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FM
Packet
Deviation
Meter
Put
your
packetstationonthemoneyfor
20
bucks.
byStevenR.SampsonN50WK
."
52
02
tN9l-4
hoA
1
0K
R13
R12
lOOK
12K
RIO
15K
''Iv
51
RU
9
V
~
.I.
Ca
li
bration
I'v
ereallyenjoy
ed
watchingallthesig
na
ls
as
much
as
listeningtothem,
and
ittook
a
bitofanalysistofigureoutthebestwayto
usethemeter.
Af
terseveraldays
of
monit
or
ing
signalso
ver
the
air
,
I
f
ound
that
thewholerange
of
themeterisused
by
vari
ous
01
2NU22
(.,1)
-
Rll
'2K
R9
.'K
R5
C2
Rl
+
I-v'
OJ
1K
luF
UK
1N91
-4
R8
••
1K
I
I
R.
1M
BufJ'
l!!r
Amp
-
-
-
--'
-
•
•
,
•
•
•
•
•
•
~
•
II
,
•
10K
10K
Pin10
of
ac
e
nne
r
MC3l511C
MAKESMETER
Re
ad
Ze
ro
W
hen
Squel
ch
Is
Act
ive
R2
Figu
rr
I.Schematicfor
'M
FMPack
et
DeviationM
et
u.
Rl
P
hot
o
A.
Tbe
FM
PacketDeviati
on
Mf!t
er
makesthis
st
ati
on
c
om
plete.
Pin
9
of
San
nef
"'
C
3J51
1C
o.L
hp
llt
C1
RJ
.
-1
,
DI
330K3
"V
causingapositiveoutputtothethirdstage.
Bill
recommends
thatyounot
ch
angethevalues
of
thesecond-stageresistors.
Th
ecircuitisbasedonthe
LM-324
opamp
ch
ip.
II
drawsabout
1
rnA
totalandwilllastforever
ona
9
volt
b
anery
.
It'sverysimpletoputto
getherona
perfboard.
SeeFigure
I.
T
herearealot
of"p
lug-and-play"ama
teurstoday,andmanyareworkingFM
packet.Whilemanytraditionalamateurscan
drawaBesselfunctionchanwiththeireyes
closed.thisnewbreedofhamisalotless
technical.Manyhaveahardlimedigesting
theconceptsof
band
widthandfrequency
drift.
nevermind
deviation.
Th
isarticle
will
help.
It
showshow10buildausefulIns
uu
meru.
exp
lainsexactlywhy
it
isne
eded
.andchallengestheless-than-technicalh
am
to
ell
pandhisorherelectronicexpertise.
LikemostnewcomerstoVHFpacketra
dio,ISCImysystemup
by
co
nnectingallthe
cablesandgettingonthea
ir
.
It
wasn't100
longbeforeIcheckedmya
udi
olevels.Un
likevoice.therearen'talotofpeoplewho
complain
if
yourpacketaudiois
100
hot
or
tooweak.Actually,
I
don
't
thinkanyone
lo
ca
llylistens
to
thepa
ck
et
tonesbecause
I
washotterthanatwo
do
ll
ar
pistol.First
J
setmyreceiveaudiolevel,andthiswassimply
anincr
ea
seinvolumeuntilthe
TNCDa
taCarri
er
Detect(DCD)lightilluminated,fol
lowedbyasquelchadjustment(some
TN
Cs
can
operatewithoutsquelch,andthisisthe
better
way
togo).You
ca
nmakeapretty
good
ju
dgementaboutsettingthetransmitterau
dio
levelbylisteningwithanotherradio,
butthe
CO!TCC1
methodis
to
useadeviationmete
r.
Youwon
't
findinexpensivedeviati
on
metersatanyradiostore.
so
y
ou're
goingtohavetobuildone.Thisarticlepresents
a
de
via
tio
n
me
te
r
ba
sedonWilli
am
Crowl
N6MWS'sdesignfromtheJanuary
1990
issue
of
73
Amateur
RadioToday.
Thecircuit
usesp
an
s
available
atRadioShack,and
will
runabout
$20
.Bill'scircuitfeaturedmany
otherusefulfuncti
on
swhich
I
deletedfrom
thisdesign
10
makeitasimpleone-evening
project.Figure
I
showstheschematic.
This
meteris
based
onsimpleAC
voltme
ter
principles.
It
picksupthe
j\
C
voltagefromthereceiv
er
's
FMdete
ct
or
.amplifies,rectifies,and
drivesthemetermovement.Thefirststage
takestheACvolta
ge
fromascanner
or
yourham
rig
'sdiscri
mina
t
or
output,blocksthe
DC,andamplifi
es
itwith
a
ga
in
of
t
hr
ee.
The
next
tw
o
op
ampstages
form
acl
eve
rfull
-wave
rectifierfuncti
on
.
Thepo
sitivehalf
of
theinput
waveform
pa
sses
aro
undthes
ec
ond
op
amp
to
the
third.whilethe
negativehalfisinverted
by
thesecondstage.
2273
Amateur
Rad
io
Today.
August,1993
PhotoB.TheFMPacketDeviationMeterwithcoverremoved.
Photo
C.
Thefinishedproduct.
Figure
2.
