Pay More and Get Less. Flash the Cash!

Since 99% of hams literally no longer scratch build anything anymore this causes the: Gee does someone make a kit for such and such application. Kit building gives you the feel of being a real ham and not just an appliance operator. Kit building while also is a Flash the Cash is less of the unboxing a completed unit from "Chine" and more of a pseudo feel of I built this. Antenna tuners are a good example and there are a couple of companies that sell fully automatic high power antenna tuners, and many have a hefty Flash the Cash price tag. But what if you wanted a kit as this suggests having the capability but at a lesser price. So, we consulted the House of Bozos (BoJack + Bezos) and found a plethora of low-cost 100-watt automatic and a bevy of kits (mostly QRP) but some rated at 100-watts where the Flash The Cash < $100.  A $35, 100-Watt Kit from Bozos. Now if you are in the 1% who wants to homebrew a 3KW automatic unit then you could do it with stepper motors and Ardui...

Here is the problem. You are passing by a garage sale and spot a box full of parts and the price tag says $0.50. In the box is a pretty healthy power transformer rated at 250AC CT at 0.130 amps, two 100Ufd filter caps rated at 600 VDC and a 10 Henry choke rated at 150 milliamps. You could get quite an array of voltage outputs from these components depending on what configuration you use for the rectifiers. Three possible configurations include: 1. Full wave rectifier (2 Diodes) 2. Full wave bridge rectifier (4 Diodes) choke input 3. Full wave bridge rectifier (4 Diodes) cap input Drum roll... Full wave rectifier ~ 175VDC Full wave bridge rectifier choke input ~ 225VDC Full wave bridge rectifier cap input ~ 350VDC That is quite a spread but while the voltage values would seem to draw our attention there are other factors which would actually directly influence your selection. Invariably many would invoke the best looking with the biggest boobs criteria (350 VDC) but fail to look at volt...

Our hobby started 1st with Spark Gap transmitters and Coherer Detectors using CW. Fast forward through tubes, transistors, AM, SSB, FM and now Satellite, Digital and of course FT-8. Something hiding in the bushes is Digital Voice and a new mode FreeDV 2.0 which is digital processing of a SSB signal. Take your standard SSB gear and add the free software FreeDV 2.0 and you are in the mode of pulling your hair out. A snippet from their website... I saw that there was a demo of this mode as far back as 2018 at a RSGB convention, so this mode has been around for 7 or 8 years. I heard about it yesterday. This Digital Voice Mode is yet another omen of contests and operating overtaking homebrewing anything. Some will read this as an assault on purely hardware defined radios as computers are involved and it is just that.  My crystal ball suggests this mode will soon be fitted with functionality and software so that your Smart Phone is now a  FreeDV transceiver. All the pieces (or most...

Before starting today's presentation, I would like to acknowledge a think outside of the box, outstanding ham homebrewer and might I add good friend Tony G4WIF.  Tony is a not a Flash the Cash guy in the sense he is always tries to find a cost-effective way to execute a project. He often looks outside of the traditional ham hardware, read often expensive. In this link  Tony presents a vertical antenna project that requires some special standoffs to keep the antenna wire from touching the mast support. Shazam, plastic kitchen cabinet hardware which is cheap and when installed appears like it was custom made for the antenna task. G4WIF employs a Nano VNA to test his antenna which is yet another must reason to visit the LINK   A great big Thank You to G4WIF for sharing your work. (Regrettably 4 Meters is not authorized in the USA.)           10 Testers /Accessories< $15 Today I am pleased to present ten test instruments and/or test accessories co...

