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Searches of this group, Google, and YouTube failed to give me anything I could use for the V6.? ?Now, I'm a noob and I admit it but really, when the Freq calibration on the set up menu says something to the effect of 'turn the knob until you get a strong signal' that isn't very helpful. I hear little or nothing.? Where does the signal come from? The radio is on and connected to an antenna but no amount of adjustment to the Freq or BFO ever seems to definitively zero in on anything I try to listen to.? I tried WWV but I can barely receive it on the v6.? Right now even my TS-2000 isn't getting it very well although I have received it well in the past (I'm in a tall narrow valley and it's winter in here).?
Is there an actual procedure for calibrating this radio?? Maybe something to do with those extra wires that came with it? If so, where is it hidden?
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The message is cryptic because of the low memory couldn't make it more explicit. But here goes: 1. Pick a station with known frequency which you can hear clearly. Like the WWV in the USA. 2. Dial the exact frequency on which it should be received. The actual signal will appear to be off the dialed frequency as the calibration is not proper. 3. Now hold down the tuning button until the setup menu pops up, choose calibration. 4. Using the tuning knob, tune up until the signal is zero-beat. 5. Click with the tuning knob again to save the setting. You are done.
On Thu 9 Jan, 2020, 8:25 AM , < k7ome@...> wrote: Searches of this group, Google, and YouTube failed to give me anything I could use for the V6.? ?Now, I'm a noob and I admit it but really, when the Freq calibration on the set up menu says something to the effect of 'turn the knob until you get a strong signal' that isn't very helpful. I hear little or nothing.? Where does the signal come from? The radio is on and connected to an antenna but no amount of adjustment to the Freq or BFO ever seems to definitively zero in on anything I try to listen to.? I tried WWV but I can barely receive it on the v6.? Right now even my TS-2000 isn't getting it very well although I have received it well in the past (I'm in a tall narrow valley and it's winter in here).?
Is there an actual procedure for calibrating this radio?? Maybe something to do with those extra wires that came with it? If so, where is it hidden?
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Some comments for clarification, and a couple questions.
step 2 above: for example I hear WWV on 14.85 MHz but I know it should be at 15.00Mhz so I tune the V6 to exactly 15000 as stated even though at 15000 I cannot hear the signal.
Step 3 above: once I hold the button in ( for about 7 seconds) to get the setup menu I get the selections:
? ? ? Set Freq....
? ? ? Set BFO....
? ? ?I assume for this step you want us to select Set Freq....?
? ? ?Once selected it confirms the Frequency you are tuning ( 15000 in my example )
Now for the question.
In step 4 you say tune for zero beat. For us newbies that term has no meaning. I know what it looks like on an oscilloscope but I¡¯ve never heard what zero beat sounds like. I tuned until I could hear the WWV signal the best. And the numbers displayed while I tuned were around 78000. Again I assume this is correct. They seemed like big numbers but it seemed to work.
I also found after this tuning if I went to the?
Set BFO menu item I could then set the BFO from the 11.053.00 setting to the best audio I could get. I my case it happens to be around 11057.6.
I also noticed if I repeated these steps I could get better results as I closed into the correct settings.
I hope these clarifications are correct and help.
73
Mick VA3EPM?
?
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Mick, it would be best if someone (that is, me) made a video where you can hear what it sounds like. Lemme take a stab at it. - f
Some comments for clarification, and a couple questions.
step 2 above: for example I hear WWV on 14.85 MHz but I know it should be at 15.00Mhz so I tune the V6 to exactly 15000 as stated even though at 15000 I cannot hear the signal.
Step 3 above: once I hold the button in ( for about 7 seconds) to get the setup menu I get the selections:
? ? ? Set Freq....
? ? ? Set BFO....
? ? ?I assume for this step you want us to select Set Freq....?
? ? ?Once selected it confirms the Frequency you are tuning ( 15000 in my example )
Now for the question.
