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CQ 3580
Tom Sevart
My cricket is chirping CQ on 3580 right now.
-- Tom Sevart N2UHC St. Paul, KS
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Re: Cricket C1 and C10
WA0ITP
Hi Tom,
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Dave spent some time working on these portions of the circuit to get them right.. The values are important. You want 150p at C1 and 180p at C10. 180 at C1 maybe causing the heat at Q2. Put your scope on the drain of Q2 and look for a nice Class C waveform. The 180 belongs at C10 for good and reliable oscillator functioning, and make sure you have a 100p at C9. GL and let us know how it goes. 72 WAØITP I love this radio stuff. www.wa0itp.com www.4sqrp.com On 4/29/2017 4:28 PM, Tom Sevart
tmsevart@... [4sqrp] wrote:
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Cricket Crystal Frequencies, Sockets, and Chip-Quik
WA0ITP
Previously lots of Cricket info was conveyed under the subject line "Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?"
So to clear the air a bit: 7030 and 7122 crystals were (and still are) supplied with the Bayou Jumper. A color burst crystal is being supplied with the Cricket. 3560s are cheap and easy to obtain, as noted in an earlier email. I'm headed over to 3560 as soon as mine are delivered, or I can find the ones I have, whichever comes first :o) But plenty of fun is to be had on the color burst frequency also. Use SIPP pins, they work well and are useful for Crystal and transistor sockets when desired, cheap on Ebay. If you need to remove parts, for goodness sake buy some Chip-Quik, it's inexpensive, lasts a long time, and you wont ruin pcb traces with it. Mouser and Digikey carry it. I've been using it a loong time, here's a little video of one instance http://www.4sqrp.com/kits/SS40/ss-40pot5kremoval.avi OK, I'm done, have to get back to the web pages and documentation of the next new kit coming out soon. Stay tuned. -- 72 WAØITP I love this radio stuff. www.wa0itp.com www.4sqrp.com
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Re: Sick cricket
Sean Edwards
What size box did you buy for it? Where did you buy it? -= Sean Edwards =- AD0QG
On Sat, Apr 29, 2017 at 7:54 PM, Tom Sevart tmsevart@... [4sqrp] <4sqrp@...> wrote:
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Sean Edwards
I just did this, and it worked! Thanks Doug! A 14 pin IC socket can create 4 crystal sockets: 1.) From each row of 7, remove pins 2, 4 and 6, extract with needle nose pliers or simply cut off.. 2.) Cut IC socket on each side where pin 4 use to be, creating 2 pieces 3.) Remove remaining cross connectors from each half, creating 4 pieces 4.) Solder one piece in place where crystal should go 5.) Insert desired crystal into the socket you just created and installed 6.) Use remaining sockets in other projects, or send to 3 ham friends -= Sean Edwards =- AD0QG
On Sat, Apr 29, 2017 at 7:01 PM, Doug Hendricks ki6ds1@... [4sqrp] <4sqrp@...> wrote:
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Re: Sick cricket
Tom Sevart
OK, problem solved. I found that the cricket works OK when hooked to a dummy load, but not an antenna. Couldn't figure out why until I realized that the cable I thought went to my tuner goes straight to my multiband dipole which was built (not by me) for the voice portions of the various bands it's built for. So it has a little bit of an SWR mismatch close to the 80 meter CW portion, which was apparently enough to feed back into the radio and heat up Q2.
So after hooking it to the right cable and feeding it through my tuner, it does put out a good signal, almost a full watt according to the tuner's meter. I would attempt a QSO tonight but with all the lightning thought I'd better not risk it. Now my next step is to put the cricket into the nice little wooden box I bought for it. -- Tom Sevart N2UHC St. Paul, KS
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Doug Hendricks <ki6ds1@...>
I suggest that you not use the machine pin socket. Use an ic socket that you cut down. Use the ones with wipers.
On Apr 29, 2017 4:04 PM, "Jim Sheldon w0eb@... [4sqrp]" <4sqrp@...> wrote:
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Good idea. Those scanner crystal sockets were designed for the large (16 gauge) crystal pins, not the fine wire of those HC-49 miniature ones. Old "machined pin" IC socket pins would be great. That's what I plan to use once my Cricket gets here.
