RemoteMyShack
Sign in Start free trial

Help › Operating

Sending and decoding RTTY

The console has an RTTY panel for standard amateur RTTY: 45.45 baud, Baudot. It appears when the radio is in RTTY or RTTY-R mode, or in LSB with DATA on. In USB with DATA on the FT8 panel appears instead. The buttons above the panel switch between the digital modes: FT8, FT4, WSPR, RTTY, PSK, SSTV and, in USB, RADE.

Decoding RTTY

The decoder listens to the radio's receive audio for the two RTTY tones, mark and space, and prints what it reads.

  • Receive audio must be on in the console. The decoder hears what you hear.
  • Tune the signal into the passband, then click Find. It looks at the last three seconds of audio for the strongest pair of tones at the right spacing and sets Mark to it. If there's no RTTY signal, it says so.
  • With AFC on, the decoder follows the signal if it drifts by up to 30 Hz.
  • Shift is 170 Hz for amateur RTTY. You can choose 200, 425 or 850 Hz for other signals.
  • Mark is normally the lower audio tone. In USB and RTTY-R it's the higher one, which the panel shows as Reverse.
  • The meter shows how clearly a signal is coming through. Clear empties the text, and unticking Decode pauses it.

Decoding works best on a steady signal well above the noise. On a weak or fading signal some letters are dropped or misread.

Sending RTTY

The console makes the RTTY tones and sends them to the radio as transmit audio, the same way it sends your microphone. This is called AFSK. So the radio has to be in a data mode: LSB with DATA on (LSB-D) is the RTTY convention.

  1. If the radio is in RTTY mode, click Switch to LSB-D on this frequency. The panel changes mode and moves the dial so the signal stays where it is.
  2. On an Icom, the radio must take its data-mode audio from the network: set DATA MOD to LAN in the radio's connector settings (under MOD Input on radios that have it). It's the same setting network FT8 needs. A FlexRadio takes it from SmartSDR's DAX, which RemoteMyShack sets up itself. A Kenwood, Yaesu or Elecraft must take it from USB (see Connecting a Kenwood, Yaesu or Elecraft), and a Hermes Lite 2 needs no setting.
  3. Type in the box and press Enter (or click Send). What's being sent shows under the box. Stop (or Esc) stops it at once.

Each transmission starts and ends with a new line, so the other station's screen starts clean.

Sending RTTY is transmitting, like Hold to talk: one console at a time, the station's TX time limit applies, it stops if your connection drops, and it's recorded in the transmit log. Keep the transmit power sensible: RTTY is a full-power, continuous mode, so many radios and amplifiers need it turned down.

Memories

Eight memory buttons, F1 to F8, work as they do for CW: {MY} is your callsign and {CALL} the call in Their call. Edit changes them, and every console at the station shares them. RTTY has its own set, separate from CW's.