VA3SAX
07-01-2007, 01:12 AM
if you managed to clean up a computer's power supply would it and it's case not make an excellent base for a homebrew transceiver. I mean a metal case for shielding and a power supply with multiple voltage level to run the digital circuitry as well as the amplifiers and such
ka5piu
07-01-2007, 03:31 AM
Hello.
There are people who have taken old boatanchors, gutted them, and built an entire modern radio.
http://www.pan-tex.net/usr/r/receivers/super.htm
I have a Hammarlund HQ-105 that was a bad radio all around when I got it.
This thing had a broken clock and meter along with broken and missing knobs.
Everything else was fair.
I installed a cheezy combo frequency counter and clock intended for the CB radio world and rebuilt the meter.
Backlighting now LED, with white on RX and red on TX, yes, the thing started life with a really puny CB transmitter, perhaps a watt on a good day.
But, everything is close to the same, sort of.
The front end is now a 6CW4.
Everything that rectified was replaced with a modern diode.
That silly AM CB transmitter was replaced by disconnecting the original circuit and making use of a Texas Star CW transmitter that now does AM and SSB as well as CW and is totally controlled by the rig.
The 2 toggle switches have been replaced by 3 position long bat handle jobs.
The Audio amp, if you can call it that, was replaced by a solid state unit and a noise squelch was added.
But, every mod can easily be undone, everything but the clock is still there.
So, there is that option, taking an older radio and updating it or perhaps, depending on what you have to work with, stripping it and starting nearly from scratch.
And, to make this clear, the unit is not used as a CB radio.
WA7KKP
07-01-2007, 07:16 PM
I'm going to use an old desktop PC case for my high current DC power supply . . .
As far as the power supply being re-used, I'd tend to stay away from switchers, because of the RF hash they are KNOWN to radiate. Stick with linear regulation, or go ferro-resonant transformers like the GE Mastr II power supplies.
The trick is being able to use the present holes in your design . . .
Gary WA7KKP
VA3SAX
07-05-2007, 03:07 AM
I don't know much so far about the power supply that I'm planning to use. but it's probably linear. I'm looking at the case of an old XT computer once I wash the black rings that the monitor left on the top...maybe I repaint it black the toughest part is probably going to be the front panel. I'll need to make a new one