Radio Homebrew
RM-1: My First Homebrew Radio
A while back, I earned my General class ham radio license (KB3RRM). I don’t have a rig yet, so my ability to use my newly-bestowed privileges is severely limited. I’ve built a small 40-meter receiver from a kit (detailed below), but that is the extent of my HF radio capability.
After looking at a number of radios, both commercial and home built, I have decided that I would get the most enjoyment out of building a radio myself, from scratch. I have a number of reasons, but the two most important for me are:
- Learning Experience
- Satisfaction of Building a Radio
- Technology Options
I could follow the schematics and plans from another ham, but I wouldn’t learn as much by doing that. I don’t want to disparage other home-built projects, but I will have to learn much, much more through the design process than I would through simply copying a design or building from a kit.
A problem I’ve found on the internet is a lack of critical information about projects. While I can easily learn high-level concepts through other websites, information detailing the details of circuit design are a bit harder to find. Often, the website’s author is an engineer and assumes that much of the detail is already known to the reader. It may be that the author’s purpose for writing isn’t really to share the detail but to provide an overview of what he has built. Regardless, it is a challenge for me when I’m researching the project.
I’m also a big fan of simply building a project from scratch. I’ve been tinkering with electronics since I was young, and very little about the modern state of technology intimidates me. There are a number of electronics skills I do not have yet, and a number of tools that I still need to be able to build a radio of the quality I want, but these are not obstacles for me. Rather, I look at these challenges and see a chance to learn about something I find extremely fascinating.
Another major aspect of my decision to build my own radio is the technology I would like to implement into my receiver. Most of the home built units I see online are made from all-analog components. While this is certainly very interesting and effective, it is not the challenge I want to overcome. I’m interested in seeing just how small a radio I can build. I’m interested in all-digital controls and the ability to interface the unit with my computer. To accomplish this, I will not only need to draw upon my existing knowledge of software and embedded controller systems, but I will also need to acquire a new set of design and development skills in order to build a quality rig.
More likely than not, I’ll probably spin the development process for my radio off onto another blog, mostly for organizational purposes. I’m hoping to open my design process to the outside world, especially to others that may be interested in a similar rig or those thinking about building a radio of their own inspiration and ideas on how to accomplish their goal.
If you have any questions about my project, or if you have some sage advice to offer, please feel free to contact me. Advice would be best shared as a comment on this page.
Ten-Tec 1056: My First HF Receiver Kit
As I mentioned above, my first foray into the world of HF radio was a small, simple 40 metre rig made by Ten-Tec. It is a direct conversion kit, easy to build. The sound quality is decent, but it is a bit drifty
My biggest complaint with using that radio comes not from Ten-Tec but from where I live. I live in an apartment near a number of high-power radio and television transmitters. There is radio noise, broadcast interference, and other electrical problems that are all translated to the radio. I have been able to overcome some of these shortfalls thus far, but one, namely NBC4′s television transmitter, persists. On the one hand, I’d like to try to filter out their transmitter somehow, but on the other, I don’t really care. The digital television conversion, slated to occur on 17 February 2009, will eliminate that source of interference, and I should be able to use that radio again.
I’ll post pictures here soon.
