Foreword
I wont profess to be expert on Chirp or Repeaters. Something I am confident about, is understanding what works for me, what errors you can make (yeah I have made them more than once or twice), and what beginners raise as misconceptions and questions. Nearly everyone has a view of what should be the “correct” way of programming an Hand-held radio, but everyones experience and purpose and requirement is different. This is not meant to be a definitive article, but one you should use as a springboard for learning and further research.
Quick Overview
Nowadays, most HT radios come with their own programming software of some form, but typically the manual is poorly written or try to cover every feature with little context, so you place it in the draw as it got too hard to work out (unless your Amateur Friend or your local club programmed it with the basic repeaters/channels). So that is why this document is all about Chirp to provide a little understanding of concepts.
Congratulations on getting your Amateur Radio Qualification and probably you are now the proud owner of your first HT (Hand Held Radio). This document can also be used by someone getting back into Amateur Radio or someone that has been in the Amateur Radio fraternity for years, but this is their first hand-held radio. If you are looking up information, it is also good to know that U.S. Amateurs predominantly call them “Handie-talkies”, but I will let you look up the reasons and history behind this name.
This guide is based around programming a Quansheng UV-K5 V3 HT, however most of this guide is equally applicable to many other HT’s on the market. The main things you need to look up is how to place your radio into Programming mode. This generally is not the same as the firmware upgrade mode. Some radio’s have a special combination of buttons that you need to press to get it into Programming mode, and if you have any other radio, my recommendation is that you look it up on the Internet in the first instance.
One nice feature with the Quansheng UV-K5 V3 HT is that you do not have to specifically place it in Programming mode. You typically just plug the cable in that came with your HT, turn it on, and it “just talks to the software”. It could not be simpler.
The Programming Cable
The Cable Chipset
Each radio brand will typically come with its own type of programming cable. The Quansheng typically comes with a cable, but it very much depends on what was ordered as some sellers try to keep the price down by eliminating certain pieces – (this is why you need to be careful in your ordering). They do this as they assume that you may have a generic cable already.
However, there are programming cables and there are programming cables. It is best not to assume that the programming cable (even though it looks the same) that you already have is not going to be the same programming cable that is meant for your radio.
The reason for this is that there are cables that have a chipset built into the cable that provides the “Smarts”, then there are other cables that have no chipset built in (quite often called straight through cables), where they rely on the radio having the “smarts” built in. Then to top it off, you have cables that have different chipsets built in. So, for the sake of a few dollars, it is better to get the one with the radio, and if you can’t get it to work, at least you can return it (if you decide to go that far).
For reference only, the common chipsets you find in these cables are usually:
CH340, CH341, FTDI (FT232RL/FT232R), WCH (CH340/CH340G) and Prolific (PL2303)
This is useful to know if you should have issues with drivers, or you are trying to identify the COM port on your computer has assigned to the cable.
You may often hear this cable called a K (or K1) Programming cable or Kenwood Style Connector Cable as this design originated as a proprietary Kenwood connector design back in the 1990’s.
Seating of the Cable
Now we have been though the main issue with programming cables, there is one more issue that needs to be raised. This is the correct insertion of the cable into the radio. The cable, whilst being the correct cable, may not seat correctly in the radio. The Internet is full of “it doesn’t work” or “I have pushed it home as much as I can and it does not work”. I will put my hand up and say I have been caught a few times, even though I know the routine, but as I program a radio on a 6 month or yearly basis, I tend to forget to push it home, and when trying to write or read the radio, I get and error ”Wrong Firmware revision” which throws you right off. You start checking your software, checking your CPS image, but this is Chirp giving you a generic message when it can’t make contact with the radio. Remember this software has been written to work with many manufacturers’ radios, so they can’t account for every issue.
Now again one of the benefits of the Quansheng Radio is that it is recommended that the radio is turned off. This allows you to put enough force onto the opposite side of the radio from the plug side, without accidentally pressing the PTT button and causing your radio to transmit. I don’t recommend pushing hard on the PTT button, but using your thumb at the side of case near the PTT button should provide a solid push, whilst using your other hands thumb to push the programming cable in.
