use N1MM so I can get both its window and MMTTY on the screen at the same time.  I tried using the MMTTY plug in with N1MM and they function nicely together but I need to do a little work getting the messages set up so I quickly reverted back to having N1MM and MMTTY running separate.  

I do not use the computer for rig control.

I am using a FT857D which is probably set up fairly similar to the FT847.  The one thing you did not mention was whether you had a narrow filter installed in the rig or not.  I was using a 300hz CW filter during the contest and it makes all of the difference in the world.  I don't even mess with the DSP bandpass settings or the BPF in MMTTY as those are both at the AF level. Your ears might not here the adjacent frequency QRM but the rig's AGC will and will respond accordingly.  

I don't know if you can use a narrow CW filter on AFSK in the FT847 or not.  You can in the FT857D both in the SSB mode and the DIG mode.  I just left it in the SSB mode, but on the FT100D I have had in the past you had to switch to DIG mode to use the narrow CW filter for AFSK.

Hope this helps a bit.  Give a narrow CW filter a try if you have one installed during the next RTTY contest and see if that clears up some of the problems.

73s JOhn AA5JG

--- On Tue, 1/5/10, Calhoun, Charlie <Charlie.Calhoun at RelayHealth.com> wrote:

> From: Calhoun, Charlie <Charlie.Calhoun at RelayHealth.com>
> Subject: [OKDXA] RTTY Elmer?
> To: okdxa at mailman.qth.net
> Date: Tuesday, January 5, 2010, 7:50 AM
> Happy New Year all!
> 
>  
> 
> I ran the RTTY Roundup for the first time this year. 
> It was a lot of
> fun.  It wasn't a stellar effort.  I didn't work
> the entire period due
> to the kids being sick, so I had to take several breaks to
> help them.  I
> also got off to a slow start learning N1MM, which I hadn't
> used before
> but it seemed to be time to put CT behind me and move on to
> a test
> logger with more functionality, namely a digital
> interface.  I did
> manage to beat last year's Oklahoma SOLP entry, so I was
> pleased with
> the first time effort during this test.
> 
>  
> 
> I have a question, though, that would help me with my
> operating practice
> for this contest and others in the future.
> 
>  
> 
> I don't have a big fancy rig, I'm running a Yaesu
> FT-847.  It has DSP
> and I can adjust the high and low cut separately. 
> I've learned to do
> that and use it to the best of my ability.  The
> problem I found I had
> was with strong adjacent signals.  I adjusted the DSP
> so I had a band
> pass about the width of the RTTY signal.  I also
> adjusted the band pass
> filter on the rig to one side and worked near the edge of
> that side and
> that helped greatly with adjacent signals to that
> side.  But that still
> left the other side open.  The built in BPF in MMTTY
> also helped some
> but didn't do anything for the adjacent strong
> signals.  When I had a
> strong signal on the open side of the pass band it would
> overload the
> front end and I would lose the weak signal in my DSP pass
> band.  
> 
>  
> 
> Is there anything else I might try to attenuate signals out
> of the
> passband so they don't overload the front end?  One
> thing I didn't try
> was the attenuator.  With some suggestions, I'll try
> some things during
> NAQP CW this weekend.
> 
>  
> 
> I also have an older Icom IC-736, but I don't use it much
> for 2 reasons.
> It doesn't have DSP and I don't currently have it hooked up
> for Rig
> control, but if suggestions are made to try it in
> comparison, I can do
> that too.
> 
>  
> 
> Thanks in advance for any help.
> 
>  
> 
> 73
> 
> Charlie Calhoun, K5TTT 
> 
>  
> 
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