Ten Things for your shack each costing less than $10. Ready to use, no technical content, no detailed need for pre-implementation preparation, no assembly or soldering required and no ham skills that must be acquired. (A perfect set of requirements for meeting the skill set level of a newly minted Extra Class Licensee) Screwdriver Set ~ $9.99 Under the new Flash The Cash template you have to do some of the work. Go to Amazon and type in Electronic Tools and you can find all of these items. Stripper/Cutter ~ $7.99 Digital Calipers ~ $6.88 Flush Cutter (also good for toenails) ~ $7.76 Tweezer set ~ $5.99 Test Leads ~$5.99 Pry Open Tools ~ $9.99 Mini Pliers ~ $9.49 Soldering Set (For Repairs Only) ~ $9.99 The Third Hand ~ $9.94 While many of the tools appear to cater to the ardent homebrewer , they have general applicability like when you need to open up your Cell Phone , Alexa , Computer , Tablet or Smart Watch . You are covered even when the XYL or girlfriend goobers up ...

The 2N3904 rig will never happen and this is a result of the reality of the very, very small interest in building anything these days.  It was a suggested project doomed to failure as using a 2N3904 throughout the rig, results in building in the old way of doing things that we have now replaced with modern technology.  Who in their right mind would settle for a drifty Analog VFO when you can have a Digital VFO and the BFO comes as a bonus.  The real negative... no circuit board and no kit. I know it can be done so I have no magic goal to personally be achieved.  A singular benefit is teaching the very few, the tired and the brave, a process for building a true homebrewed SSB radio using a common device in every active circuit.  Ten years ago, I along with AI6YR created a close cousin (with the same teaching goal) and it was published in QRP Quarterly under the title LBS standing for Let's Build Something. A few units were built by the ham community, but it ...

Yesterday's blog entry had about as much appeal as passing gas in a church service. Today's posting likely would be a "double dose" that includes not only refried beans but cabbage as a starter mechanism. I go forth well knowing the disdain for today's post. Link to Doug DeMaw Yesterday's post suggested the 2N3904 as fulfilling the FOAM template for home built SSB Radios. FOAM of course is Filter, Oscillator, Amplifier and Mixer.  One area "illuminated for development" was the Driver and Final Stages and how to get more juice out of a combination 2N3904's. One faithful blog reader turned to AI and furnished me a design for a Push Pull Driver stage capable of delivering 250 Milliwatts of RF (10 Volts PTP). It was a pretty simple circuit using FT-37-43 cores on the in and out ports. Thanks Bruce! In my own thoughts about how to do it I thought of Hybrid Combiners, and this is sort of cool where you could have two or four individual amps and sum the...

Today's Blog posting is a result of an email I received commenting on yesterday's post on introspection.   I am at this point uncertain whether the input was a tongue in cheek comment (maybe even cheeky) or perhaps a serious input. Essentially it said are we done looking at tubes, transistors, loop antennas and perhaps wean myself from 12AU7's and 2N3904's and focus on where the rigs are headed. You know FPGA's, digital signal processing, pre-distortion, SDR and external audio panels using Sennheiser Microphones. 2N3904 as sold by Jameco Electronics Shazam, I thought I get it, the input is suggesting I come up with a SSB radio that uses nothing but 2N3904's. Yes, someone has done an all 2N2222 CW transceiver (Jim Kortge, K8IQY) and the PSSST came close with 5 out of 7 transistors using a 2N2222A, but how about a transceiver using nothing but 2N3904's.  First and foremost, the 2N3904 is a very common device and really cheap. As a reference, the Jameco 100-pi...

At times it is really good to look inward and ask some of the hard questions. You know, like should I build yet another radio or for many hams do I need to buy another Chinese radio? Maybe what I have is plenty and I should just operate or join contests. I guess in the land of plenty we have developed an attitude of more and better. The Chinese marketing experts are counting on you to be "unsatisfied". Sadly, it may be more but not necessarily better. On 40M yesterday I heard two local hams banter about their very high end SDR radios. Each had one but one was a Flex and the other an Apache Anon. They were somewhat arguing "mine is bigger than yours". The argument had as a locus the "pre-distortion" functionality. I am about to share much more than I really know or understand. But I imagine the pre-distortion feature is to cure a problem. It seems when you do a wide-band SDR signal (3Khz) and pump that through a legal limit amp (for some this is 5KW) what c...