Hi Lee,
As others have said, the F6A can definitely be used as the receive side of your satellite station. I have one, and find it's an interesting radio, with many uses. But I also find that there are a lot of compromises in its design. The "B" side of the radio, especially, has relatively poor filtering in support of its "DC-to-Daylight" capability, and it's a little bit deaf. You will definitely need an external antenna to receive FO-29; nothing massive, but a small beam of the Elk / Arrow variety should be ok.
With FO-29 being Mode-J, the 3rd harmonic from your transmitter may work in a negative way with that lack of filtering, causing some desense. I have't tried it, but that's definitely a risk. I've also noticed that the space below the receive upper sideband does bleed through a little, so a strong station right below where you are receiving will be heard (distortedly) as well. It's not horrible, but might make a difference in an otherwise very marginal situation.
If you' re interested in receiving HF on the rig, be aware that an external antenna is required there too. Even local AM radio is kind of marginal, unless they're really strong.
I also have a TH-D7, and find I use that most of the time when I need to be hand-held mobile. But it doesn't do SSB, where the F6 is uniquely capable. If you don't need the super (handy!) small form factor of the F6, you might want to go with the 817 variety of radio instead.
Good luck,
Greg KO6TH
Lee Ernstrom wrote:
GA satellite goo-roos. Today I was scanning the HRO catalogue looking for an inexpensive solution to full duplex contacts for the linear birds and I ran across the Kenwood TH-F6A hand held 144, 222, and 450 MHZ FM with SSB option on receive only. That sounds to me like a great fairly inexpensive solution.
Has anyone tried one of these yet for satellite work?
And I'm wondering if there would be a de-sense problem if used on receive with a 20 watt transmitter on a different band close to it?
WA7HQD Lee (Doc) Ernstrom Syracuse, Ut DN-31xb
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