Re: Homemade Circuit Boards
Just wondering...has anyone tried using a 3D printer to print the resist pattern on PCB material? I think it could be done but I don't know if the print filament material would resist the etchant well enough. Even the cheap 3D printers like I have can do some pretty high resolution prints when set up properly...maybe not good enough for some of the really tiny surface mount ICs but then they're too small for me to solder anyway. ;) Mutli-layer boards could be a challenge as well. Might be an interesting experiment.
Is the ferric chloride etchant still available these days or has it gone the way of other things we used to use but now are considered hazardous materials?
73...???? Mark???? AA7TA
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
Bob:
I've read back through the posts and did not find anyone who said the FDA prevented other countries from using the ventilator developed here. I am the owner of the Ventilator group site you mentioned and worked with Farhan and Gordon on the ventilator. Things moved along quickly until the design was sent to the U of F medical team who were preparing the documents for FDA. Somewhere in that process, everything just died. I still think glaciers move faster than the FDA on almost everything except budget requests. If other countries want to use the ventilator, seeing a "waiting for FDA approval" whether they need it or not, is still an impediment. With tens of thousands of people dying worldwide at the time, I do not understand why FDA couldn't kick itself in the ass and get things done.
--
Jack, W8TEE
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
I would give my left...whatever...to be able to design a circuit. It is still amazing to me to see someone sit down and, looking through some spec sheets, knows how to string things together and make a circuit work. Silly questions for those people, like why is that resistor 10K and not 15K, and why is that toroid there, are major stumbling blocks for me. Still, I really enjoy kit building and I can make some things dance to a different tune if they are programmable, and I get a kick out of that, too. Sadly, there are a lot of old guys like me who miss out on both the soldering and programming fun and there's really little to lose by trying.
Digital modes, SMD parts, microcontrollers, programming, etc. are all elements of our hobby and we should all at least try them before giving up on them. Who knows, you may find a new element of this wonderful hobby that you let bypass you when a little effort would have opened an entirely new world. So, go ahead...jump in! There are plenty of people here who can help you out if you start to sink.
Jack, W8TEE
On Tuesday, April 27, 2021, 1:04:44 PM EDT, Trystan G0KAY <trystandavies+nodirect@...> wrote:
Building a transceiver from scratch is indeed great fun. Soldering the components on, winding the toroids, aligning the IF, setting up the filters. Then testing it all for smoke, and seeing if it works.
It's even better if you have designed the circuit, perhaps from Doug DeMaw's design guides.
Even putting on the knobs and connectors on the ready-built UBitX is fun too and can give some sense of achievement too.
It's all good.
Some areas of our hobby do however almost preclude home construction to some extent. Also as people get older they may find they don't have the dexterity or eyesight they used to have. We also have a huge chunk of the community who rarely turn on a soldering iron (that's if they own one). There are also people who travel for a living, or have little space, and having a ready-made transceiver makes more sense. We all may have a reason to purchase a commercially made transceiver.
This talk will give us some idea of whether they really are as good as the money you pay for them.
Trystan G0KAY
-- Jack, W8TEE
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
I might get booted out of here for saying this, but, the IC7300 is an amazing deal for the price point. For 1000 bucks, it gives a huge radio. 100 watts, DDC receiver, all the SDR bells and whistles. If you just want to get in air, that's the one to buy. If is a far better option that a xeigu at 450 dollars. I keep saying to the HF signal folks, our competition is the IC7300. At five times the price, it is twenty times the radio. Ok, i have put on my tin foil hat, may the stoning begin.
Building a transceiver from scratch is indeed great fun. Soldering the components on, winding the toroids, aligning the IF, setting up the filters. Then testing it all for smoke, and seeing if it works.
It's even better if you have designed the circuit, perhaps from Doug DeMaw's design guides.
Even putting on the knobs and connectors on the ready-built UBitX is fun too and can give some sense of achievement too.
It's all good.
Some areas of our hobby do however almost preclude home construction to some extent. Also as people get older they may find they don't have the dexterity or eyesight they used to have. We also have a huge chunk of the community who rarely turn on a soldering iron (that's if they own one). There are also people who travel for a living, or have little space, and having a ready-made transceiver makes more sense. We all may have a reason to purchase a commercially made transceiver.
This talk will give us some idea of whether they really are as good as the money you pay for them.
