FT450D and Ham Radio Deluxe - Macro for switching to low power, initiating TX, tune external ATU, resetting back to original power.

As some operators of the FT450D know there is a CS button that can be programmed to do a number of useful features. Unfortunately Yaesu in their wisdom omitted this button from being controlled with a CAT command. So using a program such as Ham Radio Deluxe you can't press this button with a mouse click.
I have programmed my particular CS button to initiate a low power carrier to enable the antenna to be tuned. Note this is not the same as the TUNE button which initiates the tuning of the internal ATU.

I had been looking for ages to try and find a way of doing this then I thought of macros that are available from within Ham Radio Deluxe (other programs may also have this feature and the following commands also apply).

Most of my working is on digital modes such as JT65 or PSK31. This is normally transmitted on USB regardless of the band so I set out doing this:

• Change the mode to AM (or CW - my LDG RT-100 works ok on any mode but they recommend AM)
• Set the power at 5 watts
• Trigger the transmitter. This enables you to press any external ATU tune buttons or if like me you have a carrier triggered fully automatic remote ATU - nothing.
• Set the mode back to USER U (USB audio fed to the rig via the data socket)
• Set the power back to its original setting - in my case 30 watts

The CAT commands to do this are below

MD03;
EX048005;
TX1;
TX;
TX1;
TX;
TX0;
MD0C;
EX048030;

I put multiple TX1 TX commands in as HRD seemed to just switch TX power on and off almost simultaneously. So the addition of a couple more TX commands resulted in what I was looking for and latched TX on until I pressed the macro button again..
Save this as a macro in Ham Radio Deluxe and assign it to a button. (read the HRD manual to do this).

30 Watts and AM TUNE Buttons added

In use here is what I do

One click does the first part of the macro resulting in the TX button being set. Another press of the button switches off the TX and resets everything (apart from the power) back to the original settings.  Because there appeared to be a bug somewhere in having the the EX048005; and EX048030; commands in the same macro I wrote another separate macro to set the power to 30 watts.
If you use HRD try it out. If you have another CAT control program the same command should also work.

HRD Specific Macro Method

There is also another way to do this using HRD's own Macro commands but this is specific to HRD (not the CAT macro command editor)
In the Macro editor create a new macro
Add the following commands in

TYPE                            TITLE             VALUE
Advanced/Slide             RF Power        5
Dropdown Button                                  Mode: AM
Standard Button              TX                 Switch ON
Standard Button              TX                 Switch OFF
Dropdown Button                                  Mode: USER-U

AM Tune Macro

Set power to 30W

Logbook #1 completed - 36 years after it was started

In my blog entry from August 2015 g8yph.blogspot.com/2015/08/logbooks-and-logging-in-uk.html I posed the question to myself "I wonder when the logbook will be completed". Well the day has come and it was filled by the station RX1CV Sergo in Russia at 0929UTC on April 1st 2016.
This was almost 36 years after I started it as a teenager back in October 1980.

The first contact was Fred G8TLB who is now G4TJU a few minutes after I received the license through the post on October 4th 1980. I remember that first QSO as it was a nervous time taking the steps for the initial time speaking on air. I'm sure everybody has gone through that.

There are lots of gaps in my logbook, sometimes years without operating, others were exclusively logged electronically when operating on packet radio. Remember that? I'm not sure it still exists. Most of the off times were due to changes in circumstances, job commitments, family commitments, changes in lifestyle where I didn't have time for the hobby.

And here were are so many years later with a brand new blank logbook.

Hopefully it won't take as long to fill logbook #2!......