Chirp Software
CHIRP is free, open-source software maintained by a community of developers and contributors. It supports a large range of amateur radios.
If you have not come across it before, you may have been told that your radio is compatible with CHIRP. The following page has a comprehensive list of radios it is compatible with:
https://chirpmyradio.com/projects/chirp/wiki/Home. However don’t click on the links on this page, as many are “fake” download links from advertisers. If you want to download, then go to this link. Instead go to this link https://archive.chirpmyradio.com/chirp_next/ and click on the latest date you can see in the list of Chirp releases, and this will take you to the various download files with limited or no advertising links that you can accidentally press by mistake.
Now I will talk mainly about Windows, but of you have a Mac or Linux desktop, the files are there as well. Click on chirp-next-{latest date}-installer.exe and download this file.
Once downloaded, click on your normal install process for your computer and install. Once finished it should look like this:
So, if you reach this point, you have successfully installed CHIRP.
Now click on FILE (in the top left-hand corner and select NEW
And you should have a screen that looks somewhat like this
You will note that it has a one-line entry (or it may have no lines). You may also note that the first line begins at 0 (zero). Just for interest, it is highly possible that your radio will not support an entry at line 0 (zero).
At this point CHIRP doesn’t yet know what your radio supports. For example, the generic Chirp screen might show a power option that your HT does not have nor is capable of.
So, before you start blindly putting your local repeater frequencies in, we need to download the current configuration from your new HT and in the process, we will select what model radio that you have.
Now the next step requires your radio to be in Programming mode (if you have some other model of radio, you need to find out how at this time, but if you have the Quansheng, it’s as simple as turning your radio on which we will do shortly (and we are assuming that your cable is well seated) and the other end is plugged into your computer
To do this we click on the RADIO menu item at the top of the screen (between view and help), and select DOWNLOAD FROM RADIO…
And the following dialog will pop up
- The first thing we want to check is that it comes up with a COM port showing the USB-SERIAL CH340. This tells us that the cable is being recognised by Windows. This is an important first step. It does not tell us that it can see the radio (not at this point anyhow).
- The next thing you need to do is tell it your Vendor (in our case the Quansheng)
- And the final parameter is the model of radio, in our case the UV-K5
- Click Ok
Now the following screen will appear. As you can see, it tells us when to turn the radio on. However, we have already connected the Cable (to avoid accidentally pressing the PTT button)
So, the better instructions are (for the Quansheng Radio)
- Connect cable to mic/spkr Connector
- Make sure connector is firmly connected.
- Turn the radio on
- Click ok to download the image from the device.
It should pop up a screen showing it is reading the radio with a progress bar moving across till completion. Once it has completed, it will show what it has read from the Radio
Now in the case of an unprogrammed radio, it will just provide a range of frequencies that was programmed in at the factory which is of little value to you.
However, as your radio is pre-programmed by your local club, your screen may resemble the following
Whether you start with a clean radio (manufacturers default programming) or whether your radio has been pre-programmed by your local club, you will notice that you now have a few more tabs which are Memories, Settings, Browser, and Info
What this also means is that your Radio was read correctly and your cable is functional.
Now this guide on CHIRP is not intended to be a complete guide to how to program with CHIRP. This is where you take over on your path to learning. However, we will provide you with some directions to make it easier to understand the CHIRP software and how it relates to Repeater Settings needed.
Looking at the last image, you will notice that the line starts at Line 1 – this is because it has determined that this radio starts at Line 1 (or really in this case Channel 1).
So, you might be wondering where you get all this information from that you need, and this comes down to obtaining a reliable source of information. Typically, the owner of the repeater is your best source, and typically an Amateur Radio Club is the owner of the repeater, and generally their Website is expected to be up to date. As an example, we are going to use CRARC’s (Canberra Region Amateur Radio Club) Website Repeater Page https://www.crarc.org.au/services/repeaters/ as a source of truth.
You will find that most Amateur Radio Clubs will have a similar page, and these pages will have all the information you need to program into CHIRP. We will refer back to this image as we go through the settings in CHIRP.
