Do you suppose this radio was actually tested before it was released? How difficult is it drive around and see if the navigation function points in the right direction?

It appears the radio cannot be changed with a firmware upgrade, so I am expecting they may all need to go back to the factory. As I remember, there was also a recall of VX-8’s when they were released.

Click for larger image

However, the display clearly shows the destination “D” as being behind me and off to the right.

The error changes depending on the direction of travel.

Going north, the target error is to the right but north and south seem to be ahead and behind, where they should be.

Going west, a target that should be ahead displays as behind and vice versa. But, when when due south, appears properly in the display. Until you drive past, when the destination becomes ahead of you when it’s really behind. Not to worry, when the destination was in front, it displayed as behind.

I am talking to Yaesu about this.

OK, I want to use the NAVI function to drive to a location or “point” as the radio calls it. I have received a packet from a friend at his house. I saved the location as a point.

I am now navigating to the point. I am south of the point, headed north, the NAVI screen (which I think is “heading up” on the display) shows me heading toward the point.

The point is two blocks off the road I am on. It is to the west (left on the display) of the road. But, as I get closer, instead of deviating to the left (west) and pointing toward the point, the target moves right (east) about the same number of degrees as is should me moving to the left.

When I am going west (and the target is north of me) it seems to do the same thing, moving the target northeast when it should be moving northwest. 

When I drive to the target, I get the GOAL indication as I would expect.

Can someone attempt to reproduce this behavior? It must be something I’ve set-up wrong, but with these lousy manuals, who can tell?

§97.113 Prohibited Transmissions
(a) No amateur station shall transmit:
**********
(3) Communications in which the station licensee or control operator has a pecuniary interest, including communications on behalf of an employer, except that the station licensee or control operator may, on behalf an employer, participate in emergency preparedness and disaster drills that include amateur operations for the purpose of emergency response, disaster relief or the testing and maintenance of equipment used for that purpose. Amateur operators may, however, notify other amateur operators of the availability for sale or trade of apparatus normally used in an amateur station, provided that such activity is not conducted on a regular basis;

This is not terrible wording and having spent weeks working on wording, that is no small feat—especially for a large committee. Frankly, I was 50/50 on whether the League would support a change to 97.113. It will be interesting to read the final minutes of the meeting and see how the debate went.

My main concern about this wording is that its too wordy (amateurs may participate in drills that include amateurs!). The lack of breaking the paragraph into pieces makes it seem like swap nets have something to do with emergency response (at least remove the “however” from the next sentence).

The major failing is that there is no provision for the employee who runs the RACES program to talk on the radio about the program, or to its members about program “business” such as meetings, outside of organized drills and exercises. I am pretty sure the wording does include regularly-scheduled nets and such but don’t understand why the “testing” wording is necessary. Is testing so special that it needs to be called out?

I am sure others have the same sort of complaints about our wording, which I—of course—think is much better. Heck, wording we didn’t use is better than this. But, it is not bad wording. It does accomplish the task and the FCC is unlikely to use anyone’s wording but its own. Any proposed wording is just to make sure the FCC understands the issue and what you want to accomplish.

It is good to have the ARRL involved on “the right side” of this issue. I hope the FCC will soon assign an RM number and designate comment periods so we can get this change into the rules. It is my fervent hope the League won’t feel the need to file a petition of its own and possibly delay the process.

The Board passed preferred wording for changes to 97.113 and that wording has not been released.

This raises the possibility that to mark its territory (after helping to create the problem) the League will file its own petition rather than try to get this issue handled as quickly as possible.

I expect to see the wording in a few days, when the actual minutes of the meeting are published. I hope they won’t pose a problem.

Having spent weeks working with Gordon West and Tom Blackwell (primary author) on the wording in our petition, plus getting lots of feedback from the field, I know you can’t just pick some nice-sounding words.

We will see what Newington does.

The Board instructed the ARRL staff to seek a change in Section 97.113(a)(3) of the FCC rules to permit amateurs, on behalf of an employer, to participate in emergency preparedness and disaster drills that include Amateur operations. 

On behalf of the petitioners, Gordon West, WB6NOA, Tom Blackwell, N5GAR, and myself, thank you to the ARRL BoD for supporting the effort to change a rule that actually hampers our emergency response.

I will add additional commentary later when I am back in the shack.

His cousin, Rev. Armand Hinault, said he heard that Fr. Hinault was alive and had been on his ham radio and was apparently alive.

However, my lack of crashes could be a lack of “on time” for the radio, which has not seen lots of use. With the help of Dan, N6VLG, I now have a longer Ethernet cable to connect the radio head to the base unit. This will allow me to move the base unit closer to my Powerpole block and reduce by a number of feet the length of the power cord.

If the lock-ups are really a function of occasional voltage drops, then my problems should be over.

Yaesu has asked that I send the machine in for a look-see, which I will wait to do only if the problem recurs after I get the power lead shortened.

Otherwise, this is a very nice radio that has some changes that I hope can be fixed. I need to find out if Yaesu plans to provide firmware upgrades for this radio, or whether than is even possible. I was shocked to find out that adding additional APRS capabilities to the VX-8 requires changing physical componentry.

I will be talking about the radio and what it is like from a happy user perspective soon.