VK Logger Ham Radio Forum Archive

ATV Outside Broadcast box
RX
- 1250/1283 MHz FM
- 2415 MHz FM
- 1287 Mhz DVB-S

TX
- 1250/1283 MHz FM
- 2415 MHz FM
Both transmitters can operate together, fed from a HDMI to composite converter from the Surface Pro 3 running vMix.
Time for a cold

Very neat.

Noticed the empty glass that needs filling in the first photo

Sometimes simple projects can be very satisfying and enhance your enjoyment of the hobby. Recently I made an adapter box for my FT897 to help make operation easier.

I wanted to connect a headset, PC and a footswitch to the radio. Some research revealed that the mic connector on the front panel of the FT857/FT897 carries a second CAT port so that made my job easier. I know there's a CAT port on the rear of the radio but I wanted to leave that connector free to connect to the VK3TU switch box.

The headset I chose is an Altronics C9064 aviation style set that I found in their bargain bin. The headset has a integrated preamp that is powered from the mic connector of the radio. Besides the connectors and the box I also needed a resistor and a couple of ceramic caps. With these two additions to the radio I now have auto antenna selection plus integration to my favorite logging program and my hands are free to type as I talk. For a one man(person) operation it greatly reduces the effort required to get on the air.

As it's not something I use every day I added instructions to the label to remind me of the settings I need to make to the radio before I use it.
Details on how to connect to the front panel MIC connector can be found here.

Lou,

Any RF protection on pins 2 and 3 data lines and the transistors?

Cheers

Peter VK3QI

Hi Peter,

You caught me out!

No, no protection on the serial lines although I did check for the presence of RF in the box. There are no transistors in my box as I'm using a USB CAT-62 cable to talk to the radio. These cables seem immune to RF and I expect effective RF protection inside the radio. The only thing I found was RF getting into the mic preamp via the supply line. A 0.01uf bypass cap cleaned it up nicely. The RF came from common mode current on a dipole feed line. I also looked for noise getting in to the radio from the serial line/PC - nothing heard.

Hi Lou,

Yes it seems to sometimes be an issue with extensions from the front mic sockets, even when all leads are bypassed with ceramic caps on the radio side of the socket.

Cheers

Peter VK3QI

Yep understood.

This box represents about two hours work and was built on the morning of the last Oceania contest to fit a particular purpose. Thankfully it worked but I have a feeling that the FT897 is intolerant of RF floating around the shack.

A more bullet proof solution might be a die cast box and proper RF bypassing/decoupling on all leads at the point where they enter the box. I would also change the entry method for the blue cable to an 8 pin mic socket. This would make bypassing lines easier and allow me to make custom wired cables to suit other radios.

It's not often that I finish a project and don't see a better way to do it almost immediately. That's the fun of the hobby eh?

Hi, well at the moment I haven't got anything substantial on my workbench. I am mucking around with a Raspberry Pi and have just ordered the quad core one, which should speed thing up (lol).

I have just finished etching my first PCB following the technique outlined on this website k7qo.net

The method is based on the Manhatten idea, but with an etched PCB rather than glue on pads. I am extremely pleased with my first attempt, I will post a photo or two if people are interested. I made his Crystal checker circuit as my first experiment, but don't know what I will do next at this stage. I am interested in the QRP transceivers and regen radios that are discussed on a few site on the net, for example at https://aa7ee.wordpress.com/tag/direct- ... -receiver/

Keeping the dust off my electrons, VK2HAL ( Graeme)

Graham, I too am interested in building "stuff" and have been searching around the net. There is a series of articles being written at the moment that will end up being a 40 meter SSB tracceiver using a Arduino DDS to control it.
The first article is in QRP Quarterly Jan 2015 (free to download here http://www.qrparci.org/qqsample/qqsample.pdf ). It could just be the thing for both of us starting out on our home brew journey.

Best 73

VK2HAL wrote:I have just finished etching my first PCB following the technique outlined on this website k7qo.net

PCBs is always a interesting subject!
Considering the cost of chemicals, and other materials required, fabricating your own PCBs these days can be a marginal exercise at best.

