February 2017 – Remote Station Control

The topic for the February meeting was remote station control.  Ted McArthur (AC7II) opened by presenting on rig CAT control, software, connection types, configuring your internet connection, etc.  Ted demonstrated using his Yaesu FT-5000DX with FT-2000RC software by Brend Koch (DF3CB) over Skype.

Next, Tyler Griffiths (N7UWX) presented his remote shack implementation utilizing Team Viewer, Skype, and his Kenwood TS-2000.

Finally, Bob Wood (WA7MXZ) demonstrated using his Yaesu FT-897 with Ham Radio Deluxe over Skype and VNC.

Operating a station remotely definitely has some neat advantages but as we observed during the three demonstrations given, there are a few bits that need to come together for everything to work correctly.  While it takes a small learning curve and a bit of finesse to get everything dialed in for remote operation…  Tinkering on this topic is one of the many things that makes ham radio so fun.

For a more “turn-key” solution, Kenwood has a proprietary feature called Sky Command in some of their radios.