Progress Pictures
If you have questions: E-mail Me!
To see the progress pictures for any section, click on the section header.
If you have questions: E-mail Me!
To see the progress pictures for any section, click on the section header.
Having had the urge to get back on 6m and being on a budget from hell, after much agonizing between finding something I'd really like on ebay (FT-736 with 6m, 2m, 1.25m modules for $100 - just dreaming :-), the MFJ offering and the Ten-Tec, I decided on the Ten-Tec 1209.
Not just because it is inexpensive although that certainly helped. Ten-Tec has a very good reputation, I have a very nice 2m All mode (Kenwood TR-751A) and it comes as a kit which gives me a fun project to do :-).
Thus I put my order in on February 8, 2006 and UPS managed to deliver it on February 15, 2006 one day ahead of schedule. I don't care for UPS shipping as I have had enough problems with them in the past, but it was all that TT offered (I prefer FedEx given any choice).
Opened the box and found it nicely packaged! A thick manual and several sheets of errata and a catalog to drool over, unfortunately not many prices to plan with, so the catalog got tossed :-).
I was in the process of building an SDR (SoftRock v5) at the time (40 and 20m modules) so I put the 1209 up on the shelf after just perusing the manual. Finished up the SDR but with my HF noise problems it really does no better than the FT-747GX and has considerably less coverage - Cool stuff though!.
I picked up the manual and errata sheets and posted them to the manual. Checked myself on a second pass all which took probably no more than a half hour while being VERY careful. I like the double check boxes they use!
Today we opened up the shrink wrap and put the bags in a pile to start verifying we have everything and organizing them for starting construction.
Only complaint is that the board was scuffed up a bit in the lower right hand corner, nothing serious and I am sure the VERY complete manual will get me past that.
I think the hard part is done now. All the parts are inventoried and organized.
No missing parts and only one error in the parts list - C5 is a 220pF and they have it "(marked 151)" when it should have been "(marked 221)" Trivial and easy to fix :-).
All immediately needed parts are now staked into foam blanks and labeled. A few parts are left in the bags as they are either delicate or won't be needed for a while.
In the process I dug out my ground bracelet and got that hooked up and verified as working (~1M ohm to ground) as I was somewhat concerned about the dual-gate MOSFET Q14. Better safe than sorry.
I dug my old Bishop Graphic PCB loupe out and checked out the scuffed up area of the board and it looks like the damage is just cosmetic.
This was time consuming and is seems that this took about 5 hours to do between other things, but the rest of the project should be easy.
This is essentially putting in the "via"s and test points.
Of interest the vias are unmarked (find 'em! :-) and TPs 3,4,5 are not marked as shown on the diagram on Assembly - 4, but you can figure them out from that.
The mating plug for TP1 and TP2 is less than confidence inspiring, but if the crimp I put in to hold the 1K0 resistor is a problem I can solder it when the time comes, I doubt melting the plug a bit will really be a big deal. Maybe at some point in the 1209s history they used something with thicker leads.
Also discovered a mismarking on the board, What should be marked C61 is marked C19 on the board itself and on the Circuit board X-Ray View, manual is correct as is the schematic. [ Added later ] C19 may be real and C61 is just not labeled on the board, with the manual and some reading of it, it really is not a problem to figure out.
This step took a bit longer than it should have, just to be careful and sure.
It was pointed out to me that my case did not match the case on Ten-Tec's page. I have no idea if I got a old kit, a newer kit, the picture on the web page might be that they used the 1208 pix or something else (not everyone is the web whiz I am or has ready access to a digital camera, even businesses :-), or what. I'm proceeding under the assumption that I have a newer version :-) where the two switches were integrated into one :-). Even if it is an "old kit", it sure seems that people that had it were happy enough with it. We'll see what TT has to say about it.
Took my time with this and took breaks to do other things. Nothing difficult or unusual to report. Locate, form leads, stuff, solder, trim, check, repeat :-).
On the Phase 1.0 Progress Check, I used the FM broadcast radio (in the US apparently the digital ones tune 93.9 MHz and then jumps to 94.1 MHz :-), but I do have a signal so apparently all is well. The frequency counter on the MFJ-249 SWR Analyzer turned out not to be sensitive enough or something, never had much luck with that aspect of the MFJ-249. We'll figure out where it is later.
Again, nothing difficult or unusual to report. Locate, form leads, stuff, solder, trim, check, repeat :-). Just taking my time and checking everything two or three times! Not rushing this at all and just having a good time leisurely assembling the kit.
