I miss my 746

I'll write it up another time, but I blew up my IC746Pro the other week. It won't be back until next week and CQ WW SSB is now. Thanks to an anonymous benefactor, I'm using a radio that's better than the IC725 that we also have ...

Unfortunately, the borrowed radio, while including DSP filtering, has no auto tuner. Apparently, I miss the 746's AT. A lot. I have an MFJ Versa Tuner II, but trying to get the trap dipole tuned up is much harder than I remember. The other odd thing is that the tuner's SWR meter reads differently than the one in the borrowed radio. I don't know if the tuner is "too low" or the radio is "too high", but if the radio thinks it's more than 1.7 or 2.0:1, it backs off the power. Oh, and I only have the hand mic and don't have the adapters to use my Heil BM-10 headset. I miss that, too!

So, not having fun. Four countries in the log so far (can't work Ks for points other than Zone mults).

Ah, well.