Adjusting TX gain in the FT-817ND

If you’ve been following my latests posts, you’ll know that during the last V-UHF contest I detected reduced output power on the 70cm band in my FT-817ND. The output power was only about 60% of the maximum 5W in SSB and CW, but in FM mode it reached 5W. This problem only happened on the 70cm band. On all the other bands, the radio reached 5W output power in every modes. After spending some time studying the service manual, I came to the conclusion that the problem was that TX gain in the UHF band was too low. This is a software calibration parameter, so, in the end, fixing this problem has been rather easy.

Below you can see the relevant part of the block diagram of the FT-817ND. Q1007 is marked in blue. This is an IF amplifier where the FM signal and the signal for SSB and CW join together. Before this stage, the FM signal and the SSB/CW signals follow totally different paths. Q1007 is a dual gate FET. The ALC circuit applies a DC level to its second gate to control the gain of this stage. This ALC circuit is rather complex: it monitors output forward and reverse power and it will reduce the gain of Q1007 under high forward power or high SWR conditions. In fact, the ALC circuit is what limits the output power to 5W, since the finals of the FT-817ND can reach 10W or more.

The signal then passes to Q1002 (marked in green), which is an attenuator controlled by the software calibration parameter TX gain. This parameter is band-dependent (there are 3 HF bands plus VHF and UHF), but mode-independent. Then, the signal is mixed with the local oscillator to convert it to the transmit frequency, filtered and amplified before passing to the PA board.

FT-817ND TX gain & ALC chain
FT-817ND TX gain & ALC chain

The key aspect to understand the problem with my radio is something that is not really mentioned in the manual: when reaching Q1007, the FM signal is at higher level than a (full power) SSB/CW signal. Thus, the FM mode will operate under a high level ALC action, which will reduce the gain of Q1007. Even if TX gain is set a bit low, the radio will reach full 5W output power, since the ALC will just reduce a its action to compensate for increased attenuation in Q1002. However, the SSB/CW mode operates under a low level ALC action. The ALC is just used to make the radio reach full output power even if the gain of the finals changes slightly under temperature variation (or similar). Therefore, if TX gain is set a bit low, the ALC level will drop to zero and the radio will not reach full output power. That is precisely the problem I was encountering. It seemed that I just had to adjust TX gain for the UHF band.

The service manual describes a procedure to adjust TX gain: A 1kHz 1mV signal should be injected into the microphone jack. Then TX gain should be adjusted so that the output power is 2.5W. However, this procedure wasn’t so easy to do for me, because I would have to hook up a sound card to the microphone jack, and adjust the level of the injected signal using the oscilloscope to monitor. Also, this procedure relies on the correct SSB mic gain being set.

Instead, I used the following procedure. I assumed that the VHF band was more or less well adjusted and I took advantage of the fact that I have fldigi in my computer prepared to do digital modes and hooked up to the radio properly. I generated a 1kHz signal with fldigi and lowered the soundcard volume until the output power in VHF was about 3W (there is an unlabeled mark between 2W and 5W in the cheap power meter I’m using, so I just aimed for that mark). Then I switched to UHF and increased TX gain until the output power was the same as in VHF.

To adjust TX gain, I used FT-817 Commander instead of using the built-in software calibration mode (which is accessed by pressing A, B and C while powering on the radio). FT-817 Commander can read and update calibration parameters over CAT by reading and writing the EEPROM directly. Of course, this is a bit risky in case something weird happens with the serial connection, but it allows me to use the radio normally and adjust the calibration parameters with the computer. Before touching any of the parameters, you should take note of all the factory settings. I’ve made a gist with the factory settings for my radio.

I’ve found that the TX gain parameter is rather sensitive. The effect of varying this parameter by a single step is rather noticeable. Hence, it is not very important to use precission lab equipment to adjust this parameter. Even if the measurement error is very low, it will be impossible to adjust this parameter very precisely. In fact, in my case I only needed to increase TX gain from 56 to 58. After making this adjustment, the radio seems to be working properly.