PC
boardpattern
and
partsplace-
ment
diagram.
andthepredictedbandwidthusing5kHzde
viationisasteady
22
kHz.Transmittingasignalwiththiswideabandwidthis
certain
tofailwithdistantpacketstations,andlikely
eventofailacrosstown.There
are
tworeasons:First,mostrigswillclipthcaudioto
limitthedeviation,whichcauses
distorti
on
Thesecondreasoniscrystalstability.One
rigmay
be
tuncd
1.4
kHzhigh
er
infrequency,andtheoth
er
1.4
kHz
lower,andstill
be
withincrystaltolerance
on
145MHz.Thisgivesusabout12kHz
of
worse-caseusable
receiverbandwidth.Using3kHzdeviationresultsinamodu
lation
inde
xof
1.36,
and
the
cha
rtshowsaboutfoursidebandpairs,
or
8
tim
es
2
.2
kHzfora17.6
kHz
bandwidthonthemore
o
H
~
C
K
L
DEV.
ME
T
DeviationBasics
Whether
an
FMreceiverhasadiscrimina
tor,
ra
tiodetector,quadraturedetec
tor
,orone
of
themodemphasedetectorsmakeslit
tledifferenceaslongasthe
ou
tput
of
the
de
tectorisproportionaltotheamplitude
of
themodulating
to
rte.
Wh
en
asignalisfedtothe
FMmodulator,
it
variesthefrequ
en
cydirectly.ThemodulatedPMsignalisa
va
riablesetofsidebandswhosetotalbandwidth
dependsboth
on
thefrequencyofmodula
tionandtheamount
of
deviation.Thelimits
setbythetypicalnarrowbandFMreceiver
IFstageisabout15kHz.
Thebestmethodofdeterminingtheband
width
of
an
FM
s
ig
nalistouseaBess
el
functionchart,as
show
ninFigure3.You
usethischarttofindthenumber
of
sidebandpairsandthencomputethebandwidth.First
youcalculatethemodulationindex:
p.
!l
m
whereP
""
modulationindex.D
""
peakdeviation,andm
""
modulatingfrequency.
Then
youexaminethechart
10
see
howmanysidebandsthereareoneachsideofthe
carrier.
If
thecurvecomes
off
thebaselinea
line-width
or
more,
I
includethatsideband.
Thesimple
ba
ndwidthformulasyoufindintextbooksarealldifferentandcan
be
consideredu
nr
eliable.Usethechart.Theworse
caseexampleisanFMsignalthathasbeen
deviated5kHzwithamodulatingfrequency
of
3
kHz.Themodulationindexis
1.67,
givingusfoursideband
pa
irs,or
eig
htsidebands
of
3kHz,requiringanestimated
24
kHz
ba
ndwidthto
co
ntainit.Thisisquite
acceptablefor
voicew
hen
it
occurs
on
lybriefly.Pa
ck
etusesahightone
of
2.2kHz,
ject
istogetadownwarddeflection.
Someradiosproduceanoticeablediffer
enceinthetwoAFSKpackettones.Here,
youmaywanttodothealignmentusingthe
morecriticalhi
gh
tone.Asyoumightex
pect,anyfrequencyerrorthrowseverything
off,somakesureboththemeter
's
receiverandthetransmitterarctun
ed
tothesamefrequency.packetstations.
Th
ereallypo
or
ones
dr
ivethemeteragainstthe15reading(overdevia
tion),whileno
audio
of
cou
rse,
drop
sitdownto
OI
chosethe
21
3-scale
10
readingasthebestcalibrationsetting.
Withoutasignalpresent,thediscrimina
toroutputsanoisewaveform,sothecalibra
tionp
ot
on
themeterisaligned
to
center
aboutthis
10
reading.Calibrationneedstobe
performed
eac
h
tim
ethefrequ
en
cy
ischanged.Iusuallymonitorthefrequencyfor
aminutetomakesureth
er
eisnointe
rf
er
ence,and
then
recheckca
librati
on
.
Any
anomalycausesmetochangefrequencyand
recalibrarc.
Whenapacketisreceived,themeterwill
deflectdownwardforthegoodguysandup
wardsforthebadguys.It
's
importantthatyouonlymeasuresignalsthat
are
full-quieting,asnoisewillthrowthereading
of
f.
I
finditbesttokeepthecircuitportableand
takeittothetransmitterfora
li
gnment.RFis
badnewsforconsistentreadings,howev
er
.You
can
avoidthisbybothremovingthe
scannerantennaandplacingadummyload
on
the
transmit
ter.
If
your
TN
C
doe
snothaveavariable
de
viationadjustment(ade
signdefect),thecommonmethodistowire
a10kohmpotentiometerintotheaudioline
tothetransmitter.Don
't
dependonhigh
or
lowjumperstooperate
co
rrec
tly-these
aresuckersettings.
Aftertheseinitialsteps,
I
usuallycom
mandthe
TNC
intothe"calibrate"modeand
sendthehightone.Anothergoodmethodis
to
comma
ndthe
TN
Ctothe"convers
e"
modeandholddownthe"return"key.
I
thenquicklyadjusttheaudiopottomycalculated
3kHzdeviationreading(about
8.0
onmymeter).Unlessyoucalibrateyo
ur
metertoaknownsourceyouareonlyguessingabout
whatthereadingsmean,aseachdiscrimina
torisdifferent.1fyoucan'tfindacalibration
source,youcanlistentosignalsontheair
or
tuneyourstationby
car
togetaninitialestimate.Afteracoupleofdaysyouwillquick
lycometoknowwhatis
good
andwhatisbadbymonitoringtheperformance
of
bothyourownandotherpacketstations.Theob-
2473
AmateurRadio
Today.
August,1993
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