Xiegu X6200 Usage Notes: Connecting with FT8CN via Bluetooth

--By Ed Durrant DD5LP

Document Version 1.01 – January 2025 (for X6200 units with firmware v1.06).


FT8CN is an Android Smartphone App written by BG7YOZ. Its purpose is to enable FT8 data communications from a smartphone to an amateur radio enthusiast’s radio. Please see the FT8CN GitHub page at github.com for more details. This is also where you will need to download the APK file to side-load it to your phone

This short guide sheet covers the steps to configure FT8CN to work with your X6200 radio. It will not cover how to install or operate FT8CN. Please see the GitHub page referenced earlier for such information.

A pre-requisite for this operation is that your X6200 radio has been upgraded to firmware version 1.0.6.

To check this please go to GEN menus – SYSTEM – System Info.

First, we have to enable BT in the X6200, then on your phone, then have both systems “pair” and then connect. Only after these initial steps are successfully completed should you start FT8CN and configure it.

Turn on your phone with BT enabled (see your phone’s handbook if you do not know how to do this) and the X6200.

On the X6200, in the system menu, scroll across and start the Bluetooth panel – if you don’t know how to do this refer to the X6200 extended manual for guidance.

If the small symbol on the right of the word Bluetooth is not blue click on the middle “ON” button and wait. You will then see a list of devices that the X6200’s internal Bluetooth controller is seeing. In our example we have my PC (LENOVO-T460) and my Smartphone (K42) and several other unnamed devices. It is possible that your radio also sees some unidentifiable devices and it will then just display the MAC address of the device – ignore these devices – if your phone’s name is not shown, address the problem in your phone and come back to this point.

Getting the X6200 and an android phone to pair “should” be possible from the X6200 side, however, I have had more success starting the pairing from the phone side. During the pairing process a code will be displayed – whatever it is just accept (OK) it.

Now switching to the Bluetooth settings in your phone’s settings App – we can see in this picture, that my smartphone can “see” the X6200 but is not as yet connected to it. Click on the “X6200 Bluetooth” name and the phone will try to pair with the radio.

If “X6200 Bluetooth” is not in the list refresh the list and hopefully it will appear, if not you many have an incompatibility between BT versions or you have disabled the internal BT board within the X6200 through the function in the settings2 menu. Correct these issues if possible.

(Left): Here, we can see that (after acceptance of the code displayed) the phone is both paired AND connected to the X6200. Press the edit wheel at the end of the list entry and you will see the following screen (or something similar depending upon your phone):

(right): In the case of my phone, it sees and attached to TWO audio channels – this is not what we want and I needed to disable the “call audio” all FT8CN needs is the “Media Audio” and won’t work when “Call Audio” is enabled on this link

You can now exit the settings program on your smartphone and return to the X6200 Bluetooth panel:

It is likely you will see “paired” under the name of your Smartphone but not “connected” – after highlighting you phone name by turning the outer part of the MFK knob, press the “CONNECT” button (the 2nd one under the screen) and wait, wait wait – The X6200 will say Connecting – if after this (and this is likely) the X6200 still does not show “Connected” – press the SCAN button (the leftmost under the screen) and wait, wait, wait – now (hopefully) your display will reflect the one below. It seems that after a successful connect option, the X6200 does not refresh the display, hence the reason to do the SCAN.

The good news is that your phone and the X6200 are now connected with both a 2-way audio channel and a serial CAT control channel connected.

OK, so now we need to return to the Smartphone and (at last!) we can now start the FT8CN application, which you have installed but not yet started. As mentioned at the beginning, these instructions are not a guide to FT8CN and you are well advised to read the FT8CN online short guide on GitHub at this point.

FT8CN can communicate with certain radios via USB, Network or Bluetooth to provide simple portable operation, here we will get the Bluetooth working.
Go into the FT8CN settings panel and
* Enter the mandatory data (callsign, Maidenhead locator etc.)
* Synchronise your phone’s clock to a reliable source (needed for FT8 to work).
* Set control to CAT
* (leave connection type on USB for now)
* Set the communications parameters to Data bits 8, Stop bits 1, parity bit none, CI-V A4, Baud rate 19200 Bps. Select the X6100 as radio type as X6200 is not yet in FT8CN

– any issues with these points – see the FT8CN documentation. Now let’s go back to Connection type and change it from USB to Bluetooth and you should have a panel similar to the one below come up:

Press on the X6200 Bluetooth entry and this will then link the app to the two channels to the X6200 radio and you can now start using FT8CN – remember I said earlier, it was a good time to read the FT8CN manual – here is another point where you will need to check how to do everything again!

If you don’t get a decode, 99% of the time it is due to the fact that your smartphone’s time is off by a large amount. While FT8CN can compensate for a small difference, what is it using as its reference? It is best to get your smartphone clock aligned to a network time server. Most of the Apps to do this on Google Play and elsewhere need you to have root access to your phone however I have found one that allows a manual reset by you without having to have root access and it is called ClockSync. As always YMMV!