In step 4 you say tune for zero beat. For us newbies that term has no meaning. I know what it looks like on an oscilloscope but I¡¯ve never heard what zero beat sounds like. I tuned until I could hear the WWV signal the best. And the numbers displayed while I tuned were around 78000. Again I assume this is correct. They seemed like big numbers but it seemed to work.
I also found after this tuning if I went to the?
Set BFO menu item I could then set the BFO from the 11.053.00 setting to the best audio I could get. I my case it happens to be around 11057.6.
I also noticed if I repeated these steps I could get better results as I closed into the correct settings.
I hope these clarifications are correct and help.
73
Mick VA3EPM?
?
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Thanks Ashhar, us newbies would appreciate this very much!
73
Mick VA3EPM?
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I've had difficulties getting into the setup menu with a long push, because the encoder is really sensitive.
I find it very helpful to hold the dial still with one hand and push the dial in with the other.
That said, the first time I encountered the setup was by starting the radio up while holding the encoder in.
That forces a screen recalibrate (use the stylus and be precise), and then it goes into the frequency setting (defaults to 10 MHz, I don't know if that can be changed easily, but I was able to zero-beat to WWV on 10 MHz), then on to the BFO setting (use the audio spectrum analyzer found here:??-- for the life of me, I can't find it anywhere on the various BitX V6 web pages -- Ashar PLEASE put a link on the V6 pages to the BFO tuning aid).
The trick to using the BFO tuning aid is to use the Chrome browsers and enabled access to your laptop/tablet microphone.? ?You will then see the tuning aid appear on the page.? Turn up the volume on the V6 on a blank area of the band, and adjust the BFO tuning until the noise is centered between the red lines on the audio spectrum display on your laptop/tablet.? The red lines signify 300 Hz and 3 kHz, which should be the pass band of the crystal filter in the V6.
Hope that helps,
73,
-- Dave, N8SBE
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [BITX20] Need to Calibrate the V6 #v6
From: "Mick" < Mgsebele@...>
Date: Thu, January 09, 2020 10:03 am
To: [email protected]
Thanks Ashhar, us newbies would appreciate this very much! 73 Mick VA3EPM?
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Dave, I wasn't sure if it would be useful. Now that many have confirmed it to be so, I will link it up in a day. - f
On Thu 9 Jan, 2020, 10:59 PM Dave New, < n8sbe@...> wrote: I've had difficulties getting into the setup menu with a long push, because the encoder is really sensitive.
I find it very helpful to hold the dial still with one hand and push the dial in with the other.
That said, the first time I encountered the setup was by starting the radio up while holding the encoder in.
That forces a screen recalibrate (use the stylus and be precise), and then it goes into the frequency setting (defaults to 10 MHz, I don't know if that can be changed easily, but I was able to zero-beat to WWV on 10 MHz), then on to the BFO setting (use the audio spectrum analyzer found here:??-- for the life of me, I can't find it anywhere on the various BitX V6 web pages -- Ashar PLEASE put a link on the V6 pages to the BFO tuning aid).
The trick to using the BFO tuning aid is to use the Chrome browsers and enabled access to your laptop/tablet microphone.? ?You will then see the tuning aid appear on the page.? Turn up the volume on the V6 on a blank area of the band, and adjust the BFO tuning until the noise is centered between the red lines on the audio spectrum display on your laptop/tablet.? The red lines signify 300 Hz and 3 kHz, which should be the pass band of the crystal filter in the V6.
Hope that helps,
73,
-- Dave, N8SBE
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [BITX20] Need to Calibrate the V6 #v6
From: "Mick" < Mgsebele@...>
Date: Thu, January 09, 2020 10:03 am
To: [email protected]
Thanks Ashhar, us newbies would appreciate this very much! 73 Mick VA3EPM?
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Dave N8SBE wrote :
"I've had difficulties getting into the setup menu with a long push, because the encoder is really sensitive."
