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NX-5000 And Mobile Relay Station (Cross Band Repeat)

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opelgtalex

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Joined
Dec 13, 2016
Messages
7
I just wanted to pass along my findings to the forum after I got my L-5023 Mobile Relay Station Cable installed and set up in KPG-1D.
It works pretty well, press a button and your in crossband mode, press the exit button and you are out. what comes in one band goes out on another like you might expect. There is no adjustable hang time, courtesy tone etc...it is intended to be transparent.
This cable when installed on a dual or triple band setup (between 2 RF decks only), and a front panel button assigned in KPG-1D will allow you to cross band repeat from one RF Deck to the other in either direction.

A few notes and pics are attached to this post.

1. You cannot run mobile relay station and GPS/Bluetooth at the same time with this cable if you select Custom Cable COM 2 (the software grays out the GPS/Bluetooth option when Mobile Relay Station is selected). This is due to the COM ports that the radio uses. COM2 needs to be selected for this cable to work otherwise you get a cable error on the display when trying to use Mobile Relay Station.

2. The mobile relay station does not allow you to repeat in digital formats i.e. you cannot come in on any digital format and come out in analog or digital, it only allows analog to analog repeat.

3. You have to specifically assign a zone and channel for the mobile relay to repeat on in KPG-1D, its not adjustable in the the front panel, i.e. you cannot select channel x on UHF and channel x on VHF and then crossband them while out in the field- the selection in done in KPG-1D and not re-configurable via front panel.

Hope this explains this function to others that were interested in it.

(yes, I mounted the RF decks with the heatsink side up, and stacked them, this was deliberate as it runs cooler in this config)

-Alex
 

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RK3AAG

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Jun 25, 2011
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392
Location
Russia
Good info, thank. It would be nice to have pinout of this cable. I can suppose, that it's very simple to build.
 

opelgtalex

Member
Joined
Dec 13, 2016
Messages
7
So an update to my original post stating that you cannot run mobile relay station and GPS/Bluetooth at the same time with this cable- that is true with firmware 2.01, however, with the newest firmware v2.10 Kenwood has made changes, and you can now run GPS/Bluetooth and mobile relay station!
 

dapaq2

Member
Joined
Oct 10, 2005
Messages
308
Location
Northwest Indiana
In the programming under the mobile relay section there is a setting for the DB25 cable setting with a drop down menu where I can select either a "Cross Cable (Occupy COM port 1)" or "Custom Cable (Occupy COM port 2)", can anyone please explain to me what the difference is between these and what exactly the function or behavior is of each?

Thank you,
Doug
 

dapaq2

Member
Joined
Oct 10, 2005
Messages
308
Location
Northwest Indiana
Also under "mobile relay channel list" there is RF Deck #1 and then #2. Which deck does the receiving and which deck does the transmitting? What is the "Path of the Relay"?

I notice there is also "Model Name" and "Frequency" (which are currently greyed out), anyone know what those are for and do?

Thank you,
Doug
 
Joined
May 16, 2017
Messages
20
Location
Cave City, AR
Cable pinout

Good info, thank. It would be nice to have pinout of this cable. I can suppose, that it's very simple to build.

Well, I tried to get a screenshot of the cable, but I could not get it to work, so here is the cable pinout, use Program as COM 2 in the extended function.
conn 1 conn 2
5---------------19
7---------------7
9---------------10
10--------------9
11-------------11
18-------------18
19-------------5

THe rest of the pins have no connection. According to the manual, you can use this cable for analog OR digital modes. I have not tried it for digital yet, as I don't have a digital UHF radio, but it works great for analog to analog. It will not do cross mode repeat ie. analog to digital or digital to analog. (as far as I can tell, at least I cannot make it do it, you get a programming error.) I will have a digital UHF radio soon, and will try that mode also. I ordered a mobile repeat cable from Kenwood, and it would not work, after checking it with my cable tester, I found it to have pins 9 and 10 connected straight through instead of crossed. Once I straightened that out, it worked great.
 
Joined
May 16, 2017
Messages
20
Location
Cave City, AR
According to the Kenwood manual, the cross cable is just a commercial null modem cable with two 9 to 25 pin adapters. You can only use this cable for analog repeat. THE CUSTOM CABLE, (com2) is supposed to work for analog and digital both. (see my other post on this thread). The function of the cable is to transfer audio between the two decks, and also do the interfacing between them, keying the radios and such as that. Depending on which way the signal goes, one deck will key up, for example if you transmit on frequency 1 which is programmed in deck A receive, and deck B has a different frequency deck B will transmit the audio you originally transmitted on frequency A from your HT or whatever. When someone transmits on the receive frequency of deck B, it will be retransmitted on the transmit frequency of deck A and you should hear it on your receiver. Hopefully that explanation will help. 73
 
Joined
May 16, 2017
Messages
20
Location
Cave City, AR
Mobile relay

Well, the digital to digital repeat mode works well. As to my earlier post, it will only do straight through mobile repeat, (analog in analog out) or ( digital in digital out). I wish it would do cross mode repeat, possibly with a custom cable, but have not had the time to try. Any one out there tried this? Sure wish Kenwood would allow transmit channel change from the front panel like they do in the Amateur side instead of hard code the channels by program/reprogram only. Sure would make it a lot more useful (IMHO). Any others out there using this mode with any mods?
 

mmckenna

I ♥ Ø
Joined
Jul 27, 2005
Messages
23,615
Location
Hiding in a coffee shop.
Pyramid makes some equipment that will interface with the NX-5000 mobiles and allow more functionality, including linking from the Pyramid repeater to any one of the 3 RF decks.
 

KB1WLI

Member
Premium Subscriber
Joined
Sep 9, 2010
Messages
13
Location
middlefield,ct
I just wanted to pass along my findings to the forum after I got my L-5023 Mobile Relay Station Cable installed and set up in KPG-1D.
It works pretty well, press a button and your in crossband mode, press the exit button and you are out. what comes in one band goes out on another like you might expect. There is no adjustable hang time, courtesy tone etc...it is intended to be transparent.
This cable when installed on a dual or triple band setup (between 2 RF decks only), and a front panel button assigned in KPG-1D will allow you to cross band repeat from one RF Deck to the other in either direction.

A few notes and pics are attached to this post.

1. You cannot run mobile relay station and GPS/Bluetooth at the same time with this cable if you select Custom Cable COM 2 (the software grays out the GPS/Bluetooth option when Mobile Relay Station is selected). This is due to the COM ports that the radio uses. COM2 needs to be selected for this cable to work otherwise you get a cable error on the display when trying to use Mobile Relay Station.

2. The mobile relay station does not allow you to repeat in digital formats i.e. you cannot come in on any digital format and come out in analog or digital, it only allows analog to analog repeat.

3. You have to specifically assign a zone and channel for the mobile relay to repeat on in KPG-1D, its not adjustable in the the front panel, i.e. you cannot select channel x on UHF and channel x on VHF and then crossband them while out in the field- the selection in done in KPG-1D and not re-configurable via front panel.

Hope this explains this function to others that were interested in it.

(yes, I mounted the RF decks with the heatsink side up, and stacked them, this was deliberate as it runs cooler in this config)

-Alex

Do you have to program both decks with identical perimeters in the mobile relay settings for this to work?
 
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