thehxfiles

 Hello and welcome to 030 of the HX files.

In this issue I would like to talk about some of the “few” parts bought at the Friedrichshafen Rally in June.

In photo 1 bellow,

you can see some of the leads and parts purchased, in the picture you maybe able to make out a couple of small monitors, various leads, fittings, and a couple of RF amplifiers.  Not in the photograph are a couple of transmitters, receivers, and a couple of aerials that were bought for some future projects. Some of the leads and fittings will be used to replace the ones taken out of other units not being used at the time, and the rest for stock. It may look like a lot, but when you take in to account the parts and modules used in a project, such as the transmitter, receiver, amplifier, preamp, relays, coaxial leads and aerial to be used, and the fact they all have to be joined together, it is a wonder any RF gets out at all, and you would be left wondering

where did all the leads that were bought go to.

Ouch

On the subject of fittings and RF, in photo 2 above, you can see some fittings, some of the connectors go as high as 24ghz, they are not exactly falling out of my hand and this lot had not a lot of change out of €120. As with any radio rally those of you who have attended rallies over the years would get to know the various sellers selling equipment and also other traders and buyers who have dealt with them. The fact that some of them have been in the business of designing and manufacturing for years, and take pride in showing their equipment is 100%, they would have the spec sheets of their products for you to inspect, some even go to the bother of bringing some test equipment to show the buyer the equipment running before you buy, even more important some of the traders would let you know the ones that whose claims of their equipment would not live up to what is stated on the label.

Bargain?

 Prices can vary quite a bit as some items can have less of a demand in one country than another, and as a result you could buy well from one trader and in the next row of stalls see the same quality of gear from someone else a lot dearer/cheaper than the last trader, so when you have bought your parts for a steal, stop looking for them at other stalls to see how well you done as you will feel like you were robbed if you see them cheaper. The cheaper parts may just be that, cheaper, or be a cheap brand that may not be up to the spec you need and all that lovely RF will go any where but to the aerial.

 In photos 3 and 4 above, you can see a couple of the amplifiers bought at the rally, one is for 5.7GHz and the other is for 10GHZ .

Below in photo 5 shows some more fittings.

The worst part of this rally is not having my own car with me, and seeing plenty that would fit nicely in the boot, not only the various new pieces of equipment, but the “scrap parts”. One piece of equipment bought was a repeater that could be modified for 10 GHz, these pieces of equipment weighed a few kilos more than my total allowance on the aeroplane, I would have loved to have brought a couple of the units home with me, not only was the enclosure a nice size but was meant as a mast mounted unit and was waterproofed and it only had the wave guide connector and a small multi plug for the dc connections. Inside the unit, other than the TX/RX equipment, there where some lovely fittings and brackets to be had, but as this item was purchased on our last day at the rally we knew that the limits of our allowance was getting close and something had to be left behind, as the extra charge would have cost 5 times the amount paid for them, so knowing some of the traders I got a loan of some tools and the parts wanted removed, and in these recycling times, the metal container and other parts where given back to the trader to sell to someone else, he was so happy to take them back he said that we could have some of his other stock, as the container was a seller on its own and it saved him the grief to disassemble it. As you know quality cost but I wished it didn't cost that much, cheaper fittings and connectors could have being bought but they would have being no good at the frequencies I wanted them for, and as mentioned earlier the need to get as much of the RF out of the equipment as possible and into the aerial, as one of the high power transmitters(or should that be QRPP) bought can push out nearly 100mw and so some high end connections (and a amplifier) will be used on this project that would be a permanent outdoor unit, now where can I get a professional waterproof enclosure to house everything and keep it dry and safe, (ah feck).  

That’s it for this issue of Echo Ireland.

May your signals be P5.

73

Pat.