Class d or e transmitter

[ve6pg]

..my k7dyy is on 160...never had a problem...very reliable...325 watts carrier, runs all day...the only change i would like to see, is provision for a vfo...it draws 5 amps on tx, barely gets warm....my point was, whenever i talk with a class E  guy, they start slagging the rig, without any delay...i've had the tx for 2 years, and it has never let me down...i think, that says alot...

..sk..

[K6IC]

and i cant understand why these class E  guys keep wanting to trash it...

..tim..

..sk..

Well,  Tim,  I did try to be very gentle in making my remarks ...

Know of three DYY rigs.  Three of them HAVE had problems.  The most recent one had been back for repair several times that I know of.  Finally,  the buyer of that rig bailed out of it.  (dunno know the exact details)

Rigs can and do fail.  For the DYY rigs,  Bruce has more responsibility in the reliability of the SRs that he builds,  as he BUILDS them.

EDIT:  Hi Tim,  UR post arrived as I was doing this one ... Thanks for the clarifiation -- thought that U were referring to my previous DYY comments as "trashing" --

Regarding the QIX design,  it is just that,  a design.  Others,  usually the user,  builds it.  We can make make a number of errors in our implementation of the design,  but it does appear to be robust.

I do not think that what I have said is trashing K7DYY,  his design,  or its implementation.  I am delighted that you and a number of others have had such success with the DYY rigs.  I do think that a VFO could be used with the DYY rig,  but one would need to gate it off,  as it seems to be a primary control element,  as I recall.

Have Fun !!     73,  C U on AM     Vic

[steve_qix]

..my k7dyy is on 160...never had a problem...very reliable...325 watts carrier, runs all day...the only change i would like to see, is provision for a vfo...it draws 5 amps on tx, barely gets warm....my point was, whenever i talk with a class E  guy, they start slagging the rig, without any delay...i've had the tx for 2 years, and it has never let me down...i think, that says alot...

..sk..

Hi Tim, I've talked with you on 160 with the rig, and as I recall, your DYY rig sounded fine 

Any technical talk here or on the air with respect to quality, reliability, etc. is not meant to trash any particular transmitter or design.  These are just technical facts, measurements, etc.  We do this sort of thing all the time; I do it with my own designs if they are found to be wanting !   Anyway, I don't think anyone meant any offense - certainly none from this end over here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We might get a bit punchy about the tube vs solid state thing, but no harm there... just boys being boys     All of this technical bantering will indeed improve the state of the "art", so to speak - and that's a good thing.  Heck, if we couldn't build and design new transmitters, what would we do 

The DYY rigs are out there as a real product just like the Rangers, Valients, B & W 5100s, rice boxes, etc... and there is generally talk at some time or another about the various problems in all of these rigs.  They all have something and we seem to like to banty it about!  Even the flex 5000, which I think is a pretty perfect radio, has its issues.

Heck, my company built the AMM-HF1 modulation monitor, and we immediately got requests for new features (which may be incorporated into a future version of the product!).  One thing about that, we never got any returns on the mod monitors which is pretty good in my book, and every customer we talked with loves the product.  But, the monitor went through a 3 year testing cycle before it was released - a bit overkill I admit, but as I said, I'm a bit anal about equipment failures 

Everyone on 160 before the static comes in !  :-)

Regards,

Steve

[Steve - WB3HUZ]

All kidding aside, my hat off to anyone trying to sell a product in the amateur radio market. Finding the right quality/reliability versus cost/profit point has to be tough. Anyone can make a very high quality, very high reliability product, as high long as cost isn't much of a factor. That's why I never got all the slobbering over Collins engineering. Sure their stuff was good, but it cost way most than most other amateur radio gear. I find the Hallicrafters engineering more amazing. They made some good stuff without the price being ridiculous.

[KF1Z]

You're right Steve..HUZ..

Any product out there that is manufactured for such a small market, is expensive.
(NOT including stuff from big manufacturers that is)

One of the biggest problems facing anyone who wants to market equipment, is having the financial backing or resources to purchase large enough quantities of parts to keep the price of the product ""within reason".

And then, if you want to make a complete transmitter and market it, you need an FCC tag to put on it.
(just need to leave out a couple minor items to get around that)   

[K1JJ]

One of the biggest problems facing anyone who wants to market equipment, is having the financial backing or resources to purchase large enough quantities of parts to keep the price of the product ""within reason".

Bruce,

Ain't that the truth.

It's difficult making a go of it in most any manufacturing environment, never mind catering to frugal hams in a very limited specialty market.

One of the true success stories is MFJ.  The founder of that company has been doing it since at least 1978 and continues to come out with new accessories on a regular basis.  Their MFJ-259B antenna analyzer was pure genius. Even I bought one... :-)  Despite the quality issue with MFJ, ya gotta hand it to him for his pricing and marketing skills.... and recent acquistions.

Good luck to you, Steve/QIX, DYY and anyone else trying to make a difference in the AM ham market. 


Tom, K1JJ

[n1ps]

Don't know about DYY, but safe to say Steve QIX is not in this for the dollars .  His motivation is the (AM) hobby and that is 'nuf said.  Probably true for DYY too.

The E rigs are challenging to build, never mind design. They are difficult to get "right" and the technology is akin to nuclear versus hydro in the sense that the theories are completly different.  But the results are the same.  I have let the smoke out on a number of occasions...but we won't dwell on that  ...the point is these radios are fixable and easy to troubleshoot.  Same can be said of the hollow state homebrews.  I like the homebrew solid state versions...lower B+ 

Next we need to think about an E rig for the car.  A pleasant thought to think I can light up the dashboard of the car next to me on Rt 128, especially a Prius.  But that's another subject. 

~ps

[WA1GFZ]

Layout is very critical in a good solid state rig. A poor layout brings early crap outs.
I just stripped out my first class D final and laughed at myself as I snipped it apart. What a crap layout. TO3 FETs IRF250s on 75 meters. big buck FETs in 1983.