low cost 10 meter rig

[Frank Gentges]

At the Timonium hamfest, there was a fellow with a stack of used Cobra 
CB sets.  He must have had around 100 of them, all pretty much the same. 
  I  bought 2 of them for $20 each to put in my car and van to monitor 
CB when the driving got bogged down and I wanted to find out why.  Both 
work fine.

A web site has gobs of information on these Cobra sets with manuals and 
schematics etc.  We are speculating about how the frequency range could 
be changed to cover 29.000 MHz as channel 1 and put the rest of the 40 
channels on up.  If we can modify these with the addition of an 
oscillator at 12.275 MHz and retuning the first IF frequency, front end 
and PA they might prove useful.  Of course they would be AM and not 
sideband.

Unfortunately, I do not recall who the seller was but I think he shows 
up at other local hamfests.

The web site includes the Cobra Documentation Project at

http://www.cbtricks.com/radios/cobra/29ltd_29ltd_st_29wx_st/index.htm

Lots to look at and think about 10 meter conversion.  If we can come up 
with a simple conversion, there are lots of these radios to apply the 
conversion to.   I think this could be a fun conversion for the younger 
hams. They could become a modern day command set type project.

A potential downside is that our young hams just use them as is on CB 
and join up with the good buddies and breaker one-nine.  I hope not.

Do we have any takers?

Frank K0BRA



On 7/6/2010 3:17 PM, wb4jfi wrote:
> I still have a Sears CB that was converted to 10M back in February 1978
> (Sandy took a group of us AMRADers on a 4WD tour of the various Sears
> stores in the DC area on GW birthday, during a heavy snow storm).
>
> You need to find the right crystals to move the synthesizers to 10M, and
> the rig will not cover all of 10M. Plus, the rig is still channelized,
> and it becomes difficult without a computer printout to do conversions
> between 10M frequencies and channels on the CB set. Drove me CRAZY!
> Let's see, 28.5MHz is channel 23 with the A switch flipped up, but
> 28.55MHz is totally different....
>
> I tried to fire mine up a couple years ago, when messing with Propnet,
> but found it much too difficult to work with, plus the 10M mod that it
> had did not even cover the Propnet frequency. That's when I bought the
> Rad Shak HTX-100. Life's too short...
>
> Maybe replacing the whole synth with a decent DDS would be a much better
> solution.
> Terry
>
>
> Dan Romanchik KB6NU wrote:
>> What about CB conversions? Wasn't that all the rage during the peak of
>> the last sunspot cycle? I still have a Maxon CB and KD1JV conversion
>> kit that I never got around to building.
>>
>> 73!
>>
>> Dan KB6NU
>> ----------------------------------------------------------
>> CW Geek, Ham Radio Instructor
>> Station Manager, WA2HOM at the Hands-On Museum (www.wa2hom.org)
>> Read my ham radio blog at http://www.kb6nu.com
>>
>>
>> On Jul 6, 2010, at Jul 6,9:33 AM, Robert E. Seastrom wrote:
>>> Bill Liles <lilesw at gmail.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> Folks, the new techs hams can use the old novice and tech HF spectrum.
>>>> I am trying to find a low cost way for these new hams to get onto 10
>>>> meter SSB. Does anyone have any ideas? There are some 10 meter kits
>>>> available but still expensive.
>>> The solution that comes immediately to mind is CB-inspired rigs from
>>> the likes of Ranger that weigh in at a bit under $300 street price.
>>> Not QRO, and not cheap compared to a 2m only mobile, but they'll get
>>> you on 10 and 12m for a budget price.
>>>
>>> http://www.bigrigcbradio.com/rci_2950dx.html
>>>
>>>> Most of the high school students I run into have computers. Is there
>>>> a cheap SDR option of using their computer for most of the processing?
>>> Not sure that this is necessarily cheaper, all-in, and in any event
>>> it's generally QRP compared to "real rigs", and while that's fine for
>>> those of us who are up for a challenge, with the still dismal solar
>>> flux numbers we're seeing it would be even worse for sustaining
>>> interest than:
>>>
>>>> I find that some kids get the tech license and all they ever find out
>>>> about is 2 meter repeaters and give it up. I want to help their
>>>> interest grow.
>>> that. I agree.
>>>
>>> -r
>>>
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>
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