This afternoon I finished my taxes (due the end of April in Canada). This evening I went into the garage, intending to hook up the Push-To-Talk (PTT) wires to the audio panel harness and test out the transmit functions, using a borrowed VHF scanner to listen while a neighbour pilot transmitted. Should have been a quick job. However, it seems there is some kind of problem with the system. I puzzled around for a while with an ohmmeter, but it is looking more and more like the PTT switch buried in the stick is bad, or disconnected.

I really, really don't want to have to open the stick grip up, as it was a royal pain in the you-know-what getting it installed on the top of the stick. So, I spent quite a while chasing down any possible alternative. There was a chance that the problem was I had mixed up two of the wires coming out of the stick grip, but I checked all other functions, and they work correctly, so they must be using the correct wires. The process of elimination only leaves two wires, and they are the correct colours, and nothing happens when I push the PTT button with the ohmmeter connected to them. Blast!

I gave up in disgust and I'll take a fresh look at things tomorrow.