I contacted the Antenna Genius designers and heard that the AG does infact have a built in BCD decoder. (see the 4O3A website here:
www.4o3a.com/index.php/products/station-automation/antenna-genius/)
I asked Expert if I could use the X switches in the MB1 CTRL socket & Roman replied as follows:
Yes, you can use BCD interface to control the antenna switch from the MB1.
You should understand that Ext CTRL switches are open collector and can give you either open line or shorted to ground lines.
If you want to get TTL level 0 V or +5 V (+12 V), you should tie serial resistors 1-10 kOhm.
When the switch is on - it gives logical "0", when off - logical "1". You can adjust the Ext CTRL table for the required band combination.
If you need 5 V TTL levels, you can use 5 V zener diode from each line to GND and put resistors with diodes into Ext CTRL connection box.
Dragisa at 4O3A then kindly confirmed the following necessary connection details for me
Ray G3XLG
Our developer looked into documentation and this is his reply:
AG needs high level (positive logic) on BCD inputs, simplest way to connect it to MB-1 is to connect i.e. Ext Ctrl outputs X1-X4
directly to BCD inputs on AG, and then you pull up each line, using resistors to 12V which is available at pin 14 of MB-1 Ext Ctrl. You can use 1KOhm resistors. Then, you should configure ExtCtrl in application with inverted logic. See the picture below.
Hope you will be able to set it up. If you need more help we are at your disposal.
73
Dragiša 4O9ITT
It shows connecting a 1KOhm resister between Pin 14 (12V) and each of the other 4 wires X1, X2, X3, & X4 which in turn connect to the AG BCD Pins A, B, C, & D. You need to configure the MB1 accordingly
I will try this out over the next few days & report back to this Group.
Ray G3XLG