I’ve read #174, #375, and #807, and it appears Drew had a look, but did not complete the project. The driver for the IC-V/U-82 seems to be a good starting point for a driver for the IC-V80 (and maybe the IC-V8). Is anyone interested in providing guidance? Using the existing IC-V/U-82 driver to download data from an IC-V80 produces “Unable to probe radio band”. Perhaps, the model data string is shorter for the 80 than for the 82, so accessing md[20] produces an exception? What is the preferred approach for adding support for the older (-80 and -8) radios? Copy the existing -82 driver to a new file or modify the existing -82 driver to support the older radios?
You should not copy the V/U-82 driver. It's one of the oldest and least-used drivers, and IIRC, it hasn't even been converted to the more modern way of doing things. It may also still be broken for another issue.
I would start from scratch and model your work after a different Icom driver (there is a template.py driver with some comments you may want to start with as well). You might look at the IC-2730 which has gotten some very much more recent love, although it uses the newer large-memory cloning behavior, which your V80 likely does not. So maybe look at one of the older models, like the id880, ic2820, or ic2720. All icoms use a common cloning routine, so just inheriting from the IcomCloneModeRadio class will get you basic communication.
Also, hmm, looking in my development directory, I have an uncommitted and unfinished icv80.py from many years ago. I dunno why I never put this in, but maybe it will help you get started. I've attached it here.
--Dan