Wednesday 26 June 2013

Old and New

Spent an almost pleasant couple of hours salvaging components from junk equipment this morning. Mostly the usual suspects - electrolytics, small transistors etc, but since the big beast im dismantling is an old analogue TV transmitter, theres some real nice RF components as well coming out, one board has a lot of small ferrite binocular cores, and several nice Toko coils. Sadly, most of the really nice parts are very well soldered to the groundplane, through hole plated, and surrounded by masses of SMT parts. I really think I need a bigger rated soldering iron for taking these off. I did try with the heat gun, but its not precise enough and just torches the boards.

Whilst out doing this, I missed the post lady, and one coming back into the house found that a much sought after parcel from Graham G3MFJ had arrived - G-QRP club parts! A sexy collection of toroids and Spectrum coils (modern Toko 10K), some needed semiconductors, and of course - the crystals! I can now not only carry on with the 4m transverter, but can start the WSPR 10m transceiver as well!

The only parts im desperate for, sadly Graham doesnt stock - trimmer capacitors!

Oh well, still a few in the junk boxes, and theres a rally in the not too distant future...

Off now to cook up some Frankfurters, shrooms, onions and cheese. Mmmmmm

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