Two things I have done are to print the back of the circuit board from the pix I took of it earlier, that lets me check for shorts without having to root through the manual to find that page (and lose my place :-). The other is to copy the beginning pages for each phase, it allows me to check off what I am doing on the diagram, a chance to look over the circuit as I work and have an easy reference to find things, again without having to turn back pages to check things. Makes things much easier and more pleasant.
According to the attenuation table at Reference 28, I was going to replace R5 with a 3K9 but I don't have one. This gives me 8W rather than 5 and it seems that the TR-751A puts out about 7W on the low power setting, so this seems like a good bet to just be safe. Yes, I am too lazy to take the top off the TR-751 and screwdriver it down to 5W :-).
I'll run down to rat shack tomorrow and get the 3K9. In that whole parts cabinet drawer of RED last band resistors, there is not ONE 3K9, funny how that works :-)!
When 6m is open you can do wonders with milliwatts. Being a rather dedicated QRPer the potential loss of a few watts to be safe seems like a good tradeoff :).
The progress check came off without a hitch, just as specified!
The test plug, despite my concerns, worked with no problem whatsoever.
Getting the power to test the RF sensing circuit was really easy with the dipole pinned to the wall right above the workbench :-). Just stuck a couple jumper clip leads together and clipped one end on the twin-lead on the dipole and the other one the 2m on the board input wire and everything worked like a charm!
Not feeling pressure (HAH! Right!) to get this done soonest. I am really enjoying the assembly and learning the circuit. Beats bloody hell out of watching TV.
Went down to rat shack today on my errands run and picked up a pack of 3K9 resistors. Removed the 3K3 resistor and replaced it with the 3K9. Now we are going to feel a lot more comfortable running the TR-751A into this.
Another easy and leasurely step! Nothing difficult to accomplish.
Next step looks like it should be more challenging.
This looks like I am about half way through!
I had expected this phase to be difficult, but it wasn't :-).
The winding of L17 I expected to be the most difficult / tedious this also turned out not to be the case.
I went down to Home Depot and purchased a 3/8" bold (coarse, I think that makes it a 3/8-24). Wound the coil per the instructions, unscrewed it and almost dropped it into the circuit board. I got a 4' bolt to make it easy to hold onto while doing the winding.
Mounting Q14 (BF988) was a bit daunting, but I trusted my grounded wrist bracelet and all went well. The needle nosed pliers were quite good enough to get it into the board.
After taking a bit of a break I went into the Phase 3.0 progress test. This also appears to be where this project ends :-(.
NONE of my diddle sticks fits anything that needs to be diddled :-(. I figured I could make a tuning tool for C41 and L23 out of a toothpick and that I would run down to rat shack and pick up a hex tuning tool.
So I did, returned home and found the hex tool had a small plastic blade that fit L23 and C41. So I hooked up the TR751 and checked the voltages per the progress test and all was well. Now to peak it up on the noise!
Stuck the rat shack tool in L23 and turned it to the bottom, no change, went to bring it back up to the middle and it had jammed and the little plastic blade broke off under no significant pressure, ARGHHH, $4.95 worth of typical rat shack quality. Of course the other end doesn't fit. No, I wasn't gorillaing it. I managed to back the slug up using my jewelers screwdriver gently and left it about the middle of range.
Since C41 is only supposed to make a small difference I went for L19 and L20 only to find out that the hex tools are either too large or too small. And of course rat shack has dropped the other two sets of diddle sticks so that about wraps up this project until I can measure the slug and track down a diddle stick that will work.
All remaining parts packaged and back in the box and the box is in the closet :-(.
Rather than toss all the parts back in bags, it seemed easier to just finish building the 1209. So, I just kept stuffing parts in the board :-).
Phase 4: had nothing to report, but I skipped the progress test and just kept going.
Phase 5: This on was a bit of a different story. The assembly of the driver and final transistors, I would have swapped with the RF Transformers (T4,T5) as they do get in the way to some degree.
Only change I made to this section was to use a nylon heat sink screw in place of the 4-40 metal one supplied for Q10. Aligning it so as to not short Q10 was a lot of work for the cost of a single nylon screw :-).
T4 and T5 were somewhat difficult with the driver / final assembly in place, but not impossible, fortunately the wire supplied has teflon insulation. Both of the cores were not square and that left one side up to some degree, but it doesn't seem to have affected anything that I can tell at this point. It seemed right to leave the "A" and "B" side float so the "C" side could rest flat on the board.
Soldering T4 and T5 "C" side to the board was no problem at all with my ancient Weller WTCPS :-)
The winding of L14, L15 and L16 using the 3/8" bolt was trivial and they dropped right into the PCB holes after they were unscrewed from the bolt and trimmed!
