TNFrank Posted January 7 Posted January 7 Amazon has the QT80 Pro on sale for close to what I paid for the QT60. I returned the QT60 and I'm moving up to the QT80. It also has an external speaker with the deal that I'll probably never use but for the price it's cheaper than just getting the radio by it's self. Just to add to this, the QT80 can do 10M, 12M and 15M. The QT60 will only do 10M and 12M. The QT80 would be more useful after I get my General license. Here's a link if anyone is interested. https://www.amazon.com/Radioddity-QT80-Transceiver-Reduction-External/dp/B0DSFVRZSF/ref=sr_1_4?crid=2NVKDPKH9MKG3&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.WSHyYOEtQdgexgSQe8R9ZujMInxR0P0nzTGZ5bSLvQ4RIO5HLkdXDGPoqInNHfLvtfKqn1fWgDNKfX7fpeMRYap5VYq4emt9bdntXnij6P4.lSYspZntH_NJT6zFDEgcaspGZKtD46JEZ0aME5lQgkk&dib_tag=se&keywords=qt80+pro+10+meter+radio+ssb&qid=1767807392&sprefix=%2Caps%2C396&sr=8-4 Quote
TNFrank Posted January 10 Author Posted January 10 Got the radio yesterday, set it up today and made a few contacts. This radio is actually a bit smaller than the QT60 but has 20w more power. Seems to work well with the EFHW that's cut for 10M. All in all it's a really decent radio and I even hooked up the external speaker. Still having fun on 10M. SteveShannon 1 Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 Cigarette Lighter plug for power? Is that the way it comes; or you added it? Be careful: 12 volt cigarette lighter outlets are usually limited by their fuse to 10 amps. 60 watts is probably ok; 80 watts, I don’t know. Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 It has the male side of the T plug coming from the radio and a female side going to bare wires so you can wire it up to something. I ordered the female side lead with the adapter. So far I've not had any issues power wise. Everything is working well. Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 What’s a T plug? Male side/Female side? SSB pulls the most power on loud audio. Be careful if your antenna tuner requires you to use RTTY or FM to tune; lower your power to tune. Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 6 minutes ago, WRYS709 said: What’s a T plug? Male side/Female side? https://www.amazon.com/s?k=yaesu+power+cable Also, I don't have an antenna tuner anymore. Seems like a properly tuned antenna doesn't need one. Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 10 minutes ago, TNFrank said: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=yaesu+power+cable Bare wires still need to connect to a power source with 12 volts and enough amps. https://www.radioddity.com/products/radioddity-qt80?srsltid=AfmBOoo8QSU0_4CQVyuglQkXipLOiRyd-lCBA0oTFI8oJRyaRoLDU2cr Hate to see you blow a fuse on the 9th activation! Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 One thing about the QT80, the heat sink makes it hard to screw on the antenna so I added a BNC adapter to it so it's easy on and off. Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 The power station is 12.6v/10a with 126w output. I'm pretty sure the radio only pulls 45-50w when it's keyed up and transmitting. I'll double check tomorrow but so far things are working fine. If I do run into any issues I have a 12v/30 amp hour LiFePo4 battery I can hook up to and if that doesn't do it I'll bring my 100 amp hour battery out.LOL. P.S. I'm not Activating, I'm Hunting. Quote
SteveShannon Posted January 11 Posted January 11 7 minutes ago, TNFrank said: output. I'm pretty sure the radio only pulls 45-50w when it's keyed up and transmitting. It’s outside of the laws of physics for a 60 watt radio to only pull 45-50 watts of power when it’s transmitting 60 watts. If a radio is only pulling 45-50 watts it’s probably only transmitting 30-35 watts. No radio is 100% efficient and it’s literally impossible to be more than 100%. WRYZ926 1 Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 The QT80 is an 80w radio. I'll look at the power station display tomorrow to see how much the radio is pulling. AM/SSB isn't s constant like FM would be but I'm sure you know that. That might explain why it's pulling less watts than the rated 80w. SteveShannon 1 Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 That’s why I got the UDPower C-400. About 20 years ago I purchased the Duracell Powerport 600 it was built around a 12v 28Ah lead-acid battery and included a 12v 10 amp Cigarette Lighter Outlet, and an inverter for dual 120 VAC 300 watt outlets But it also included Jumper Cables that attached to a 120 Amp Anderson Powerport compatible outlet that connected directly to the internal battery for 12v high amps. This was my “go-to” power supply for “portable activations” that I would take pre-POTA to escape the high Urban QRMary at my QTH. I used it first for my Yaesu FT-857d and then my Icom IC-7300 with power cables that I had made by Powerwerx. It worked but it was heavy! Now I use the UDPower C-400 Power Station with its 20Ah LiPO4 lightweight battery because it also comes with jumper cables and an EC5 port on the back which I use for 12v high amps! I purchased two cables from Amazon which converts it to Anderson Powerpoles. And I can use its 12v car charging cable to daisy-chain my Jackery Explorer 300 to double its capacity if needed. Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 So I ordered this: https://www.amazon.com/Converter-110V-220V-Transformer-Compressor-Refrigerator/dp/B0DNQ83RPY Even though things are working fine and the 12v plug has 15a fuses this will convert the 120v a/c to 12v-15a. Quote