Trystan G0KAY
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
I agree that that this isn't the place for pushing a whining political agenda, but since some people have, some misstatements need addressed. Originally the ventilator that some of us worked to develop was for use in the US and the effort was coordinated by U of Florida. Recall that as the perceived urgent need for ventilators in the US and around the world diminished, so did the effort to produce alternatives. A good read on this is? "the great ventilator rush of 2020" posted by Erich Schulz in the final VentilatorDevelopers groups.io thread /g/VentilatorDevelopers/topic/76205686#2215 No other country requires US approval to use a device. To claim that the FDA stopped India from using a device is silly. The FDA doesn't stop India or any other country from putting the design we worked on or any of the many other alternative ventilator designs into production. -- ? 73 ??? Bob? KD8CGH
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
Building a transceiver from scratch is indeed great fun. Soldering the components on, winding the toroids, aligning the IF, setting up the filters. Then testing it all for smoke, and seeing if it works.
It's even better if you have designed the circuit, perhaps from Doug DeMaw's design guides.
Even putting on the knobs and connectors on the ready-built UBitX is fun too and can give some sense of achievement too.
It's all good.
Some areas of our hobby do however almost preclude home construction to some extent. Also as people get older they may find they don't have the dexterity or eyesight they used to have. We also have a huge chunk of the community who rarely turn on a soldering iron (that's if they own one). There are also people who travel for a living, or have little space, and having a ready-made transceiver makes more sense. We all may have a reason to purchase a commercially made transceiver.
This talk will give us some idea of whether they really are as good as the money you pay for them.
Trystan G0KAY
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
Most of the features are just software codes. Your main transceiver can be really, really simple. Yet you could have a front panel crammed with buttons and knobs that connect the micro inside the radio. What takes money these days if the same thing that did cost an arm and a leg 20 years ago. Bandpass filters, crystal filters. Transmit bandpass filters of 100 watt range need high Q capacitors that can take 500v RF. If you have 3 section rx filter for each band, that translates to 33 coils (11 HF bands) plus 77 C0G capacitors. Add up the relays too. This is where a homebrewer can shine.? A two band transceiver that covers just your favourite bands (mine would be 40/20), has good rx and tx band pass filters, two? crystal filters for 3 khz and 300 hz, runs off a nice analog vfo from a scavnged slow motion drive will cost less than hundred dollars and a month to build. It will run circles around any commercial rig for 1/50th the money. - f
On Tue 27 Apr, 2021, 9:39 PM Don - KM4UDX, < dontay155@...> wrote: Reg -- we build stuff 'cause it is enormous fun.
Buying a complete radio is very cool if you want to move on quickly to the software (Fldigi, WSJT-X, logging, award tracking, etc etc) for example.? If your thrill comes from (say) building antennas or maybe the mysteries of HF propogation, then just buy a radio and get on to the stuff that floats your boat.?
In all these cases, the radio is just a means to an end.? So any radio having? YOUR required functions will do. After requirements are met, any radio will do -- they are interchangeable, if critical, links in the value chain.?
All of this suggests you are correct -- we use a small fraction of a modern rig's capability because the rig is a means to some other end -- the end that floats our boat.?
Also supporting your conjecture that we use a fraction of the radio's features, due to extraordinary feature richness and complexity, is the reality of computer control.? One can argue that we interact with radio-related software? 99% of the time, and push radio buttons/menu 1% or less.
All this gets (at last), to the point.? The joy of building, and associated simplicity, for many folks, swamps any bump from buying an endlessly feature rich and complex radio.?
So mostly all use only a few features on the radio, while we spend a majority of radio time interacting with software controlling the rig or supporting our interaction.? The implication here is that for many folks, there is scant value in a feature rich rig.?
If you follow this logic train, then building a simple rig has enormous potential for joy.? The satisfaction, the simplicity, the recognition of USB-based operation, all support building a simple rig.? Building a uBITX comes to mind, as well as the Simple SSB rig (aka KK4DAS, Dean's wonderful work).? And there are many many others.
If you think of a modern rig as a USB appliance, then you want it small and out of the way.? Your "rig" is the software on your computer.? ?A simple kit or "build" seems to fit the bill.
|
Re: Homemade Circuit Boards
They look great. If anything, the local hams will be convinced that you really made if yourself ! I collect cellphones. In my collection are prototypes rhat never made to production. How can I prove it? The phones dont have in-build batteries! - f
On Tue 27 Apr, 2021, 9:30 PM Gerard, < kabupos@...> wrote: Hello,
As promised, I made today my 6 adapters to correct the error on my PCB.
You will tell me, why 6, the ubitx has only 5.
As it is a personal fabrication, I added a relay that allows me to have 12v in TX or RX depending on the output.
With this I think I will be able to drive other "gadgets" (?)
