Last weekend was the SRESU F.A.R.T camp and, beside a disappointing turn out, the weekend went quite well.
It was also the John Moyle Memorial Field Day contest weekend which means there was plenty of activity on the HF bands.
I made 10 contacts on my MKARS80. Most stations heard me well, except on VK2 station who was running maximum legal power, 400 Watts and was not really strong into station. It took many tries to get the exchange but I’m sure we did and they are in my log.
One thing I did notice with my MKARS80 is low audio through the speaker microphone. With some bud earphones the copy was fine but the speaker was not loud enough for working. Next time I take the MKARS80 away I will take a bigger speaker with me.
I also became more convinced that a back lit display is needed. I bought 2 displays a couple of weeks ago but I haven’t got around to fitting it.
I also need to look at a way of turning the back light on and off to help conserve battery power. I’m going back to the circuit to see if there is a ‘lock’ indicator I can use. Otherwise I might just fit a push button switch with a timer circuit.
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