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Do It Yourself Projects #1
Posted 01 Nov 2003
Updated 15 Oct 2004
Here are some of the "Best of the Best" Projects and "How-To" Pages I've wandered upon in my treks across the Net.
Electronics Basics
Radio Terminology - learn the basics, learn what's what! get a basic understanding of all the major terms used in ham radio and electronics
Basic Electronic Units - learn the basics of those important components Inductance, Capacitance and Resistance
Radio Basics - learn the basics at the necessary level to follow the later advanced topics. Begin to understand LC, reactance, impedance, even Q and other important basic concepts. Includes a great Javascript LC calculator written to work out L or C from resonant frequency!
Resistor color code - yes the much sought after color code chart.
Component Database Server - Visual Identification of components including utilities to identify component part numbers.
Antennas
5/4 Wave 2 Meter Antenna
70cm Collinear Antenna From Coax
Home Brew A 4 To 1 Balun
Copper pipe dipole antenna construction for 2 Meters
Diamond F23 Antenna Defect -
Guy Anchors
J-pole Antenna
Lightning - Porcupine Static Discharger
Portable wire antenna
Rotator Brake Delay and Protection Circuit
Rotator Connector Replacement
Tower Tips from N1LO
Coax - Some common coaxial cable data
Multiband Cubical Quad
Hexagonal Beam in 3 hours
80/40m Vertical
Cushcraft R5/R7 Maintenance and Repair
Antennae for the Low Bands, 80 and 160m
A Ball hitch Mobile mount
Crank-up Tilt-over Tower
Remote Antenna Switching
Automatic Band Decoders
Troubleshooting Traps
Automatic or Manual Band Decoder for 6 to 160 Meters
The WINDOM - My Favorite Multi-Band Antenna
A six-band, HF Windom antenna
NVIS: Near Vertical Incidence Skywave
The COPPER CACTUS Antenna
Super Linear-Loaded Inverted V
The Stacked J-Pole
Quickie Vertical
2 Meter Halo
2 Meter PVC Colinear
Field Day Emergency 2 Meter Half Wave Colinear
5/8th Wave Stacked J-Pole
2 Meter Half Wave J-Pole
Pocket J-Pole Antenna for 2 Meters
HF Antenna Designs
HF Mobile Antenna
Magnetic Loop Antenna - Mag-Loop, Small Transmitting Loop
Duplexer (Diplexer) 2m / 70cm
Duplexer (Diplexer) HF + 6m / 2m + 70 cm
Coax Cable Data
Coax Cable Data - (vhf/uhf/shf)
Wire Gauge Conversion Table
Clear PACTOR - Adapterbox
Spider Beam - Tribander yagi for 20/15/10m, made of fiberglass and wire.
Multiband Fan Dipole
40 meter Stealth Vertical
RF safety calculator
Antennas, some rules of thumb for beginners - Every now and then beginners, afraid of making the wrong choice, ask for antenna suggestions.
Passive Antenna Re-radiators - Again in response to some considerable interest I have posted some project ideas for receiving difficulties for you to construct passive antenna re-radiators or "sort" of Q multipliers.
Active Receiving Antennas - a discussion on some of the principles and justifications behind the design of active receiving antennas for radio projects.
Balun design - an electronic tutorial discussing baluns
Amplifiers
Audio Speech Processor
Transistor Audio Amplifiers
Home Brew A Condenser Mike
IC Audio Amplifiers
Amplifier design - Part 1 - learn how to design both a.c. amplifiers and r.f. amplifiers
Amplifier design - Part 2 - amplifiers using emitter degeneration
Amplifier design - Part 3 - amplifiers using emitter degeneration AND feedback
Buffer Amplifier design - to buffer low level stages before succeeding amplification
Small Signal Amplifier design - to follow the buffered low level stages before power amplification
Double Balanced Mixer design - an electronic tutorial on double balanced mixers
Designing Bipolar Transistor Audio PreAmps
Designing JFET Transistor Audio PreAmps
Designing Op Amp IC Audio PreAmps
Filters
L.C. Filter design - a comprehensive electronic tutorial for everybody into ham radio or the electronic hobbyist
High pass LC filter design - learn how to design high pass LC filters - Part 1
Low pass filter design - the basis of many other filters
Band pass filters for many purposes
Multi-pole narrow band pass filters
I.F. Amplifier filters as designed in the olden days
Power Supplies
Discrete Component Voltage Regulator
12 Volt Gel Cell Charger
10 Amp, 13.8 Volt Power Supply
Beef up Voltage Regulators
Rechargable CMOS Battery
Adjustable Voltage Regulator
Battery Charger in an XT power supply box
Trickle Charge Circuit for Deep Cycle Batteries
PowerPole - The STANDARD 12 volt connector
Astron Power Supply Meter Modifications - analog meters replaced with digital panel meters.