?agree, the transfer method only allows simple circuits.?Also, it¡¯s very difficult to centre if you¡¯re double-sided.
I admit that I had to repeat myself several times for my first prototype.
Look at the PCB "made in China", (without puplicity) and for a paltry price.
Double-sided, tiny holes, varnish, silkscreen and no track defects.
cdt
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
Reg -- we build stuff 'cause it is enormous fun.
Buying a complete radio is very cool if you want to move on quickly to the software (Fldigi, WSJT-X, logging, award tracking, etc etc) for example.? If your thrill comes from (say) building antennas or maybe the mysteries of HF propogation, then just buy a radio and get on to the stuff that floats your boat.?
In all these cases, the radio is just a means to an end.? So any radio having? YOUR required functions will do. After requirements are met, any radio will do -- they are interchangeable, if critical, links in the value chain.?
All of this suggests you are correct -- we use a small fraction of a modern rig's capability because the rig is a means to some other end -- the end that floats our boat.?
Also supporting your conjecture that we use a fraction of the radio's features, due to extraordinary feature richness and complexity, is the reality of computer control.? One can argue that we interact with radio-related software? 99% of the time, and push radio buttons/menu 1% or less.
All this gets (at last), to the point.? The joy of building, and associated simplicity, for many folks, swamps any bump from buying an endlessly feature rich and complex radio.?
So mostly all use only a few features on the radio, while we spend a majority of radio time interacting with software controlling the rig or supporting our interaction.? The implication here is that for many folks, there is scant value in a feature rich rig.?
If you follow this logic train, then building a simple rig has enormous potential for joy.? The satisfaction, the simplicity, the recognition of USB-based operation, all support building a simple rig.? Building a uBITX comes to mind, as well as the Simple SSB rig (aka KK4DAS, Dean's wonderful work).? And there are many many others.
If you think of a modern rig as a USB appliance, then you want it small and out of the way.? Your "rig" is the software on your computer.? ?A simple kit or "build" seems to fit the bill.
|
Re: Homemade Circuit Boards
Hello,
As promised, I made today my 6 adapters to correct the error on my PCB.
You will tell me, why 6, the ubitx has only 5.
As it is a personal fabrication, I added a relay that allows me to have 12v in TX or RX depending on the output.
With this I think I will be able to drive other "gadgets" (?)
?agree, the transfer method only allows simple circuits.?Also, it¡¯s very difficult to centre if you¡¯re double-sided.
I admit that I had to repeat myself several times for my first prototype.
Look at the PCB "made in China", (without puplicity) and for a paltry price.
Double-sided, tiny holes, varnish, silkscreen and no track defects.
cdt
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
Roger, China and India have been inches away from nuclear war for decades. I would hope that China would take the high roar with COVID relief for India.
I also wish we had responded sooner, but this India COVID surge was so sudden, I don¡¯t think any nation could have done anything faster than what we¡¯re doing now.
That said, I am deeply disappointed that our FDA threw so many hurdles in front of Ashhar and colleagues after they¡¯d developed a cheap an functional ventilator.
For mostly political reasons. The ventilators were for offshore use so the FDA should have gone hands-off, ¡°use at your own risk.¡±
I rather enjoyed another poster¡¯s speculation about how many more people died than were saved by FDA meddling.
And I personally know a one-time Libertarian Presidential candidate who has a whole lot more to say about this issue... but this isn¡¯t the place. If you want to know, ask off-list.
73
Jim N6OTQ
Sent from my quenched-gap spark transmitter.
|
Re: Homemade Circuit Boards
To avoid the tiny pores, you could the Cold toner transfer process. The most interesting
variant of that uses Mosquito Repellent lotion -?
This instructables has more details to make the transfer solution using Ethyl Alcohol and
Acetone (Toluene or Xylene could be used too).
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
Best wishes to you and all India for a speedy recovery
On Mon, Apr 26, 2021 at 5:27 PM Ashhar Farhan < farhanbox@...> wrote: Peeps The situation has been very depressing. It could have been handled much much better. The second wave has hit some of the cities very badly. They are out of beds, oxygen, drugs and vaccines. We lost many hams as well. Bhogi, who was probably a quiet member of this forum, died last week as did slokapriya, who also ran . People seem to have given up on distancing and keeping indoors. It is a bizzare situation. HF signals is working skeletally. I am fully locked up along with my family at home. We are a large house with 9 people. We play board games, carroms, bridge, read to each other and i am working on the SDR.? My partner and the man dude of HF Signals, Ehsan, is just recovering from a mild bout of Covid. Others are doing good. Thanks for your concerns and we hope to see you all in the other side of this nightmare soon. Keep the solder burning, stay safe. Use science to fight this. 73, f.
