Bill,
Not all 'auto-tuners' are built equally. Meaning that
the '850's tuner may or may not work with balanced feed
line. (I have two radios with auto tuners, neither will
handle the balanced feed line, even using a balun. One of
them is an '850', best radio Kenwood ever made!). It
depends on what the range of impedances the tuner is able
to handle, and what the antenna system presents to it. It's
certainly possible, but I wouldn't count on it. If money were
no object, and if I had the required building skills, I'd
have a 'balanced tuner' that would handle anything I could hook
to it. But! My 'lazy' out weighs my desire, and to be honest,
I can't tell the difference in not using a balanced tuner. (My
loop isn't anything near 'optimum' in where it is and how high
it is, by the way, so using a balanced tuner just isn't going
to make much difference. It does what I ask of it, so who
cares.)
'Doc

PS - There are only two kinds of people who use feed lines in/on
the ground. Those who have run over it with a lawn mower, and
those who will run over it with a lawn mower...

Doc,

Coax to 80m Windom is now repaired (carefully spliced together) and
now entirely in conduit and water tight. Tomorrow I will bury it in
the ground, I learned my lesson about mowers.

At this point the skywire loop is a project in process. One mast is
up, four more to go. It will probably take most of the summer to
finish this antenna. I also have another antenna in the works, and
today I got a string at the local archery shop, if you get my
drift. This one, a 160OCF will be hoisted at one end to a rather
tall Eucalyptus (100' plus) and will span across a field about 270'
to another 40-50' mast. This antenna will have to be used in a
portable shack out in the field since it is too far from the house
to run a cable. As you can see I am at that point where I am a bit
obsessed with antenna farming. If all goes well I will give the 80m
Windom (OCF) a try this weekend and will report back with the
experience.

Meanwhile I am thinking ahead about radios and the Knwd 850 did
look like a good one, as you affirmed. I see that they had a
TS-850S and a TS-850SAT, the latter being the one with the built in
tuner. I was just wondering if the SAT was the one to shoot for or
if the model without the tuner was equally worthwhile to pursue.

Bill K6TAJ

Bill,
The plain old '850 is a very nice radio. If I had
my 'druthers', any radio I bought would have an auto-tuner
built in. May not use it, but having the ability is always
nice, and you never know...
'Doc