Thursday, September 29, 2016

Remote Control Panel for ICOM IC-M710

The IC-M710 is a rugged transceiver built for its purpose. Though it covers the whole HF band, it is not intended for use by a radio amateur. The user interface being its weakest point (for a Ham). The features that are sorely missed by a Ham being:

  • A Tuning dial - a true VFO tuning dial is missing.
  • A real CAT interface.
  • A headphone jack
For the last couple of weeks I was pondering over the idea of having a remote control unit that will address the above limitations. Also with the additional features:
  • A remote panel that can be used as a face plate for mobile operations.
  • Band selection, tuner commands
  • Rotator control
  • Frequency memories
  • RIT
  • CW keyer

Update 13/3/2017
1st prototype finished, can go remote on/off, VFO A/B, step size changes, delayed TX freq set, etc.