The news from India has been on my mind as well, check out the graph at the top:
? ? ?
As the article suggests, the US could choose to better support other nations in this.
?
Jerry, KE7ER
On Mon, Apr 26, 2021 at 05:09 AM, Tom, wb6b wrote:
I see in the news that India is having a severe outbreak of Covid. Hope all is well for Ashhar and all our group members in India.
Tom, wb6b
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
Yes, best wishes and prayers for India and the whole world.?
I wonder if the author of the article ever thought that perhaps China should support other nations in this. Why is it when any other Country screws up, the USA is expected to come running in and fix it ?
Roger,? W8YN
|
Re: Talk: Does price buy Performance or Satisfaction in an HF Transceiver? by Frank Howell K4FMH
I look at the complexity of most modern rigs and wonder.... how many people use more than a few of the multiple facilities ?
Could the average person remember how most of the settings work without having to dig into the manual ?
Do they need most of the facilities offered ?
Then I look at the price and quickly look away again ! This is supposed to be a hobby not an opportunity to take out a second mortgage.
I have been looking at repair videos on YouTube ( hours of entertainment). It is amazing how something like a voltage regulator or leaking electrolytics take down a $1,000's transceiver. Some transceivers have known, common problems easy to fix but very expensive to get fixed unless you can do the repair yourself.
Making equipment brings pleasure, using it adds to the pleasure and you know enough to repair it if needed and you don't need a second mortgage.
Reg????????????????? G4NFR
|
Re: Homemade Circuit Boards
Hello,
Hello,
thank you for seeing that my Kicad design problem interested you.
I¡¯ll get you pictures of my adapters as soon as they¡¯re done.
For the manufacture of PCB, I use the transfer method for a simple pcb.
In the case of my manufacture, my pcb having double-sided holes of 0.6mm and very thin tracks, I have them made in China.
It¡¯s not very expensive.
I had found manufacturers here, they admitted to me that they make them also in China and charge twice the price!!
J'ai une tr¨¨s belle qualit¨¦
here see my first PCB made with transfert method
second PCB from China. there is no comparison possible.
cdt
|
Thanks for this link . I have started to study it and finds it can provide a wonderful uBitx with the choice of IARU regions, a faster answer to commands, keyboard and mouse control and many other improvements.?
73 - Pierre - FK8IH?
|
Gerry,
Yes, it's a great chip. I have one tuned to my 700Hz sidetone (lights an LED), so I know when I'm right on frequency with another station.
Trystan G0KAY
|
Re: Best wishes to our friends in India
I think it's less the Thalidomide situation than politics.? $200 is a lot cheaper than any other price I've heard/seen - a LOT cheaper. Enough so that when I heard about the paperwork... I was immediately suspicious.? It most definitely won't be the first time!
Lots of innocent lives lost in the last year (SIGH!).? I just hope we can save more lives today.
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
On 4/26/21 10:07 PM, Jack, W8TEE via groups.io wrote: For those who don't know, Farhan and Gordon Gibby did Herculean work to develop a working ventilator that could be produced for about $200. Then, the FDA stepped in with massive amounts of paper work and pretty much buried things under that paper mountain. Like Friedman once said, the FDA likely has killed more people than it saved because of its knee-jerk reaction to the Thalidomide drug in the 50's and the delays that resulted from it.
Jack, W8TEE
On Monday, April 26, 2021, 9:06:34 PM EDT, Robert D. Bowers <n4fbz@...> wrote:
I saw a little while ago that equipment to produce medical O2 is also
being sent.? That will make a big difference, and I'm tickled at the
doses being sent.
Ventilators, on the other hand, were being dumped - in Miami.? I hope
that stops and they're redistributed to the other countries that need
them.? The image I saw suggests that they should be salvageable (still
in boxes/cases and on pallets) - and they too save lives.
It looks like we're pulling together - and that makes me relieved. Those
that need help should get it.
Ashar, tell everyone you can that we're pulling for you all!
On 4/26/21 6:50 PM, Bill Cromwell wrote:
Hi,
The U.S. is sending about 50 or 60 million doses of the vaccine, an
unspecified amount of oxygen, and personal protective gear to India. I
didn't catch all of what they said on the news. On one of my military
newsfeeds I saw that Mexico is sending materials to help India with
the covid, too. The cavalry is mounting up.
My best wishes and prayers for everybody over there.
