Bizarre Issues With Repeaters & A Yaesu FTM-200D

[EastCoastSunrise]

To preface, Im still a complete novice in the Ham radio world, only getting licensed earlier this year so I'd guess my problem is pretty basic.

Over the summer I moved my Diamond X-30A from my second floor room to my attic and got great results! Repeaters I couldn't hit before were now in the clear. With the start of school for me however I had to take a break and focus on my studies. Now however I have some more time on my hands and I thought I'd tune in to some NTS nets and send some traffic around. However to my surprise repeaters that are only 10 miles away, that 3 months ago sounded crystal clear I can't pick up at all. My first guess was the connector on my radio was lose. However retightening it didn't fix the issue. Then I thought that it may have something to do with how it is mounted with an old Christmas tree stand. So I readjusted that and got nothing, now frustrated and confused, I tried moving it around in the attic by a few feet but still nothing. I checked all the connections on the antenna while I was up there, and haven't touched my radio in my away time. I know in the spring when the leaves come back out reception can worsen, but I had never heard of it happening in the fall. Also when I was moving my antenna, I noticed that when I was standing in certain spots it would clear up a tad but then when moving my body an inch or two the signal would be gone. However that isn't the most confusing thing. Just to see what I was hitting the repeaters I was testing with, as I was cherchunking most of them. I logged into their echolink node and to my utter surprise my audio was pretty much perfect. I don't have a before recording to compare too but it sounded fine, unlike the receive side which I cant hear anything on, even the station ID. Additionally however complicating matters further, when using my SDS to check the repeater output its dead silent, even though I can hear just fine over echolink, however I could hear other operators calling in to a traffic net just fine on the SDS. However when tuning it to in my case Boston Police Ch.2, which is located on pretty much the same tower as some of the repeaters I was trying to hit they were crystal clear on receive.

Repeater Info for repeaters I used to have no issues with but now I cant hear at all:
KC1US 146.715 PL 146.2 Operator MMRA, MMRA.org
W1DYJ 446.775 PL 146.2 Operator MMRA, MMRA.org (co-located with KC1US)
W1BRI 146.670 PL 146.2 Operator MMRA, MMRA.org
W1BOS 145.230 PL 88.5 Operator BARC, barc.org
WO1VES 147.075 C4FM


Anyone know what my issue might be or at least has some trouble shooting steps for me? I know it is a random issue and might be a settings thing but as far as I know everything is set up right. I have run out of ideas and I feel like it is a hardware problem of some sort but that doesn't explain it. Im more than happy to provide extra info as needed as I wasn't sure what to include here.

Thanks in advance,
KC1TBE

P.S. The speaker on my FTM-200 makes a low hissing noise when turned on. Doesn't get louder or quieter with the volume knob. Not sure if thats related, or just normal.

 

[mmckenna]

Have you tried tuning in to the National Weather Service and see how it performs?

Sounds like it could be a number of things, but here's two off the top of my head:
Your radio isn't tune on frequency correctly, you have a receive tone set, or something else with the radio.
or
There a strong interference that wasn't there before. Could be something in your home, or a neighbors. Might be a new appliance, cheap LED lights, leaky cable TV, etc...

So, a few places to start:
Double/triple check the settings on your radio. Trying a strong NOAA station might tell you something useful.
Try going through your home and shut off circuit breakers to see if it suddenly goes away, then narrow things down from there.

You'll probably get quite a few other good suggestions from others.

 

[RFI-EMI-GUY]

Wow; I looked at the complex manual for that radio and my first thought is that something is set wrong. Are you sure it isn't blue tooth pairing with something and that is why not RX audio? Are you getting signal on the S meter? I would RTFM and maybe even do a factory reset.

 

[EastCoastSunrise]

Have you tried tuning in to the National Weather Service and see how it performs?

Sounds like it could be a number of things, but here's two off the top of my head:
Your radio isn't tune on frequency correctly, you have a receive tone set, or something else with the radio.
or
There a strong interference that wasn't there before. Could be something in your home, or a neighbors. Might be a new appliance, cheap LED lights, leaky cable TV, etc...

So, a few places to start:
Double/triple check the settings on your radio. Trying a strong NOAA station might tell you something useful.
Try going through your home and shut off circuit breakers to see if it suddenly goes away, then narrow things down from there.

You'll probably get quite a few other good suggestions from others.

Thank you for the reply! Also please do get some sleep at some point as you seem to be super human in your response times on the forums. Checking the NOAA weather radio was one of my earlier troubleshooting steps, and yielded good audio on Ch 3 at full strength (everything else was quiet.) which is normal for my area, the SDS will only pickup ch 3 when I do a weather scan. Ill have to look at the interference track some more. I have a battery UPS for some PC hardware which Ill plug into to make sure it isn't dirty power. Then Ill do a double check of all of my settings. Heck I might just end up taking the antenna out of the attic and try setting it up somewhere else. However Im still confused about how the repeater can hear me fine but I can't hear it, that is still perplexing to me.

Wow; I looked at the complex manual for that radio and my first thought is that something is set wrong. Are you sure it isn't blue tooth pairing with something and that is why not RX audio? Are you getting signal on the S meter? I would RTFM and maybe even do a factory reset.

Also thank you for the response. I've never dabbled with the bluetooth settings as I have had no need to but, Ill give it a shot just incase. However I am leaning towards it being a receive thing of some sort, given the S-Meter showing anything. I did a factory reset last night to no avail, but I might give it another shot.

If none of this seems to fix it, I might call HRO, who sold me the radio and see if there by chance there was a bad batch of units, given I'd still be under warranty. Or I might just call Yaesu directly to see if there tech support would be able to provide any further details.

 

[mmckenna]

Also please do get some sleep at some point as you seem to be super human in your response times on the forums.

I spend a ridiculous amount of time sitting on zoom calls for work. Surfing the net while someone talks about boring budget stuff keeps my mind intact.


As for the issue,
NOAA should be a good strong signal, as you've seen, and it coming in well might indicate that you have some low level interference that it can break through. Lower signal strength stuff might get lost in the noise.

 

[EastCoastSunrise]

There a strong interference that wasn't there before. Could be something in your home, or a neighbors. Might be a new appliance, cheap LED lights, leaky cable TV, etc...

Hit the nail on the head. As it turns out I have not discovered a magic propagation pattern. I was up in the attic again trying to reposition the antenna and I remembered I had installed a Raspi in the attic powered via POE from a switch in the basement. I guess something about the way the shielding was working (or not working in this case) was causing issues. Disabling it fixed the problem! So now I am back on the air and happy as a clam.