Repeater directories can be useful, but their information may not always be current. Where possible, confirm the settings with the repeater owner or local amateur radio club. So, you may get a master list from say Repeaterbook, and then you should do checks using Google search on the repeater callsign, which will generally bring up the club’s web page, and then validate the information.
So, let’s look in more detail at what we have in the Pre-Programmed CRARC Radios starting at the first column which is frequency.
Column – Frequency
This is normally the repeater’s output frequency — the frequency that your radio receives from the repeater. Your radio will transmit on a different frequency when using a repeater. This is determined by the Duplex and Offset settings which are coming up soon.
Column – Name
This is a representation of the name, or in many cases, the call sign of the repeater.
Radio displays have limited space, so we use short names. The exact number of characters available depends on the radio.
Just an important naming convention I use is the use of a (V) or (u) in the name which indicates that it is a VHF or UHF repeater. You will notice that the V and the u are in different case making it easier to read on a small screen.
Column – Tone Mode
Now we come to Tone Mode. You will notice in the CRARC example, that we have predominately two entries in this field.
This field supports TSQL or Tone or {Blank}
TSQL means that your radio sends the CTCSS tone to the repeater and only opens its speaker when it receives the matching tone. This prevents your radio from opening its speaker for signals that do not contain the expected CTCSS tone
TONE means that your radio sends the CTCSS tone to open the repeater. Your radio will hear anything that opens its normal squelch.
{BLANK} means that no CTCSS tone is transmitted and your radio uses normal carrier squelch when receiving. This is typically required where a repeater is setup as an open repeater.
Column – Tone Column
If you are just setting the Tone Mode to Tone (just using CTCSS to open the repeater), it will use this column to obtain the CTCSS frequency
Column – Tone Squelch
If you have set Tone Mode to TSQL, this is the CTCSS frequency used both when transmitting and when checking the received signal.
Columns – Duplex & Offset
There are some general rules on whether it should be a + or – offset, again this is a subject I will let you look up. However, you will find these details on the Repeater owner’s websites. Main point to emphasize here – if these are entered wrong, your radio will not successfully have a two-way conversation.
Column – Mode
This is typically set to FM
Column – Tuning Step
The tuning step setting in CHIRP primarily affects how your radio’s VFO (Variable Frequency Oscillator) behaves when you manually twist the knob or use the up/down arrows. If you are just getting started, you will probably just use the repeaters as programmed as channels. I personally find the 5Khz step doesn’t impact me.
Column – Power
Use only the power level you need to make a reliable contact. For normal repeater operation, you will often find that the High setting is used, but higher power is not automatically better. However, for very nearby devices such as hotspots, a lower power setting may be more appropriate.
Column – Scrambler
Leave this set to OFF. Amateur radio transmissions must not be encrypted or scrambled to hide their meaning, except for limited circumstances specifically allowed by the regulations
Column – Scanlists
This can be left to none if you wish, but your radio typically has a scan function. As an example, you might want your radio to scan for activity on the five primary repeaters in Canberra. So, you might set those 5 repeaters to scan list 1. So, when you select scan and you select scan list 1, it will scan those repeaters until you turn it off.
Column – Comment
This is for your benefit only, just a comments field to remind you what that entry was. It does not get uploaded to the radio and the radio makes no use of it.
The other columns
Yes, we skipped a few columns, as they are not important for day-to-day use. You have enough knowledge of the columns that you really need.
As I mentioned, now that you have read in the base config from your Radio, you now have a couple of extra tabs, which have sub-menus under them
Tab – Memories
We have just finished discussing this page, but this page is where your repeater details are entered.
Tab – Settings
This page and its submenus, provide configuration details that your radio supports. Again, this guide is not meant to be an all-encompassing guide on Chirp and the Quansheng radio, so if you see an item, it is a starting point to do your research on what that feature is and what impact it will have.
Here is a quick example of the Settings – Basic Settings page (and about the only page I do change)
The settings shown in bold are settings I have changed, but have not yet written back to the radio.
Mic Gain is a common one that you might want to change. We have found the setting of 2 which is the default, sounds a touch low when on a repeater, so you might want to change this to 3 on the Quansheng (note this may differ between radios).
