by sidspop » Mon Oct 15, 2018 4:56 am
Any of you lot do any repairs on radios?
I have been fixing them for 35 odd years, since I was at school. Started on CBs at the height of the craze, and nowadays I am one of the few left in my area that dabble. I will have a go at anything within reason, up to a point.
I very rarely repair anything nowadays 27Mhz FM, unless it is a simple fix. If it costs more than 15 quid it's more cost effective to bin it, as customers will not pay 15 quid on a 20 quid radio.
I do however repair some older amateur stuff, the big boys will not touch older stuff due to parts availability and warranty for old age. A lot of the more modern gear can be daunting, due to size of components, (referred to as "bits of flea shit") but with care can be done. It's just a problem when multi-legged devices go wrong!
Quite often I have been known to apply lateral thinking, such as stripping and rebuilding encoders rather than replace. I recently repaired an Icom 775 with NLA display fault, by using some chinese LED strip.
So does anybody else perform open heart surgery on their radios?
Also, I am looking for a cheap frequency standard to calibrate my counters. I cannot afford a rubidium clock, so would welcome any suggestions, but not involving Arduino stuff.
Toodlepip
Any of you lot do any repairs on radios?
I have been fixing them for 35 odd years, since I was at school. Started on CBs at the height of the craze, and nowadays I am one of the few left in my area that dabble. I will have a go at anything within reason, up to a point.
I very rarely repair anything nowadays 27Mhz FM, unless it is a simple fix. If it costs more than 15 quid it's more cost effective to bin it, as customers will not pay 15 quid on a 20 quid radio.
I do however repair some older amateur stuff, the big boys will not touch older stuff due to parts availability and warranty for old age. A lot of the more modern gear can be daunting, due to size of components, (referred to as "bits of flea shit") but with care can be done. It's just a problem when multi-legged devices go wrong!
Quite often I have been known to apply lateral thinking, such as stripping and rebuilding encoders rather than replace. I recently repaired an Icom 775 with NLA display fault, by using some chinese LED strip.
So does anybody else perform open heart surgery on their radios?
Also, I am looking for a cheap frequency standard to calibrate my counters. I cannot afford a rubidium clock, so would welcome any suggestions, but not involving Arduino stuff.
Toodlepip