Remote Control MFJ-993B

[troynm]

The MFJ-993B auto antenna tuner has a remote control box as an option using an RS-232 serial cable. I wrote MFJ and asked about the serial interface telling them my Remote Rig had a pass through com port. They told me it should work fine but I had no luck. I plugged the serial cable into the antenna tuner and into com 2 on the Remote Rig at the site. When I powered the antenna tuner on it went into some kind of setup mode asking if I wanted to delete an antenna. I could cancel out of that menu but it would not go back to the normal display. Of course the MFJ gives no information on the baud rate, etc., that it is looking for since it is a proprietary interface. I suspect it is not a true com port and they are using the RS-232 type cable and port as they are common and cheap.

Anyone have any experience getting one to work using Remote Rig? Although the auto tune works fine it would be nice to switch the tuner into bypass mode on occasion.

Thanks,
Tom
W5GV

[dj1aus]

Hi Tom,

I'm running the same tuner with an IC-7200 successfully but I was wondering if I could get the displayed values from the 993B to my computer where I'm sitting during operation.

Tuning by just pushing the "Tune" Button works, and RS- BA1 shows me a nice SWR but the latency of this is a little confusing. Today I started to think about placing a webcam in front of the MFJ streaming the screen but then I realized this RS-232 connector on the back.

So I was thinking perhaps I can get the collected data somehow transfered into my remote shack.

Did you get further with your investigation?

Curious to learn how you proceed.

Greetings

Alexander
DJ1AUS