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Jim
On Apr 29, 2017, at 5:59 PM, Tom Sevart tmsevart@... [4sqrp] <4sqrp@...> wrote:
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Tom Sevart
I salvaged some crystal sockets from an old crystal scanner to use on my cricket, however they didn't seem to work all that well at holding the small leads of the supplied crystal. I removed them and used part of an IC socket which worked much better. Part of a SIP socket could work, too.
-- Tom Sevart N2UHC St. Paul, KS
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Request for OzarkCon 2017 photos
Jim, N5IB
My local club (Baton Rouge ARC) asked me to write an article for their newsletter
<http://brarc.org/rf-news/> about OzarkCon 2017. Unfortunately I was having too much fun to take pictures :^)) I'm looking for photos of a) the building session b) the homebrew contest entries c) the wacky key entries d) the Friday night dinner e) the swap/vendor area f) the speakers - in particular something of Nick (WA5BDU) and me I just created an album on this 4SQRP yahoo group where you can upload photos you'd care to contribute. I stuck one picture in it just to open the album. Can't promise to use them all, but would like to show the folks in BR the flavor of OzarkCon. Thanks, Jim, N5IB
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Sick cricket
Tom Sevart
Just got done putting together my cricket, and discovered that it's got a transmit problem. When I power it up, I can hear the receive LO in a receiver, which is normal. But when I key down, I hear a brief "blip" but the transmitted signal quickly goes away. When I let the key up the LO signal comes back. I did notice that Q2 gets quite warm when I have the radio keyed down.
The troubleshooting I have done: Checked all components to ensure they are all in the right place. Inspected all solder joints and touched up a few. Determined that it's not being caused by a weak battery. Tried two different batteries and a power supply set to 9V and the problem persisted. Receiver and side tone works well. I noticed that the problem temporarily went away when I wiggled the battery, and I had a solid signal when it was held in a certain spot. I resoldered the battery terminals but it didn't help. I did notice that, during construction, C1 looked like it had 181 stamped on it instead of 151, but the numbers were so small I couldn't tell for sure. I didn't check it before soldering it in, but left it until the last to make sure it was supposed to go there. Not sure if 30 extra pF would make that much of a difference or not. I may remove it and solder in a 150 pF to see if that makes a difference. Just curious as to whether or not anyone else has had similar issues. -- Tom Sevart N2UHC St. Paul, KS
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Pic El
Bill Wood
I think I’m losing it OM
I’m already a member but have not been doing anything I bought the older Pic used and already outdated so just shelved it. Still interested tho Thanks 73 Bill KE9XQ
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Pic El III
Bill Wood
Is this sold yet, and
can you tell me just a little about it??? I see there is a Yahoo group for it, but still plead ignorant, but would like to get into programming things like this and the Arduino and such… Thanks Man 73 fer now Bill KE9XQ
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Items for sale
Mike Broga <w9qs@...>
I have the following for sale: Ozark Patrol. Assembled at Ozarkcon. I've never been able to get it to work. $30.00 Pic-EL III $40.00 Heathkit AC-! antenna coupler. 9 out of 10. No modifications. Pictures available. $40.00 All items plus shipping. Paypal please Also, 1998 to 2015 or so QRP Quarterly. Too heavy to ship but I will bring them to FDIM. Offers? Please contact me off list. Thanks for the bandwidth. Mike, W9QS w9qs at comcast dot net
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Crickets and some Operating tips
WA0ITP
GA
Group
