While I am waiting for my QCX-mini, what other kits could I put together? #solder
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chuckhubbert
What are some kits that you all have put together that were fun and useful in your shack or field ops? I'm anxious to get to soldering!
73 Chuck/K8CNH
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mike.carden
What are some kits that you all have put together that were fun and useful in your shack or field ops? I'm anxious to get to soldering! A QRP dummy load is an excellent kit to build while you wait and IMHO essential to have on hand when you first power up your QCX. If you already have one of those, perhaps a nice, quiet, old fashioned analogue bench power supply with a variable current limit to help you avoid letting the smoke out. -- MC VK1MC
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John AE5X <ae5x@...>
How about one of these:
http://ae5x.blogspot.com/2022/02/thoughts-on-penntek-tr-35-qrp.html -- John AE5X
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KI5UMG
I'm looking to put together a couple of clocks, one for local time, one for UTC. I'm also planning to put together an AT-100 auto tuner kit.
Before I do anything else and to brush up on my soldering, I'm going to build a CW practice oscillator and a Pixie kit.
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Rob Giuliano
On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 08:22 AM, KI5UMG wrote:
I'm looking to put together a couple of clocks, one for local time, one for UTC.Do they have to be separate? You could build a single clock with (say) a 4 line display and have it show local and UTC on the same display. 12345678901234567890 Local: HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD (or your desired format) UTC: HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD (or your desired format) I HATE having 2 clocks close together and not being able to have them show the same time - meaning min:sec the same in thius case. Seems a waste to use separate control devices (like a GPS) to get accurate time. Just a thought. -- Rob KB8RCO
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Rob Giuliano
Forgot to mention the 3 devices I recommend:
Dummyload/power meter (second a previous post) SWR meter or SWR/Power meter Manual tuner Or a combined manual tuner, meter, and dummy load. Personally, I am not a fan of the LED SWR devices - but that is my preference. -- Rob KB8RCO
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chuckhubbert
I need an SWR and Power meter, that would be a very useful project for me. I'll start looking, but does anyone know of such a kit? For me to start from scratch would be a big leap. I like the idea of a 2 line clock as well and will consider the clock and GPS kit(s) from QRP Labs.
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KI5UMG
Ultimately, it could be. I know QRP labs makes a nice gps driven clock kit that includes maidenhead coordinates. I'm thinking of doing a couple of these I saw on amazon - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0711MHKDZ/?coliid=I1O849B4H76TVU&colid=OJS18QBT4OMZ&psc=1&ref_=_sed_dp
I can either build or print a single enclosure for both. I figure this is simple enough of a project that will help me with my soldering and assembly skills. There are also a lot of schematics online for them. You wouldn't get a dedicated PCB this way, but they seem like simple circuits with easy to obtain parts.
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Chuck I built the QRPLABS clock kit with GPS receiver which is a very useful shack addition because you can customize what is displayed. I haven’t seen any other clock on the market that has these features.
Skip Davis, NC9O
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Mike KK7ER
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Evan Hand
On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 09:05 AM, Mike KK7ER wrote:
This one is nice: https://qrpguys.com/qrpguys-power-swr-dummy-load We built this kit as part of a group build. All went well and the results are good. Agree that this is a good kit.
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If you plan to operate portable, you might build a QRP antenna tuner or an antenna match for a particular type of antenna such as an end-fed half-wave. There’s such an abundance of options there, I won’t try to list them.
