Setting up WinLink HF / VHF Wingates

Guys,

I wont go too much into about what WinLink is as there is plenty of information on their site (https://winlink.org/). But in a nut shell - "Email over RF".

After my experience running a ALE Pilot Station and not having no much interest from local Australian operation using such mode. I decided to try my hand at setting up running HF/VHF WinLink Wingates.

Before I did this and I started of by installing the WinLink Express (client) software.  This allowed me to easily configure my Yaesu FT-991A fairly quickly.  Then via sessions I was able to try out and successfully contact and send / receive emails via HF to several other Australian operator providing Wingates supporting Winmor, ARDOP and VARA modes.

With that done and me up to speed with the client software, I turned to reading up on running HF and VHF Wingate.

WinLink VHF Packet WinGate

Starting of with the WinLink VHF Packet Wingate, I firstly decided to set up my BTECH UV-50x3 VHF/UHF rig along with my Mobilinkd Bluetooth TNC.  I was able to install the WinLink Packet application and very quickly configure it to use "KISS TNC".

HF Winlink Wingate (Winmor, ARDOP and VARA modems)

With success of easily running and operating the WinLink Express client software with the FT991A I was expecting the WinLink RMS Trimode application to be just as easy.

NOPE!!!!  First hurdle was the FT991 was not among the set of support HF rigs under server side application.  Fortunately I was able to quickly develop a little powershell script which acted as a "translator" between one of the rigs available under RMS Trimode.   I opted for Kenwood TS590 to control the Frequency and PTT control via CAT commands. Using VSPE to have 2 virtual comm ports I was able to intercept the Kenwoods CAT commands and translate and even inject extra control commands to the FT991.  My script is available on GitHub:  https://github.com/vk4tmz/rigtrans
but please note its not refined by any stretch of the imaghination, but if you know your rigs CAT commands and have a bit of understanding of powershell you'll be able to alter it to suit your own needs.  This sorts me out until hopefully the fine developers of WinLink RMS tools support FT991A.

Once I got over that little hurdle, the next challenge was finding clear frequencies that would have minimal impact on other operation as the station runs 24x7 fully automated.  The modems (Winmor, ARDOP and VARA) have "channel busy" detection of sort.  But it must be kept in mind that its up to  operator wishing to connect to my wingates to perform due diligence and ensure to the best to their awareness the frequency is not in use.  Wingates DO NOT auto beacon so until they are polled they will operate silently.

Once I had my frequencies selected which I opted to support / scan through 80-40-30-20-17-20m bands.  

PLEASE NOTE: It takes ~45 secs for RMS Trimode logic to scan through and spend ~7sec dwell time on each band. So please ensure if trying to connect to any of my wingates you give it a couple of goes incase when you tried I just missed you polling attempts.

So witth the HF and VHF set up I'm hoping this service will provide valuable to Ham both Land and Maritime Mobile on your travels.

Please drop me a email via VK4TMZ[AT]winlink.org and say gday.

Why no Pactor Modem / Support

Pactor modems are very expensive and are not opensource.  Many other stations around Australia seem to support Pactor, but at this time I've no intention to purchase one of these modems.


That's all for now folks
73
de VK4TMZ (Mark)

PC-ALE and MARS-ALE Running as a Pilot Station

Guys,

I ran PC-ALE for a period of months, and then requested access to become a Pilot Station using the MARS -ALE. I was granted access and set up successfully to allow Email to be sent via AMD commands.

Unfortunately at this time the only other Australian stations running ALE were primarily Peter VK2EHQ and more recently Peter VK4EA setup himself and our club station VK4RC.  The participation in Australia via amateur bands is virtually non-existent which is a real shame. 

I've enjoyed my time and the experience of running the Pilot Station but have ceased operation for now. I have both PCALE and MARS-ALE backed up for any EMCOMM situation and can be running in very short notice.  Perter VK4EA is looking to reestablish the original Brisbane ALE Pilot Station VK4SAA and I wish him all the best and hope it will continue to support those that want to have experience using ALE.

73
de VK4TMZ (Mark)

Setting up PCALE with YEASU FT-991A

For the last week I've been trying to setup PC-ALE with Yaesu FT-991A and have managed to do so. However having the station running for last 2 days for extended periods (i.e from early morning to late at night) there doesn't appear to be too many "sounding" occurring where I can hear them at least.