This is exactly why, when I assembled my v5 uBITX, I didn't use the push shiwtch on the encoder, but instead connected a separate red SPST push switch on the front panel of the radio. Works like a charm with no interference to or from the encoder.
73,
... Martin VE3OAT
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Good call. It¡¯s just a contact closure so you could do both in parallel if you wanted. :-)
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On Jan 9, 2020, at 3:12 PM, Martin Potter <ve3oat@...> wrote:
?Dave N8SBE wrote :
"I've had difficulties getting into the setup menu with a long push, because the encoder is really sensitive."
This is exactly why, when I assembled my v5 uBITX, I didn't use the push shiwtch on the encoder, but instead connected a separate red SPST push switch on the front panel of the radio. Works like a charm with no interference to or from the encoder.
73,
... Martin VE3OAT
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I experience similar difficulties with settings and freqs shifting during the button press. But too many miles for me to get a ham/electronic hobbyists candy store as it were hihi.? Only one here was a morphed Radio Shack (aka TheSource) and since Bell Globemedia took it over all the hobbyist candy inventory has been removed; now they just flog cell phones TV's and Express Vu Sat TV. selection for us is really gone downhill.
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Show quoted text
On 2020-01-09 2:11 p.m., Martin Potter wrote: Dave N8SBE wrote :
"I've had difficulties getting into the setup menu with a long push, because the encoder is really sensitive."
This is exactly why, when I assembled my v5 uBITX, I didn't use the push shiwtch on the encoder, but instead connected a separate red SPST push switch on the front panel of the radio. Works like a charm with no interference to or from the encoder.
73,
... Martin VE3OAT
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Thanks Ashhar, that got it done although I had to find WWV on 5mhz since the 10mhz just wasn't strong here.?
Some thoughts:
Would it be possible/reasonable for you to store the BFO and Freq adjustment numbers in EEPROM?? I had to go back and forth from setup to regular operation to finally get the v6 accurately at zero beat and each time the BFO and Freq adjustment numbers would revert to their defaults and I was starting from scratch again.? Also, the tuning speed could be damped down a bit; it seems far too jumpy right now....
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Oooops!? Correction: obviously the BFO and Freq adjustment numbers are stored.? What I should have said was could they be pulled back in and displayed like the other values that are stored in EEPROM.? As far as I can tell they aren't right now or, if they are, the knob is so twitchy that they get changed before my palsied fingers can let go of the knob ...
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That request would be best served by creating an "issue" here:
I've noticed that it reverts to default as well, and I agree it might be nicer to show the current value, rather than default every time, but these suggestions will get buried in the threads if they don't get acted on immediately, or logged somewhere like the issues page.
Reed
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Thanks Reed!? I did add that issue on Github as you suggested.? I'll get this figure out some day ....
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I am trying to use the BFO tuning aid. What exactly does the part of the website mean that says to tune until the noise is centered between the two red lines? I have noise all the way across with a dip partway across. I would assume that the dip is to be centered between the two lines but tuning does not move that 'notch'. Tuning changes the relative height of the noise on the right and the left. Does someone have a screen grab?
After I wrote the above I started up the radio again and went to the web page again and twiddled the knob some more and I just snapped an image. What does that image indicate?
Morris K7LSV
On Fri, Jan 10, 2020 at 2:27 PM < k7ome@...> wrote: Thanks Reed!? I did add that issue on Github as you suggested.? I'll get this figure out some day ....
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Hi Morris,
When it says "tune" it actually means tuning the BFO, not the tuner. You'll want to push the tuner knob in and then hold it in for a LONG time. This should pop up the setup menu, at which point you can select the BFO tuning menu. Once there, you'll want to turn the tuning knob until the tall green blob is centered between the red as best you can. The image you captured looks like it's off to the left, which means you have more low frequencies than you should.
Reed
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Mick
Smitty, N6MTS
