WJ Simple Serial Control


Summary

This is a simple application which one may choose to use to control 
the very fine series of older Watkins Johnson Radios in the WJ-861X series.
This work is built on the strong shoulders of many others, including the creator
of IP1k, a radio control program for the ICOM PCR1000, another fine radio.


Setup

After unzipping the files set to your MS Windows directory of choice, you should
First, make sure that you know the configuration of the WJ Receiver's serial port settings. 
They should be set for 9600 Baud, 8 data bits, no parity, 1 stop bit.
If you cannot or will not change this, you will have to recompile the WJ1 application,
using MS Visual Basic 6.0 and program whatever settings you want.

If all is consistent, then you should simply be able to run WJ1.exe, set the port number
(channel number) in the lower left of the WJ1 screen, and go!


Prologix USB-GPIB Device

This can also be used to drive the Prologix USB-GPIB interface if 
the USB/Serial Drivers are loaded for it. Note that the Prologix interface uses an FTDI
interface to the USB side and there are TWO (2) kinds of drivers that FTDI makes
available (native, and serial emulation). You will want to only use the serial emulation
version with the WJ1 application.

So load the serial drivers for the Prologix USB-GPIB interface, and connect the USB end to your
Windows PC, and power everything up. Check what port was automatically assigned to the USB
interface by going to Control Panel> System >Hardware >Device Manager >Ports (COM & LPT)
and find your USB COM assignment 
this is the number you will need to enter into the Channel Number field).


Configuring the Prologix Interface

The easiest way to configure the Prologix interface for the appropriate GPIB address
for your WJ Receiver, is to down load the KE5FX GPIB Toolkit, a collection of free 
Windows utilities from:
http://www.ke5fx.com/gpib/setup.exe

There're free and they work very well.
In it you will find PROLOGIX.EXE (a configuration utility for Prologix GPIB-USB adapters).
Run PROLOGIX.EXE and set up the interface with the correct GPIB address of the Receiver.
Note well: you have to set up the serial interface (emulated) to the USB side of the 
Prologix unit AND the GPIB side as well.

Now run WJ1 and your WJ Receiver should respond.


The WJMemory.txt File and Comments

The WJMemory.txt file is used for the "Bank Scanning" feature. You can edit the file with Notepad, 
or WordPad MS utilities but KEEP THE CHARACTER ORDER AND CHARACTER COUNT THE SAME for each line. 
It's not very flexible but it works just fine. The Scan button simply scans up from the current 
frequency with the increment pre-selected. If your WJ Receiver does not have the same IF filter 
set as displayed, don't worry, it simply selects filer 1,2,3,4, and 5 appropriately.


General Disclaimer and Permissions

Please feel free to use this to learn and have fun. NO GUARANTEE WHATSOEVER in any way is made 
for its operation and efficacy in any way. This is offered to you for your education and amusement.
That's it.



Have Fun.
Best Regards,
Geoff Bunza
2009