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Lots of folks are having fun with the analogy mentioned below, me too. So I decided to investigate it a bit. I found a youtube video that shows a Cricket "chirping". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQFEY9RIRJA The sound seem to be a little over 4k cycles, and interrupted at a rapid pace. I didn't hear any of the "whoop" that we normally associated with oscillator "chirp". Notice that the cricket turns around every 6 seconds. Wonder why, should we rotate ours too? 3560 crystals are readily available at ESS http://www.expandedspectrumsystems.com/prod4.html and also on Ebay. http://www.ebay.com/itm/80M-QRP-Ham-Radio-Crystals-HC49-S-4-pack-/282420358175?hash=item41c190ac1f:g:7JEAAOSw8vZXN-Ke I installed machined pin sockets on mine so can change xtals at will. I'll be trying 3560 soon. I'm having great fun with my electroCricket, with over 20 Q's, 11 or so are Cricket to Cricket QSOs. Along the way I've found that QSOs are indeed possible with a half watt on 80M, but one has to listen carefully for the frequency of the stations come back to you. Originally my beta build Cricket, had a very low tone on a received station wanting to work me. Placing 10p across C15 (bottom of board) brought the offset up to 440 cycles, a distinct tone that is easily detected. Another great benefit of the 440 offset is that nearly all the digi signals are above the Cricket and the 440 tone slides right in underneath them. If the signal is too weak, nothing helps, but if its strong enough it's easily detectable. A 9 volt battery will last a surprising long time, and the Cricket will still make power down to less built the keyer adapter and use the EzKeyer III with the Cricket. Sending slower seems to garner more contacts than sending fast. IMHO the QRM and low power conspire to make the Cricket more difficult to hear. Slow sending seems to help overcome that. OK, I've rattled on long enough. Hope you are enjoying your Cricket, as much as I'm enjoying mine.. 72 WAØITP I love this radio stuff. www.wa0itp.com www.4sqrp.com On 4/29/2017 11:48 AM, Gene Warren via
QRP-L wrote:
The name of the new CW tx is interesting in view of the fact that the classic sound made by a cricket is a chirp! But this Nov. when 80M season returns I will be listening for you crickets on 3579 kHz and maybe 3560 if you can locate such a rock. 72, N5GW, CBLA #40 Sent from my iPhone ______________________________________________________________ QRP-L mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/qrp-l Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:QRP-L@... This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html Message delivered to wa0itp@...
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
There's one major problem with staying on 3579 - it's called PSK. The PSK people are not listening to their frequency before transmitting (many don't recognize CW signals on their "Waterfall display) and they jump right on top of pretty much any non-PSK signal anywhere near there. 3560 is more like the QRP watering hole on 80 anyway and the 3560 crystals will probably come out near there, like maybe 3559+ so that would be much more practical if you actually want to use the Cricket to communicate, not just call unanswered CQ's until you accidentally get lucky. Terry WA0ITP has been lucky as have several others but that ain't gonna last. The more and more PSK signals that crop up on 80 and those using the "Warbler" style crystal controlled rigs (all use color burst crystals) will eventually cause problems and the "Cricketeers" will get discouraged and either put them on a back shelf to gather dust or sell them and create more frustrated Cricket owners. It will be a never ending battle for sure. Just my opinion, but I've already ordered some 3560 crystals for my Cricket (and for several local friends) when it gets here. Jim - W0Eb
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Paul Bonham
Bob,
Count me in. Just let me know how much and how to send you the money. Thank you, Paul Bonham - KG5NKW 8408 Spectrum Drive McKinney, Texas 75070
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
Curt
But we can't be the colorburst army unless we are on 3.579... :-) Just like can't be (40M) spies unless on 7.121.
71 Curt KB5JO
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3560 crystal
Bryan Nehl
Bob,
I’m interested. I bet you could put a little bubble wrap around it and throw it in a regular envelope…. Let me know how much and would PayPal be the easiest? 73, Bryan Nehl - K0EMT 4052 Southampton Dr Jefferson City MO 65109
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Re: Exact Bayou Jumper Crystal Frequency?
I like that idea. I may just go ahead and buy 10 crystals from eBay for myself. Anyone else who is willing to pay postage from me to them (I'll look up postage), I'll send one to them as well as one to my friend in Alabama who came up with the idea (ok with you, John? Great idea). Bob Groh, WA2CKY
On Sat, Apr 29, 2017 at 12:06 AM, Doug Hendricks <ki6ds1@...> wrote:
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