SteveShannon Posted January 11 Posted January 11 22 minutes ago, TNFrank said: So I ordered this: https://www.amazon.com/Converter-110V-220V-Transformer-Compressor-Refrigerator/dp/B0DNQ83RPY Even though things are working fine and the 12v plug has 15a fuses this will convert the 120v a/c to 12v-15a. As an Amazon shareholder I thank you for your business. Northcutt114 1 Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 5 minutes ago, SteveShannon said: As an Amazon shareholder I thank you for your business. LOL, just make sure to get my cut of the take in the mail. SteveShannon 1 Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 Can’t beat the price. I hope it doesn’t inject any noise. I used my Duracell Powerpack 600 for years before finally buying a power supply ar HRO that can handle 30 amps. Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 If there is any noise it'd probably be at 60Hz well under 10M/28MHz. I also would hate to think that the 12v/10a deal was holding my radio back not letting it reach it's full power. Quote
SteveShannon Posted January 11 Posted January 11 1 hour ago, TNFrank said: If there is any noise it'd probably be at 60Hz well under 10M/28MHz. I also would hate to think that the 12v/10a deal was holding my radio back not letting it reach its full power. Nothing about that power supply looks like it’s filtered for sensitive equipment. Most of what it’s advertised to support are motorized loads. I’d be very interested in what the output looks like on an oscilloscope. It looks like it is probably a switch mode power supply, which operates at much higher frequencies than 60 Hz. Still, if it works for you that’s all that matters. Typically, when a power supply can’t keep up the voltage will sag. If the radio has a microprocessor and it sags too much you might see it click off (almost always while transmitting) and then power back on when the power supply catches up. Northcutt114 1 Quote
WRYZ926 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 I have found that most of the cheap switching power supplies on Amazon are noisy on the HF bands. I run Astron power supplies since they have built in filters. As Steve mentioned, a good power supply will shut itself off if too much power is drawn from the radio(s). I know even my old 30 amp Astron will shut down if I try running my Icom 7300 and LDG AT-1000 Pro II auto tuner. The power supply shuts down as soon as I push the tune button on the LDG. I don't know about the Radioddity QT80, but it is common for radios to reduce output power when running on less than 13.8 volts. I know my Xiegu radios do that. The manufacturers stated power output is when running at 13.8 volts. SteveShannon and Northcutt114 2 Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 I just purchased this watt meter to monitor the output of my UDPower C-400 https://www.amazon.com/Heluok-Analyzer-Precision-Consumption-Performance/dp/B0F13JLJFH?adgrpid=182243981247&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=748519331721&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8732533830556314734&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9031204&hvtargid=dsa-1574853651722&hydadcr=&mcid=&hvocijid=8732533830556314734--&hvexpln=m-dsas&tag=hydsma-20&hvsb=Business_m&hvcampaign=dsamob to guide me about what power (watts,amps) is being demanded by my radios/amp as I power them portable. It also lets me know when the C-400’s battery is getting low. Quote
SteveShannon Posted January 11 Posted January 11 12 minutes ago, WRYS709 said: I just purchased this watt meter to monitor the output of my UDPower C-400 https://www.amazon.com/Heluok-Analyzer-Precision-Consumption-Performance/dp/B0F13JLJFH?adgrpid=182243981247&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=748519331721&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=8732533830556314734&hvqmt=&hvdev=m&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9031204&hvtargid=dsa-1574853651722&hydadcr=&mcid=&hvocijid=8732533830556314734--&hvexpln=m-dsas&tag=hydsma-20&hvsb=Business_m&hvcampaign=dsamob to guide me about what power (watts,amps) is being demanded by my radios/amp as I power them portable. It also lets me know when the C-400’s battery is getting low. I bought that same meter in late 2023. It seems to work well. A friend and I went in on a two-pack. That’s how I was able to see that my power supply was sagging while I transmitted. WRYS709 1 Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 So I watched the solar power station watts output and the max I saw was 118w. That's close to but not over the 126w max for the 12v output. I'm pretty sure they build in a bit of "fudge factor" because all the power stations I've seen tests on went over the rated wattage. I did cancel the order for the 12v to 15a converter. The power station seems to be working well enough so I'm just going yo use it for now. No reason to spend money on something I may not need. SteveShannon and WRYS709 2 Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 My Jackery charges my UDPower C-400 more quickly than its own 120v AC power wort (150 vs 77), because the 12v DC comes in through the solar/DC port; which are engineered to allow higher charging rates from solar panels. I think my C-400 tops off at 150 watt input but their larger Power Stations can handle higher wattage inputs. I have watched many YT videos of people daisy-chaining other batteries to their initial Power Station to get more power capacity more inexpensive than the brands options: 12v 100Ah batteries and even 24 volt batteries so long as your power station can handle increased voltage in their solar input , which most do. This is not as convenient as carrying a small Bienno battery for POTA, but I like the increased versatility living in earthquake country! Quote
TNFrank Posted January 11 Author Posted January 11 I have 2, 100ah and 1, 30ah LiFePo4 batteries I can connect to my power stations. See my YouTube channel for more info on them and the power stations I have. That way I don't have to get into it here. Quote
WRYS709 Posted January 11 Posted January 11 1 hour ago, TNFrank said: See my YouTube channel for more info on them and the power stations I have. That way I don't have to get into it here. Link please Never mind : I found both of them! TNFrank 1 Quote
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