Yea, I know I'm replying to my own post but I have the solution.. Hope this helps someone else.
The solution I found involved using the factory reset for a completely different group of 3com AP's.
What I did was to remove the ethernet connection and with the unit powered up I pressed the reset button for 30 seconds. After that the unit reset to factory defaults but this included DHCP enabled. I do have DHPC running at home and 3com's wireless device manager was able to see the new IP under properties. From there I used the browser to connect to the AP the user name is "admin" and the password is "left blank" (It says this right on the login page). From there it's a snap. I still can't get the wireless device manager to configure the device just to get the properties but I can live with that.
Hope this helps!!