Ham Radio Help Desk

A reader responding to a post on the N3FJP Software Support forums asked how I adjusted things to allow control between an Icom 746 (not the pro model) and N3FJP Virginia QSO Party software. To quote:

“I read your post about setting up rig control with the 746. Did using the hex address of 66 work for you? I’m getting that rig in a few days and have been totally unable to get my Icom 725 set up with the rig control after trying every possible solution.”

My solution uses the RigBlaster Pro as the interface between the Icom and a laptop with a real serial port (DE9 connector). My radio settings are:

• CI-V Port Speed: 9,600 bps
• CI-V Address: 64h
• CI-V Transceiver: ON
• CI-V 731 Mod: Off

It took a bit to get working. The RigBlaster serves very well as the interface between the DE9 connector of the computer serial port and the little phone plug on the radio.

The N3FJP software has the address set to 64 also.

It works for me. Does anyone reading this post have any advice for the reader with the Icom 725?

Field Day 2008 was great for us. Our wide area wireless network worked pretty well and every station could monitor progress of the whole group.

This year we extensively used the “operator initials” field in the N3FJP Field Day Network 2.8 logging software package. Operators used their call-sign as their ‘initials’ while honored guests used their actual initials.

The site-wide log offered many great analysis possibilities. One particularly interesting metric we tracked this year was QSO rates. We generated graphs of QSO totals vs. Time Between QSOs. Here is an example of the entire log…
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