I took a look at extracting the meter (on it's bracket) from the radio. Sadly, it seems this is not possible without first removing the front panel. That's more work than I want to do at this stage.
On the plus side, I now have the analogue dial '301 working well on RX and TX. I did a major glue job on the thin, SRBP spacer that indexes the pins on the rear of the six-pin 'Tocon' (Miniature Jones-like) connector on the booster. The pin spacing and orientation of the Tocon is not the same as a Jones. I took measurements of the spacer as, if my glue job fails at some point in the future, I will have a go at making a replacement out of some 1.6 mm thick fibreglass board, with slot and hole cutting using a Dremel, or similar.
The '301 produces 100 W+ PEP of SSB on all bands. The stock Yaesu hand mic didn't sound great, so I substituted a Shure 444T and got improved reports. I did have to move the carrier crystals a little to optimise make the best of the (slightly narrow for my tastes for rag-chewing) filter bandwidth. PA bias sounds OK. The RF processor works well - just like I remember the one in my FT-101E. The VFO is incredibly stable.
There's still a way to go fixing up this old rig - the meter; lack of power out on CW; full alignment; making an adaptor so it will key my linear; and possibly more - but I like 'rolling restorations'. What it has shown already is that the results will justify the time spent. When I run out of electronic work to do on it, I might just attempt to give it a fresh coat of paint, something I have never tried.
Regards to all in the group,
Mark, G4FPH.