Logo Strings – You can change logo strings to anything you want; it is just what displays on the radio when you first turn it on. You might want to change this to your name and maybe your call sign. This means that if you leave or lose your radio somewhere, someone picking it up and turning it on, has some details if they need to contact you.
Vox Enabled – It generally is enabled by default from the manufacturer. I normally turn this off. If you have not heard this term before, VOX is voice activation, meaning that it transmits whenever the Voice or Noise reaches a threshold. Most people do not use this function, not on hand-held radios, as you do not want it to transmit unless you press the PTT button, and it can confuse some people when their radio transmits when they place it on a table.
There are a lot more options in the sub-menus, but this is the main page I change.
The other two tabs (Browser and Info) are primarily diagnostic pages (read only) for developers, and It provides some information you may be interested in, such as how the radio memory is organised and what settings and ranges your radio supports
Uploading to the Radio
Now, once you have completed any changes you want to make to either the memories tab and/or the settings tab, we need to Upload or Write them back to the Radio. As we already know that are cable is working correctly as we read or downloaded from the radio earlier, all we have to do is select the Radio menu (top menu) and select Upload to Radio. (Do not disconnect the programming cable while the upload is in progress)
You will see the Progress bar again, but this time it is uploading to the radio. When it finishes, the radio should restart. That’s it, your radio is updated.
Wrap-up
Once you have completed any changes you have, and uploaded them to your radio, you can now save the file to your computer. It will save the file as an .img file which is a radio-specific backup. After a while you can have a number of these .img files, so it is best to be descriptive with your names and including a date.
These .img files include all your memory settings and the radio settings and are usually specific to that radio model and firmware revision. If you try and restore it to another radio, in almost all cases, CHIRP will recognise that the radio you are trying to restore to is not the one the original template was for.
It is for this reason, when you have completed your radio programming, you should do two things:
- Save it as an .img file
- Export your memory settings as a .csv file
The .csv file differs from the .img file in that it is a generic, radio-independent file. It contains the memory/channel information, not the complete radio configuration. It can therefore be used to transfer channel information between different compatible radios, although some fields may not be supported by every radio.
A CSV file cannot be uploaded directly to a radio; its memory entries need to be imported into a radio-specific CHIRP image first (for example, into the radio-specific file you downloaded from the radio earlier)
A good habit to get into is a solid filing process. Each time I make a change, I make a directory on the computer with the Model number / Firmware version/ Date, and in there I place the .img file and the .csv file. It is not failproof but saves you pulling your hair out later.
Finally, one more point, if you ever restore a CSV file, ALWAYS check that it has imported the file correctly. This may mean spending some time checking every column. I have personally seen some issues with CSV imports on a number of occasions; it has mucked up the duplex settings or dropped the Tone for repeaters. If you don’t catch these errors when they occur, you can spend a lot of time trying to find out why your radio is not working.
As an example, many years ago, my original import of a CSV file from Repeaterbook, looked great to start off with, and I was happily using the local VHF repeaters, and having issues with the UHF repeaters. It was not until a year later, whilst working with another amateur trying to communicate through the UHF repeaters, that I identified that ALL the UHF repeaters in the list had the wrong offset symbol — the + and – signs. After correcting this, never had a problem with UHF repeaters again.
I found out, that around the date I had exported the file from Repeaterbook, that they had a bug in their export function that specifically wrote out the wrong offset for UHF repeaters only – lesson learned.
Alternative software
It needs to be stated that CHIRP is not the only software out there.
At this present time, your main alternatives are
- Manufacturer software is another option, where available.
- Commercial software such as RT Systems is also available and generally provides additional features and support, but at a cost.
So, it is your call on what software you use. However, personally even with a few issues, I find the CHIRP software will do the job.
The Five Things to Remember!
1. Read the radio before you change it.
This gives you a known starting point and creates a radio-specific configuration.
2. Get repeater information from a reliable source.
The repeater owner or local amateur radio club is generally the best source.
3. Check your settings before uploading them.
Especially Frequency, Tone, Duplex and Offset.
4. Keep your backups.
Save the radio-specific .img file and export your memories as a .csv file.
5. If something doesn’t work, don’t panic!
Check the cable, the connection and the settings before assuming something is wrong with the radio or CHIRP.
