Sept 11, 2024. Everything that is folded is to be rolled and everything rolled is to be folded!

Our mandatory "bait photo" ~ $35 for a 7" HDMI Display

Those words were barked to a group of US Navy Midshipmen (me included) by Marine Drill Instructors just prior to a barracks inspection during a summer training cruise.

Space on a Navy ship is at premium and so personal items are rolled or folded to fit in very small lockers. As usual, the Navy prescribes what is folded and what is rolled. This is a prime example of getting your underwear tied in a knot.

Two Lockers Stacked

The Saturday morning inspection reversal by the Marines had another purpose and that was to teach the art of adapting, improvising and overcoming an unexpected turn in the road.

I never forgot that lesson and now it is just a part of my life. Whilst dabbling with the electrons it is just a part of the process. A variant is thinking out of the box.

Often, I will build a prototype and observe the knots and warts which are then addressed in the second build. The lesson, get it working properly 1st and then you can make it pretty.

It also is a strong point for building in modules as it provides three huge benefits.

1) Being able to test and align a specific sub-element of the whole circuit. Read you know that part works!

2) Having a benchmark and documentation of how a specific circuit performs. Read future troubleshooting has a reference point.

3) The opportunity to experiment with alternate modules such as Audio or Microphone Amplifiers. Read the Modular Approach facilitates such experimentation.

TYGNYBNT. Don't eat your pet!

73's

Pete N6QW

March 31, 2024. Happy Easter to those who celebrate this day.

What a great day to Binge on Chocolate and experience the pain of that filling that has been leaking. I would be in that category with the leaking filling(s) had I not just spent an amount equivalent to one of the fancy new uptown appliance box transceivers on two filling repairs. Well at least I can binge on the Chocolate bunnies without fear of pain. Regrettably everything appears to have jumped in price including the price of parts. Well not so much the parts as the shipping costs. That notably is seen in the eBay treasures. I spotted a nice heathkit DX-20 for about $50 and the shipping was $65. Likely it is a twofer with part being a way to in effect charge a higher price by inflating the shipping and in part by increased shipping costs. Shipping with insurance across the US was about $150 for this jewel and that was three years ago. 6AM on the Left Coast ~ 20M Easter Sunday! My only hope is the cost of Chocolate Bunnies remains steady although a pound of See's Candies f...

January 26, 2024. A simple CW Transceiver/Transmitter

Cruise through the lower part of the ham bands bands and what do you hear? Well, FT-8 and CW. Often you will not hear any SSB stations yet go to the lower part of the bands, and it is a cacophony (I love that word) of bad sounding signals and some high-speed keying. Fast is not so much of the issue as is bad, run together and jerky keying. But none the less our hobby started there. So, you could crank down your ICOM 7300 and watch the waterfall on CW or you could homebrew a radio. Actually, to do CW right you need more thought up front than you do with a SSB transceiver. Often, I will state that a CW Transceiver is much more difficult to build than a simple SSB rig. I published two articles in QRP Quarterly on CW transceivers and all I got was a yawn so maybe history will repeat itself. Yawn! 30M CW Transceiver with RIT! Of interest is that the LO is a Varactor tuned LC oscillator using a NE602. Look closely at the RIT circuit which is only activated on ...

August 30, 2024. A PNP 20M SSB Transceiver

Shown below is the Block Diagram for the 20M PNP SSB Transceiver steered in the Transmit Mode . The components shown in the dotted block are relay steered so that the block module is single pass and amplifies in a single direction. The Block diagram show steered in Transmit. Essentially the steering process works so that the IF Module input follows the Balanced Modulator on Transmit and then the input side follows the Receive Mixer on Receive. All done with some relays and a bit of RG174U coax. For those who count things in detail, this block diagram is not unlike what was used for the PSSST Transceiver which can be found on my website . Yes, a warmed over P3ST only using PNP devices. TYGNYBNT. 73's Pete N6QW

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