Someone on the Twitters challenged me that 60m was “hot” for FT8 about a week ago, so I endeavored to try working at least one station on that band – had never worked that band on any mode yet. It was challenging. I have since learned some “tricks” to get it to work.
So, when I got this radio, one of the excited exclamations in the manual was that it included the “new” 60-meter band, but they did not re-work the band-select buttons. And I suppose that makes sense, especially given that 60 is not so much a “band” in the traditional sense, but rather is a set of 5 discreet “channels” in which we’re allowed to operate. But, the way WSJT-X works, it expects to have complete control over both VFO-A and VFO-B for split operation.
However, Yaesu published an updated firmware for this radio sometime in 2020, which I had not upgraded. Today, I upgraded it, in part because it now allows switching the VFO to 60 by long-pressing the “14” (MHz) band button. Great, so now I can twirl the big knob through the 60 meter band. But transmitting is still disallowed there in VFO mode. Huh. Weird. But OK.
BUT… this at least makes WSJT-X a little happier because it can adjust the VFO-A… even though it’s not really going to use it. I still have to use the memory channel in order to unlock TX.
Then, because it’s a channel, and not a band, WSJT-X needs a settings tweak:
And then, because changing the mode to USB-DATA in this memory channel is disallowed, I have to re-configure a Menu item in the FTdx3000 so that it gets its SSB “microphone” input not from the actual microphone, but instead from the USB port.
This means that the next time I go to some other band and intend to operate regular SSB phone, using the mic, I’ll have to remember to switch this back to saying “FRONT.” What do you think my chances are of remembering to do that every time? Yeah, not good.