Bill KU8H
bark less - wag more
On 4/26/21 3:40 PM, Arv Evans wrote:
Farhan
Got my second Covid shot last week.
News in the US says that Biden is sending our stock of AstraZeneca
vaccine
to India.? Not sure when though.
Please be careful.? We are waiting for that SDR rig.
Arv
_._
On Mon, Apr 26, 2021 at 11:42 AM Ashhar Farhan <farhanbox@... <mailto:farhanbox@...>
<mailto:farhanbox@... <mailto:farhanbox@...>>> wrote:
??? thanks all, i wish there was a hack that could fix it. some of us
??? here even tried. i worked with a few really fabulous? hams to
??? develop an open source ventilator project that got jammed in some
??? red-tape. the ventilators are moot right now. what we needed was
??? to have everyone vaccinated well in time. we wasted it on petty
??? politicking and haggling away. the vaccine manufacturers were give
??? a very raw deal and they had to wind down their capacity at a time
??? like this. anyway, this is not a forum for this discussion.
??? The interesting part is the science of it. Very very few of those
??? vaccinated caught the second wave. those that did, (like over
??? ex-prime minister Man Mohan Singh who is 88 years old and has had
??? a heart infarct a few months ago), survived with very mild
??? disease. so look at the data coming out in the Nature, the Lancet,
??? etc. and decide for yourselves. Much like we read the datasheets
??? of our devices. it is not different at all. It is even fun!
??? - f
??? On Mon, Apr 26, 2021 at 10:19 PM Jack, W8TEE via groups.io
??? < <>>
<jjpurdum@... <mailto:[email protected]>
??? <mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>> wrote:
??????? Farhan:
??????? Know that you and the others are in our thoughts and prayers.
??????? 73,
??????? Jack, W8TEE
??????? On Monday, April 26, 2021, 11:27:37 AM EDT, Ashhar Farhan
??????? <farhanbox@... <mailto:farhanbox@...>
<mailto:farhanbox@... <mailto:farhanbox@...>>> wrote:
??????? Peeps
??????? The situation has been very depressing. It could have been
??????? handled much much better. The second wave has hit some of the
??????? cities very badly. They are out of beds, oxygen, drugs and
??????? vaccines.
??????? We lost many hams as well. Bhogi, who was probably a quiet
??????? member of this forum, died last week as did slokapriya, who
??????? also ran radiojitter.com <
<>>.
??????? People seem to have given up on distancing and keeping
??????? indoors. It is a bizzare situation.
??????? HF signals is working skeletally. I am fully locked up along
??????? with my family at home. We are a large house with 9 people. We
??????? play board games, carroms, bridge, read to each other and i am
??????? working on the SDR.
??????? My partner and the man dude of HF Signals, Ehsan, is just
??????? recovering from a mild bout of Covid. Others are doing good.
??????? Thanks for your concerns and we hope to see you all in the
??????? other side of this nightmare soon.
??????? Keep the solder burning, stay safe. Use science to fight this.
??????? 73, f.
??????? On Mon 26 Apr, 2021, 7:48 PM Jerry Gaffke via groups.io
??????? < <>>,
<jgaffke@... <mailto:[email protected]>
??????? <mailto:[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>>
wrote:
??????????? The news from India has been on my mind as well, check out
??????????? the graph at the top:
<>
< <>>
??????????? As the article suggests, the US could choose to better
??????????? support other nations in this.
??????????? Jerry, KE7ER
??????????? On Mon, Apr 26, 2021 at 05:09 AM, Tom, wb6b wrote:
??????????????? I see in the news that India is having a severe
??????????????? outbreak of Covid. Hope all is well for Ashhar and all
??????????????? our group members in India.
??????????????? Tom, wb6b
??????? -- ??????? Jack, W8TEE
--
Jack, W8TEE
|
Hello Bob,
Your order is ready for shipping and will be done so in the next couple of days. We will inform you via a private mail the dispatch details. It usually takes between 5 to 10 days once dispatched with many even having received it? on the 3rd day.
Thanks and Regards,
Thomas
On Tue, 27 Apr 2021 at 02:20, < kk0mg@...> wrote: Hi, All,
Just wondering...From the time you ordered the uBITX, how much time elapsed until you received the package?? Were you sent tracking information?
I didn't find a place on the website to add the funding for faster shipping, so I figured I could wait.? I certainly and not lacking things to do!? Hi.
If anyone could enlighten me, I would appreciate it.
TNX & 73,
Bob
KK0MG
Pisek, North Dakota.
--
--
Support@...
|
Bob Benedict, KD8CGH
Trystan G0KAY
Gerard