—Mike Perry, WA4MP
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The perfect clock answer is the QRP Labs shack clock with the QLG2SE GPS receiver. Not only do you get two time zones but a bunch of other features too. Fun to put together too. 73 Phil WA8YAN Sent from my Verizon, Samsung Galaxy smartphone
-------- Original message -------- From: "Rob Giuliano via groups.io" <kb8rco@...> Date: 4/14/22 8:58 AM (GMT-05:00) To: QRPLabs@groups.io Subject: Re: [QRPLabs] While I am waiting for my QCX-mini, what other kits could I put together? #solder I'm looking to put together a couple of clocks, one for local time, one for UTC.Do they have to be separate? You could build a single clock with (say) a 4 line display and have it show local and UTC on the same display. 12345678901234567890 Local: HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD (or your desired format) UTC: HH:MM:SS YYYY-MM-DD (or your desired format) I HATE having 2 clocks close together and not being able to have them show the same time - meaning min:sec the same in thius case. Seems a waste to use separate control devices (like a GPS) to get accurate time. Just a thought. -- Rob KB8RCO
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richlim11
Agree 100% with Phil. The QRP Labs clock is great. If you are inclined to do so, you can get a 4 line display and display more info simultaneously. You can also program clock to scroll between local time and UTC. I built mine into the QRP Labs case and added additional 3.5mm jacks to allow PPS a output to calibrate my QCX rigs and a temp port so I can measure ambient temp or PA temp. If you add a supercap, when you lose power or turn off the clock, GPS lock is super fast. The green led flashes w the PPS signal….who doesn’t like blinkly lights! Rich
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chuckhubbert
On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 08:53 AM, richlim11 wrote:
Thanks for the photos and ideas!
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KI5UMG
I've heard of the 4-line display mod. Is there a walkthrough for how to do this available?
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Colin Kaminski
I do a lot of Satellite work so I need to have a spot on clock. I use a pi that is set up as a GPS tamed NTP server. It makes all of my decoding stratum 2 clocks. It still needs internet to account for leap seconds. But it only needs it a few times a year. I have found my QRP-guys dummy load SWR meter really useful at home and in the field. The AT-100 kit is a fun build and an all around interesting project but it sits in a drawer. The trUSX is also a fun build. Weather satellite reception is a fun project but not a quick and easy kit. I was about $150 into it to have quality imagery on a local web server. I like the QRPguys stuff. The triband antenna kit works well for SOTA. I am low on things to build right now so I am following this thread with great interest. I waiting on parts for my USX triband, USX octoband and ATU-10. I try to make “radio progress” every day. The lack of processors has made simple tasks really hard. I have moved my work designs (beer related electronics) to the Arduino nano and the Raspberry Pico. Colin
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Viktors Miske KC8CKZ
toggle quoted messageShow quoted text
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The 4 line display connects electrically exactly like the 2 line LCD. The problem is that the outside dimensions of the 4 line are different that the 2 line display and the clock pcb. I solved this by attaching one hole directly to the clock pcb, attaching 2 holes to the plastic case I was mounting it all in, and using a soft non conductive spacer to support the 4th hole and keep it spaced correctly from the clock pcb. All of this required some custom length spacers which I easily fabricated from stripped insulation from a cable I had. A 4 40 size screw self tapped easily into the pieces and provided very functional non conductive spacers of custom lengths. I think insulation on RG58 coax might work for this but I never tried it. If you can't find any cable to strip some insulation from let me know and I can mail you a couple of lengths to work with. As far as programming for the 4 line, that is identical to the two line only with 4 lines to program. Hans' instructions are very clear. There are also a few examples you can find using Google. You'll enjoy having 4 lines of text to play with. This is a cool clock and no other one I could find had near the features this one has, even at 10 times the $$$. Plus there is the satisfaction of putting it together yourself and your own customization of the final product. Hope this has been helpful. Glad to answer any questions you may have. 73 Phil WA8YAN Sent from my Verizon, Samsung Galaxy smartphone
-------- Original message -------- From: "KI5UMG via groups.io" <KI5UMG@...> Date: 4/14/22 1:11 PM (GMT-05:00) To: QRPLabs@groups.io Subject: Re: [QRPLabs] While I am waiting for my QCX-mini, what other kits could I put together? #solder
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ke9uw
How about some of these great kits…
http://nm0s-electronics.com/
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