11 comments

  1. hello Daniel,
    am impressed by your detail explanation however i am in a difficult situation with my ft817nd, i bought it while was in england and bring it to my location Reunion Island french territory in the indian ocean

    on all vhf uhf channels radio works fine but on hf i have never been able to listen to anything

    my config is
    yaesu ft817nd / autotuner Z817 from LDG / HFedz End Fed 6m-80m

    even thought trying everything could not get on air on hf bands

    after reading your post i am confident you could help me with the settings for the hf please

    and also i am powering my rig from a car battery 12V / 100Ah / 760A (EN) hook to a solar charge controller and from the controller am taking the 12V

    but on the screen its always between 15to 18.2V at night when no sun charging the battery and 15 to 23V during day time with sun

    i have once power it from my car lighter, same result if car off or on

    can you clarify me somhow help me or i am lost

    thanking you in advance

    swl
    FR-80.401

    QRZ (27Mhz, PMR446, LPD433)
    173 FRS 040

    name: Ramjean Sakeel

    mail: sakeelr@yahoo.fr
    phone: 00 262 692 90 21 09
    skype: ms2910

    thanking you in advance

    1. Dear Ramjean,

      First, I am not sure that you can put more than 13.8V into the FT817 DC input. If the voltage meter of the FT817 says between 15 to 23V you might have damaged the radio (or maybe the meter is wrong, check with a good voltmeter).

      Second, from your message I’m not sure if the problem is that you are not able to RX, to TX or both.

      If you cannot RX, are you sure the problem is with the radio and not with your antenna or tuner?

      Probably debugging this problem without any sort of test equipment (at least some rudimentary or improvised equipment) will be extremely difficult. It is not a matter of going blindly into the radio setting and changing some values. The hardware might be damaged.

  2. Hi Daniel, I wonder if you can help with a problem with my ft817nd?
    I have noticed that on all bands Hf & vhf that I only am getting a max of 3W out falling to 1.5W only when using CW. This drops to 1.5W after being switched on for a while. All other modes give me the full 4.5 to 5 Watts out (AM 2.5W). I have had this for many years and it is as purchased (no mods or fiddling). As I live in Ireland I don’t want to send it to the uk for repair if I can isolate the problem and effect a repair myself. I have carried out a full reset but to no avail.

    Many thanks,

    Anthony (EI6DT)

    1. Hi Anthony,
      Since your problem is specific to CW it seems that you don’t have enough drive level in the CW carrier, or something similar. However, just to narrow the problem, I would check also whether you get ALC action on different modes. For example, are you able to get 5W out on SSB or digital with no ALC action?

      I’m seeing in the list of factory settings for my radio (linked in the post) that there is a setting for “CW Carrier Injection Level”, so the fix might be as easy as changing this value. But it is better to think it carefully over the block diagram and schematics to try to determine if this is really the problem.

  3. Hi Daniel,

    although I do not have a real problem, can you explain what “AL” means, this is displayed when I transmit on HF.

    Thanks,

    Wilco
    PA1WLC

    1. Hi Wilco,

      Thanks for your question? Where is AL displayed? In what mode is the display? The display of the FT817 is a tiny display that can be cycled through several modes. A photo of the whole display showing this message might help.

  4. Hi
    Good morning from Chennai India. I recently added an 817nd to my shack. Extremely satisfied with the performance of the little Yaesu. My 7300 is taking rest now. I have made contacts all over India using my EFHW 4010 antenna from myantennas.com which is perfectly matching with the rig without a tuner. No questions as such, this is going to be a keeper here.

  5. I have some issue with my FT 818.
    The Rig transmits 4 watt on the 10 and 80m band. when the radio is on for about 20 minutes the power will be the factory specified full 6 watts.
    What is going on here?

    Does the radio need to warm up to reach the factory specified transmit power?

    73, Roy
    PD5RVL

    1. Hi Roy, the FT-817ND will put out the max. 5W immediately after being powered on. No need for it to warm up. I guess the FT-818 should be similar. What signal are you using to do this test? When you only get 4W, is there ALC action? Perhaps the signal amplitude is not strong enough to generate ALC action when the radio is cold, and with the radio warm the gain is higher and the ALC acts.

  6. Great page! I just bought an FT-817 (slightly used) while living in The UK for a year. Love it, and have now installed the lipo battery pack, which works so much better than the original. Anyway, my issue is, all of the sudden, and without me changing anything, the keyer won’t do the dashes. The dits are just fine. I’ve made sure the rig is fully charged. Still nothing. The very simple iambic keyer I’m using is still working fine and all the contact points are solid, so I know it’s the radio. Any ideas? TNX

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