I opted to purchase the 40 Meter version of the QCX-mini along with the enclosure. I also purchased the dummy load. its a nice addition for setting up the QCX-mini and testing it.
Building the QCX-mini wasn’t difficult, if you are an experienced builder. Even though the website says “easy to build”, that is also “easy to say”. Its imperative that you have the proper tools for soldering very small parts on to a PC board. Having said that, all of the SMD parts are already soldered in place for you. You must take your time, and follow the directions exactly, which are very well written.
However for me, when I went to install the finished QCX-mini into its case, I had to do some rather aggressive filing on some edges of the PC boards. I probably didn’t exactly align things perfectly during assembly. But after some filing of the PC board edges, I got it to fit into the case.
Once assembly and testing was complete, I could not wait to put it on the air! So I hooked it up to my antenna at home and tuned around and found W5TEN calling CQ. So i answered him. He came right back and gave me a 579! I was thrilled! It worked!
Tell me about the CW assist. I am fair at CW but an assist, that works well, to help decode and double check me would be very useful. Did it work? Thanks
Good question! I was going to talk about that but forgot to. I fiddled with it a little and was not real impressed. Maybe if I had spent more time with it perhaps it would have worked.
One nice thing about POTA, is their spotting page: pota.us What I encourage people to do when they are learning CW is to find a POTA CW spot. The spot has all the info to make a legit POTA QSO. So all you really need to be able to do is to copy your own call. So when you hear your call, just send his RST and your state abbreviation. The POTA rules for a QSO are very laid back.
Hope this helps!
— Mike
The CW Assist (decoder) works great, but requires getting it setup correctly. I am no expert at it at all, but I fiddled around with the settings on it and it works very well if everything is working properly. That would include band conditions being good. I know you have to set noise floor level, and wpm inside the decoder menu.
I have found out that you want your volume down enough that it mainly hears the CW tones and not all the background noises on the band. All the hissing and noise on the band the CW decoder tries to decode. But a good clean CW signal it does fine.
I have the original QCX in 40 Meter and just built the QCXmini in 40 Meter and I believe the decoder is better than what it was in the the original QCX.
Glad you had a blast with yours. I am now tempted to go out and try my QCXmini with my EF random wire antenna I built.
73 Juddie WD8WV
Hello and thank you for you input on the CW assist. Can you please share your parameters that you used to get it working properly?
— Mike