Drawing software and fabricators has been discussed in the past here:
http://www.vklogger.com/forum/viewtopic ... =20#p35589

Software like DIPTRACE is free to download, and once you pass the learning curve hump, it's easy to be churning out double-sided gerber files.

iTead studio (which I have used twice already) are highly recommended: http://imall.iteadstudio.com/open-pcb/p ... yping.html
PCBs here in about 2-3 weeks.
QTY 10 of 5x5cm max boards can be made for USD10 + postage.
These are double-sided plated through with solder mask and silkscreen - try doing that at home.

Larger PCBs become progressively more expensive.
QTY 10 of 10x10cm max are a whopping USD$20 + post!

Even if you were to keep 1 PCB and throw 9 away, (or give to your mates), it's hard to justify the expense and hassle of exposing the artwork and etching.
Not to mention the risk of having these toxic and corrosive chemicals around.


Post up pictures of what you are doing though, it will be interesting all the same.
But PLEASE consider starting a new topic rather than see it buried here in this perpetual topic.

Too many great projects and ideas are getting buried in this Facebook style of posting, and just like Facebook, few people will manually go back to catch up on everything... so it gets missed.
Ultimately these on-going threads become counter-productive.
I've unsubscribed to some these perpetual topics on the drone forums, with one of them being into page 1093, which became difficult and counter productive about 1,080 pages ago.

Finally put the OXCO that has been sitting on the shelf for months into a box and made up a frequency counter that is referenced to it.

Can now be confident that the frequency being shown is actually very close to what is being generated.

GPS locking to come when I get all the other projects on the list finished.

VK4GHZ wrote: Too many great projects and ideas are getting buried in this Facebook style of posting, and just like Facebook, few people will manually go back to catch up on everything... so it gets missed.
Ultimately these on-going threads become counter-productive.
I've unsubscribed to some these perpetual topics on the drone forums, with one of them being into page 1093, which became difficult and counter productive about 1,080 pages ago.

Adam, I think it's a two edged sword. Yes an ongoing thread can become difficult to manage but so can 300+ individual topics on pet projects. Considering most projects illicit no more than a handful of comments perhaps a perpetual thread isn't such a bad thing. It certainly seems to have captured the interest of many users.

OK so some people don't go back and look - too bad, so sad - the forum is easy enough to navigate and if all the projects are in the one spot perhaps not so difficult to search for. For example, I know VK5ZD posted something about a transverter controller. It's not so hard to use the advanced search and look for an author and a keyword.

Hey, I can fit another 'arf in my glass

Work bench.... kitchen bench.... same, same!

New 2.4GHz grid pack for permanent install at home.... just so I can listen to the WiFi QRM between FD's!

Thanks for your comments and info Adam, as you can see I am very new here and enjoyed reading some of the past comments.

Hi Mike, its funny you should mention the QRP magazine article as I also just received the magazine and have been following a similar idea but for morse on Youtube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uABR2jeaU6Y

However, the QRP mag appelas as well, I have already got a DDS chip from aBay and an Arduino Nano and a few cores. The oscillator I mentioned in the earlier post is also from QRP mag. The PCB I made with chemicals described by Chuck on k7qo.net costs about $2 to make a board using his process and as I'm only making one off's it suits me well.

I can't put my photos up as I don't have priveleges to do that and I haven't got a website where I can store them.

Also Mike i agree with you - "It could just be the thing for both of us starting out on our home brew journey."

73s
Graeme
VK2HAL

Graeme,
You could use one of the photo sharing sites and post the link to the photo's.

Places like https://www.flickr.com/ .

Well I created a Flikr account so lets see if this works:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/129403328 ... 430185156/



https://www.flickr.com/photos/129403328 ... 430181486/


Hope they are not too large, still learning all this stuff

Graeme

That worked fine. Photo's look good.

You have beaten me to get the test fixture up, far too hot to go out in the tin shed here at the moment.

Another project for the cupboard until I get time to start on it - maybe ready by next season, maybe....

50MHZ 400w pep amp pallet - ex Harris TV broadcast amp

The project is the workbench - or at least a new shelf for the operating position. 12 years after making the desk, I'm finally making the shelf to hold the multiple monitors and accessories.




Sent from my SM-G900I using Tapatalk

VK4CZ wrote:The project is the workbench - or at least a new shelf for the operating position. 12 years after making the desk, I'm finally making the shelf to hold the multiple monitors and accessories.




Sent from my SM-G900I using Tapatalk

Nice bench Scott

Can I suggest though, don't waste such a piece of work with monitors, how about a couple of these to save valuable bench space and make it a whole lot tidier:



http://www.jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=CW2833