I was performing a "shoot-out" testing different accessory antennas for my Yaesu VX-8E to see just how much difference there was between each. In order to do that, I obtained signal strength reports for each antenna at each of the four power levels. After that, I measured the power output on each of the four settings, so as to convert the signal strength readings to relative dB. For interest, the power output of my VX-8E running on the battery pack is:

• H - 5.5W
• L3 - 3W
• L2 - 1.2W
• L1 - 400mW

When checking the lower power levels I was puzzled to find that I was still getting full power. Eventually I realized that there must be a bug in the power setting firmware. After changing the power level, the first transmission is always at high power. The selected power level is only produced on the second and subsequent transmissions.

I don't know if this is a general fault or something that only affects my radio. I would be interested to know if anyone else can confirm my findings.

Labels: Antennas, VHF, VX-8