Good description Colin.   I started with an old MFJ TNC to radio 
interface box for a long gone TNC.   A small metal box with 8 pin  male 
jack on front and   cables with 13 pin din and 8 pin  female  microphone 
plug, out the rear of the box.

I removed the 13 pin din cable for some future project,  and pulled out 
the internal pc board and other unneeded junk.

Since my Heil Gold line as well as my headphones all use 1/8 plugs, I 
didn't use the front panel mic jack, but  instead  wired a 1/8 jack  on 
the rear of the box for the microphone.  Added a RCA jack to the rear of 
the box, wired to the ptt line, to plug in my foot and hand PTT switches.

Lot's of point to point wiring and a real rat's nest in there, but it 
works.    A total of 6 switches: 4 extra pf keys and  also the up/down 
buttons  which are usually reassigned as pf keys.

I may redo this sometime in the future, in a larger box, with a few more 
things going in and out.

73, Steve  KW3A


On 10/23/2014 9:22 PM, Colin McDonald wrote:
> Here is what I did:
> I chopped the plug end off the stock hand mike that came with my
> radio...there was about 3 or 4 inches of straight cable before it started to
> coil, and I chopped it off right where it started to coil.
> I found the kenwood standard 8 pin microphone jack pin out description on
> line so I knew which pins were for what.
> I then went to an electronics store and got a project box, an 8 terminal
> phone connection strip where there are 8 sets of 2 connected terminals...the
> terminal strip is almost exactly as long as the bottom plate of the project
> box...so I used some glue to secure it in place.
> I got 4 momentary mini switches, and a roll of 47K and 100K resisters...the
> wattage doesn't mattter with these, just find the smallest ones you can.  In
> fact, a commercial version of this box could use surface mount resisters and
> flat push buttons and put it all into a very small compact package using one
> small PCB.
> In my case, I wanted to use a standard studio style microphone, so I used a
> piece of mike cable with an XLR female on one end as the microphone pig
> tail.
> I stripped the wires on the original piece of stock mike cable and connected
> them in an order I'd remember to one side of the 8 terminal bus bar.
> I have a continuity meter, so armed with the pin out description, I could
> determine which pins were for what function and their associated wires.
> I drilled the appropriate holes in the project box to mount the switches,
> and to let the microphone hookup cable out and the cable to the radio out
> the other side...I also added a 6 foot piece of 18 gage regular speaker wire
> to hook up to a remote PTT foot switch.
> I have always meant to mount a proper xlr male jack on the box along with a
> 1/8th inch jack for the PTT switch, but never got around to it...I also had
> thoughts of mounting a male 8 pin kenwood style mike connecter and having a
> custom 8 pin female to 8pin female cable made up to go from the box to the
> radio...
> Anyway, in the simplest terms, you switch the up pin to ground through a
> 47/22K  or 100K resister, and the same with the down pin to get your four
> functions...with a bigger box and more switches, I could add both the
> regular up/down functions along with a PTT switch...but again, this was an
> experiment and a project and i haven't gotten around to building the deluxe
> version of the box like Steve did.
> The only soldering I had to do was one end of the resister to each switch
> I don't recall now what order the PF functions are in acording to which
> resister you are grounding the up or down pin to...but it's pretty self
> explanitory once you build it.
> You can even add power to the box for powered microphones etc from one of
> the mike jack pins.
> I'm surprised LDG, or MFJ hasn't come out with a commercial version of this
> box...there are allot of different break out boxes for use with studio
> microphones and equalizers and all that kind of stuff, but I haven't heard
> of any made with the four function switches added on.
> To add proper jacks to the box, you would have to solder wires onto them and
> connect to the terminal bar...sometimes those little bulk head style jacks
> are tedious and difficult to solder, especially the 8 pin variety as I've
> tried several times.
> Anyway, fire away with any questions and I'll try to answer them or Steve
> can answer them since he's built it as well from my description.
>
> 73
> Colin, V A6BKX
> --------------------------------------------------
> From: "Howard, W A 9 Y B W" <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2014 1:04 PM
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Has anyone here ever built a project from QST?
>
>> In regard to this box built for use with the Kenwood 590, I realize that
>> one
>> needs to access three connections on the microphone socket.
>>
>> How does one do that with a microphone connected to the radio?
>>
>> Howard #3
>>
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Steve Forst" <[log in to unmask]>
>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>> Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2014 1:02 PM
>> Subject: Re: Has anyone here ever built a project from QST?
>>
>>
>>> John,
>>>
>>> Sorry, but no.    To get more pf keys for the 2000 you need to build a
>>> box, or find a microphone with  the 4 extra  pf buttons that can be
>>> assigned in menus.  The ability to reassign the up/down buttons as pf
>>> keys didn't come along until the 590.
>>>
>>>
>>> 73, Steve KW3A
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 10/23/2014 1:54 PM, John J Jacques wrote:
>>>> Hi all, is there a way to re-assign the up / down buttons on the mic of
>>>> the TS2000 for other functions?  I know the PF key on the radio can be
>>>> re-assigned, but not sure about the mic buttons!
>>>>
>>>> Thanks in advanced, and 73:
>>>> John
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> John Jacques
>>>> Amateur Radio Station: KD8PC
>>>> "Whare Cat Is, Is civilization!"
>>>> Robert A Heinlein
>>>> http://www.johnjacques.weebly.com
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>
>>
>> ---
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>
>
>