Locally I've heard 1 VK station "VK2EHQ" a handful of times through the day and evening on different bands with good S/N reports.  I've just heard "YD0OXH8" there on 12m but due to a small misconfig on ALE^Stat it did not upload the report to HFLink.

So at this stage I'm probably not going to run it much longer but will keep eye on forums and the HFLink Portal.  For now though I thought I'd share with you how I setup PC-ALE to work with my Yaesu FT-991A.

Firstly head over to HFLink.net to sign up and where you can get access to download the following files

1. Download the latest PCALE Full Install

• Currently a file called "PCALEv108B1000TB3_2_FI.zip" is latest

2. Download the latest PCALE Update

• Currently a file called "PCALEv108B1000TB3_3_UD.zip" is latest and is required as this adds in the radio-type MMI-RADIO  interface which  allows you control the Yaeus FT991A as its not one of the radios currently supported.

3.  Download the latest version of the MMI-Radio library to support FT-991A

• Currently a files called "MMI-RADIO_FT-991_Library.zip" is latest. I'll described the couple of changes I made to the macros further down.

Follow the instructions for installing the full install and the update which are fairly straight forward and well documented.

At this time the FT991A is not available as under the standard / common available radio interfaces under PC-ALE. However as part of the patch they have introduced MMI-RADIO which allows you to define a set of macros to control your radio.  Thankfully the was a FT-991A MMI-RADIO library already implemented that I just had to change the channel macros.

So to install the FT-991A MMI-RADIO library, extract the  "MMI-RADIO_FT-991_Library.zip" files in under "C:\PC_ALE\MMI_RADIO"

Under the menu option "Configuration->MIL-STD 188-141 Options" set the following at minimum:

• Sounding to TWS Sound (if you wish to TX "Soundings")
• Set Radio-Type to "MMI-RADIO" this will tell PC-ALE to use the macros under "C:\PC_ALE\MMI_RADIO" how to control the radio.
• Under "Radio Port" - Set the Baud and setting as needed to match what you have set on the FT-991A.  For me I was  38400, 2, 8, N and make sure you select "Split VFO" (more on this later)
• Audio level - 
• TX - Manual says so that ALC is barely trigger.  I currently have sit so ALC ~ 50%
• RX - So the RX meter signal level was about half which for me was ~%50
• CAT  - Set to the "Enhanced Serial Port"
• PTT - Set to the "Standard Serial Port"
• BTW - to be resolved,  I had to uncheck "LBT - Look Before Talk" as for some reason it was detecting activity and not allowing "Sounding".

QRG - I utilised the "AUSTRALIA_NOCALSIGN_USBD_2014C.qrg" as this sets the channels to use "USB-D" mode.

Antenna Tuning - I was fortunate that my 1/4 WL 40m vertical antenna could be tuned by the Yaesu FT-991A built in ATU. Obviously you may have a broadband Antenna that does not require any tuning but either way all I'm going to say is for me I went through each of the channels and "tuned" them.  So as PC-ALE was scanning and then TX on any of the frequency the Freq was in memory so I did not need to have PC-ALE run any ATU steps.  But if you do then you may need to read up on the MMI-RADIO macros and add commands to the QSS_nn_CHANNEL macros etc etc

To operate the FT-991A in quiet mode while scanning, I put the radio into split-mode "manually" and as you say from the "Radio-Port" settings above we have told PC-ALE to operate via SPLIT VFO.  What this means is that while scanning the VFO A will be updated as the channel changes and upon needing to TX the VFO B will be set to match VFO via the MMI Radio Macros and then TX will take place.

MMI-Radio Changes for Me -

• The "MMI_RADIO__CHANNEL_nn"  and "MMI_RADIO_QSS_CHANNEL_nn" were not the frequencies for my region.  So I had to alter / create as necessary "MMI_RADIO_CHANNEL_nn" for each channel from the QRG file I was using.  Each frequency needs to have a corresponding macro file starting at 01.  Failure to have these sync'ed will mean you scanning and TX will on frequencies not matching the PC-ALE display.
• Obviously make sure there is a corresponding QSS channel macro
• In each of my QSS macros files I set the "preamp" to the desired level.

That's it!! Have fun with PC-ALE and your Yaesu FT-991A

73
de VK4TMZ