If any step in the assembly of the 1209 could be considered difficult / tedious, this would be it, but it really isn't any significant problem to accomplish.
Phase 6: This forced the issue with the alignment tools. I figured that if it was going to sit in the closet and do nothing, it might as well sit in the closet with broken slugs :-). Every time in the past that I have attempted to kluge alignment tools I have ended up with broken slugs, so I was a bit upset that the tools were not supplied. It would have been worth another 10 cents (assuming quantity purchase) since acquiring them locally with rat shack now only carrying the one set appears problimatical...
I took the rat shack hex tool and an X-Acto handle with a #11 blade in it and laid the hex tool flat on the desktop. I'd position the blade as close to horizontal as I was able and scrap a couple times, rotate to the next flat and repeat until done with one revolution. Test for fit and repeat until it did. Took some time, it is tedious work. At last I finally had a hex tool that fit the cores fairly well.
Next I took the diddle stick with the metal screwdriver blades and selected the smallest. I cut the plastic back about 1/16" (aprox. 1.5mm) so it would clear the top of L23, L2 R43 and C42. I took a jewelers file and filed some down on each side of the metal blade until it fit the parts in question.
PITA to do, but now the rat shack diddle sticks fit something I need them for :-).
Went back to Phase 3 and completed the receiver tune up. Did not seem to be able to get a signal source that wasn't almost, if not full scale. Tried a room monitor (49.890 MHz), a 50 MHz clock oscillator module and the MFJ-249 which is incredibly difficult to fine tune. Seems no amount of shielding attempts made any significant difference here.
Re-checked everything to make sure there were no holes unfilled that weren't supposed to be and checked for solder bridges. The layout and the print of the backside of the board has made it easy to resolve any time there was a question about that.
The tuneup itself went well. My initial bias adjustment seemed a bit flakey at first. My inital idling current was about 420 mA, but after putzing for a bit, it came up to about 550 and I set it accordingly.
Phase 7: Nothing of significance to report with the assembly phase, all went well and the strain relief for the power cord was the easiest to put on of any I have ever done :-). My LED did not fit snugly, but that was easy enough to fix.Interesting to note, that the bolts for the UHF connectors were hard to get at and I was lucky enough to still have in my toolbox, a Heathkit 1/4" wrench which made it a snap to do rather than trying to hold it with pliers :-). Sure wish I knew what happened to the tuning tools and the other tools that used to come with the Heathkit stuff over the years and moves.
Final tuneup went well and it looks like I end up drawing just over 2A and putting out about 5W. This appears to be from 3.5W on the low power setting for the TR-751A.
Looks like I didn't need to change that resistor in the attenuator network after all, but better safe than sorry :-).
Well, it was no Heathkit, but it is by no means a bad kit in any way. If I have to have a complaint, it is the cheaping of it with no alignment tools.
I never have heard back from Ten-Tec on whether this is an old kit or newer kit, but it sure doesn't look like the picture on their web site.
I got it hacked into the shack which basically looks like this (or will as soon as I get another switch, my one expensive Comet switch has the switching blade inside broken off):
Update: Found some more UHF patch cables and another Vantec three way switch when rooting through the boxes so this is set with the exception of figuring out where to put the 6m dipole, but I am leaning toward putting it on S3 at the end of 50 feet of RG-6 (I know, but it works well on HF and apparently 6m as well here and the price is RIGHT, 75 ohm or not :).
The HF dipole does seem to load up easily on 6m off the tuner, but I loose access to the HF gear if I do it that way and I think there is going to be a LOT of monitoring going on with 6m operations and with HF, at least I have some distraction (better than watching the TV card :-).
Done with gEDA's gschem under linux :-)
With some gracious help from Michael (KC7QYR), last night and using the 40/20/10m dipole (in the apartment) loaded up through the MFJ-949D tuner, I was heard down in Burien, WA which is about 30 Km south of me. He had noise problems but was able to hear me, not well, but he did hear me! Now as soon as I hear someone on this end, I'll be REALLY happy.
With all the trouble I had with tuning up the receiver section, I tend to wonder if perhaps the receive section of the 1209 might not be too hot?!? Everything I attempted to use for a signal source was too strong, despite all attempts to attenuate it, even a 50 MHz crystal oscillator module!
I live right on the edge of an industrial part and noise is generally a problem on HF so we'll get to see over time, after getting some experience with the 1209 I'll add a comment following all this.
The reason I mention this is that the S Meter on the TR-751 goes from zip to full scale with no signal when I turn on the 1209. We'll see...
Well, for now that that is it, reports of how it works will be added later.