Thursday, Feb. 17, 2022
Last night I replaced my TS-520S that I’ve been using with the TS-520SE that has no transmit. No, the RF Fairies didn’t come and repair the problem as I had hoped; the radio was dead as a hammer in transmit mode.
Actually that’s not quite true. On another receiver, you could hear a decent signal being transmitted, albeit a low-level one. So that points to the driver or finals circuitry. Its enough for me to decide to sell it rather than spend more time working on it.
Today I received the Cinch Jones connector used for the DC supply for the Drake TR-7 I own. It was a rainy day today, and I decided to take time to cobble together a power cord and give the radio a go.
I’ve owned the TR-7 for years; I even acquired the matching external VFO for the radio. But until this evening, I never operated the radio.
Frankly, I wasn’t sure the radio would receive or transmit. It was a fantastic to see the lights and display come up when I hit the power switch.
All of the pots and switches were clean, though I had to download the owner’s manual to figure out what everything was.
The radio — unfortunately — doesn’t have the CW filter. The band was a little crowded this evening, and I only had the PBT – passband tuning — to help deal with QRM. It helped.
The power out was impressive; in fact, it stressed the alleged 35 amp power supply. At max output, the dial lamps dimmed. On another receiver, I could hear the signal shift frequency while the power supply grunted its disapproval. I cut the power back to about 60 watts to reduce the issue.
I have the original Drake power supply for the TR-7; however, that thing is a HOSS and heavier than hell. I really don’t want to use it, but I believe it has enough capacity to power the Drake sufficiently.
My current 12v supply is one of those off-brand one. Its supposed to handle 35 amps, but anything over 22 amps seems to stress it out. I have several 35 watt Astron supplies.
I operated the Drake on CW using my Heath UltraPro 8999 CW keyboard. The Drake performed admirably and was on frequency.
I was also using the external VFO, which worked fine. I left the main VFO in 3927 and had the VFO on 3549, the net frequency.
On the NCS’s net report email tonight, Jerry mentioned that my signal sounded like I was operating a classic radio on the net. I was, but frankly, I’ve been using classic rigs for months. I’m not sure what gave the Drake away …. probably some chirp due to the power supply.
I’m going to try to find a Drake CW filter for the TR-7, but I know its going to be hard to find. There’s not one on QTH or eBay.
I’m tickled to death with the radio as it is. I’ve about decided to sell the TS-520SE and the VFO 520 I’ve been using. I just bought a later VFO 520 that matches the TS-520S. I’ve just about decided that I want to sell the Kenwood TS-530S that I own.
OTHER GEAR TO TRY OUT. I still have gear boxed up that I want to use in the shacks sometime. I have an HQ-170 receiver and a Knight T-150 transmitter to run as a combo. I also have a Heathkit HW-16 I want to couple with the Heathkit VFO. And of course, I have my Hallicrafters SR-400 station, which I’ve not used yet on CW.
MORE BULLDOZING AHEAD. My wife wants us to spend time moving more of my shack furniture and gear upstairs so she can have my old shack for the sewing room she wants to have. When the weather warms up, she says I’ll probably be out in the garage every minute I can, and that’s probably the truth. This weekend, we’re going to clear the floor and clear off one of my 4-foot tables and move as much as we can upstairs. Wish us luck, lol!
I’m waiting to hear back from the NCS as to what signal quality (or lack of) gave away that I was using a classic rig. More on that later!
73 es CUL … de KY4Z …. SK SK …. (dit dit) …
POST SCRIPT. I got a note from the NCS this morning who said he enjoyed hearing the TR-7 on the net as it was “happily chirping away” … HI HI. When I was transmitting, I could see the dial lamps dim considerably, so I’m thinking the Pyramid (or whatever cheap-ass power supply I’m running) is lacking some “oomph.” Maybe night I’ll haul the PS-7 upstairs and see if it chirps.
The Pyramid is supposedly a 35 amp supply, but rigs rated at 22 amp at full power have loaded it down more than I think it should. Perhaps 35 amps is the “only on a good day” rating. Hrmmph!