A Power Supply Dummy Load - Made from brake lamps
Power Supply - 1 - a tutorial on the basics of designing simple power supplies for radio projects.
Power Supply - 2 - regulation of power supply voltages.
Power Supply - 3 - designing with solid state regulators as well as using higher current regulators.
Power Supply - 4 - a bench variable voltage power supply project for you to construct at home.
Switching Regulator Basics
Using Transistors As Switches
RDF
RDF2 - 2 Element Sniffer Beam with Tape Measure Elements
Tape Measure 3 Element Yagi - RDF Optimized Beam
VK3ZPF PROJECTS INDEX
2m Quad Construction Instructions
Tape Measure 3 Element Yagi - RDF Optimized Beam
RDF2 - 2 Element Sniffer Beam with Tape Measure Elements
Passive Attenuator - easy for beginners
Active Attenuator - Slightly more complex than the passive attenuator.
555 Time-Difference-Of-Arrival RDF UNIT - Minimum T.D.O.A. Circuit.
SIMPLE Time-Difference-Of-Arrival RDF UNIT - A center scale meter shows which way to transmitter.
The FOX TIMER - travel alarm used to control 250 milliwatt transmitter.
FOXBOX Transmitter Controller
THE FOX - two transistor 40 milliwatt fox transmitter
THE FOX-750 - three transistor 750 milliwatt fox transmitter
Radio Direction Finding Projects
Receivers
100Khz Crystal Calibrator
Simple Electronic S-Meter
Variable Bandwidth CW Filter
Radio Receivers - the fundamentals of radio receivers
A.M. Radio design - the basics of a.m. radio design Part 1
A.M. Radio design - the basics of a.m. radio design Part 2
F.M. Radio design - the basics of f.m radio design Part 1
F.M. Radio design - the basics of f.m radio design Part 2
A basic old time crystal radio set - basic crystal radio set but includes a lot of design information
A reflex radio receiver circuit - out of fashion now but here are the principles, design information and schematics
Radio Telescope - In response to some considerable interest I have posted a project for you to construct a 30 Mhz radio telescope.
Use LEDs to Replace Bulbs for LCD Backlight
Multimode Interface Info
Transmitters
Basic VOX Circuit
PL Tone Encoder Board
Improved PL Tone Encoder
40 Meter, 5 Watt QRP Transmitter
80 Meter, 5 Watt CW Transceiver
CW Tone Keyer
Easy Morse Code Keyer
Easy FM Keyer
Simple Electronic Keyer
Thermal Fan Controller
GE Mastr II Mods
Design of RF Oscillators - a discussion on some of the principles and justifications behind the RF design and construction of radio frequency oscillators
Design of Voltage Controlled Oscillators - a discussion on some of the principles and justifications behind the design of voltage controlled oscillators or VCO's.
Design of Crystal Oscillators - a discussion on some of the principles behind the design of crystal oscillators or VXCO's.
Test Equipment
Field Strength Meter
Bird 43 Wattmeter - pages from the manual
LC Meter Project and Kit - Now you can easily build a quality inductance and capacitance meter (LC meter project). Ideal for any serious constructor - designed by Neil Hecht of AADE.
Square Wave Signal Generator - Build a basic first class electronic hobbyist test instrument - ideal for trouble shooting. Includes a how to use guide. Excellent beginner project to start your collection of amateur-radio-equipment.
Links to More Projects
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