Posts by G8PJH

Thanks Matthias, I’ll give it a go.

Hi there. I have been using the SDR console geo stationary beacon to lock my LNB receive frequency to the QO 100 centre beacon. No problem, but tonight the beacon doesn’t lock the receive, I can lock it initially, but then the receive starts to drift. This has never happened before, Any ideas?

Have you measured how far it is “off”? Looks pretty close to me.

Thanks for that, very neat! I have added an external reference lead to my Pluto c and connected my new Leo Bodnar. Worked flawlessly and very stable. So now ready for first QSO!

How’s your rig going? Had any QSO’s?

Hi I used a nano vna v2 and nano PC program.

Hi, I think my main problem was water in the connector where it entered the poty, and also a wet uncovered poty. I have also retuned my poty, ( thanks to Sigi, DG9BFC) so swr now about 1.2 and return loss -24.

Did a test TX today, and triggered LEILA, at about 75% gain on SDR console TX panel, so now plenty of power in hand!

Just need to connect up my Leo Bodnar GPS ref clock and should be good to go !

Thanks for everyone’s help and comments.

73

That’s a USB microphone!!

Hi,

Can anyone recommend a good audio quality microphone for use with a SDR console/Adlam Pluto set up? Thanks.

Phil

G8PJH

I have now measured my cable run loss, which is 1.01 dB. This pretty much agrees with the published figures for eco flex 150 coax and two n connectors. I am now going to attempt to tune the poty.

I have removed the attenuator

Detlev, when taking that measurement, it was 10W.

Hi Matthias, I think you’re getting my set up and 2E0ILY mixed up?

Phil

2E0ILY sorry Chris, getting confused. Forget you had the Rev B Pluto, which doesn’t have the switchable external standard.Well done for replacing the internal standard with an external feed, wouldn’t mind seeing a photo of that.

DH2VA. Appreciate that 2.7 is not good. Going to take the poty off the dish and check indoors with a nano vna. Also going to measure cable where it enters the poty, as there is a small chance rain water may have got into the cable/connector.

I will be measuring at the end of cable tomorrow, need a new adapter

Hi Chris, You seem to be making more progress than me! How did the Pluto software external standard command go?

I seem to be having problems with my POTY, vswr of 2.7 to 1.

Did you buy your POTY fully assembled and tested?

I will do more checks tomorrow, thanks

Phil

Hello to all,

I have finally got all my components hooked up to form a QO 100 station, my TX path is a Pluto into a 6 dB attenuator, CN0417 feeding a SG labs v3 20watt amplifier, 3 metres of low loss eco flex 150 cable feeding a home made POTTY antenna on a 80cm dish.

Using the test tune on SDR console, I can generate 16 Watts at the output of the rig. However, when connecting the cable and dish for a “live” test, I can only see my signal on SDR console showing about S4/S5, most of the other signals I see are S8/S9. Does this suggest something wrong with my POTTY? Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Phil G8PJH

OK Thomas, thanks for that.

Hi all, can someone please explain why people sync the TX frequency with an offset to read the same as the RX frequency in SDR console v3? Why not just leave the TX frequency in the 2.4 GHz band? Thanks in advance.

Phil G8PJH

Hi, thanks for response. I turned everything on this morning so I could check to see the tone as per Detlev. I could see the tone, so put my RF meter on the Pluto TX port, and lo and behold, there was an output! Reading about 5mW with the tune, tried with my microphone and all good. So, don’t know why it didn’t work last night! I can now start assembling the TX chain.

Thanks for the response.