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Showing posts with label bicycle. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bicycle. Show all posts

Friday, February 12, 2021

A Lifetime of Workshops

 

https://microship.com/consoles/?fbclid=IwAR37yc-NfOrUC93C8QZYXZfakGLf-4eBtPw2php0CpzGHBW3-fb55ciyp0w

It has been more than decade, but we've posted about Steven K. Roberts N4RVE before: 

https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2009/09/i-didnt-care-i-had-secret-life.html

https://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2009/09/knack-on-bike-steve-roberts-video.html

This morning I came across his recent article about the workshops he's had over the course of his life.  Very nice.  Man, I should have held on to that SP-600 I once had.  You folks will like this: 

https://microship.com/consoles/?fbclid=IwAR37yc-NfOrUC93C8QZYXZfakGLf-4eBtPw2php0CpzGHBW3-fb55ciyp0w

Monday, July 13, 2020

"The All Japanese 6" Receiver


One of the great things about having a "miscellaneous" box in an otherwise well-ordered junk collection is that rummaging through that box will often send you off on fun and interesting radio adventures.  I was rummaging yesterday and I came across the guts of the little AM radio that used to be mounted on my bicycle handle bars.  I last mentioned this in 2011 : 

I was just about to cannibalize this board.  The IF transformers were almost certainly at 455 kc and I could use a few of those.  But then I started thinking and Googling and trying to figure out the circuit.  That all led me this the site that provided the diagram below: 


Six transistors, four transformer cans, two audio transformers.  Yea, that's pretty close to what I was seeing on my board.  So of course I had to see if I could get it going.   I hooked up a 9V battery.  I connected the pot wiper connection directly to the connection at the top of where the pot had been (it had disintegrated).  It works!  It is inhaling nearby WFAX, Falls Church, Virginia. 

You will notice that the transistors in the circuit above are PNP.  I had assumed negative ground and had hooked the battery up accordingly.  No smoke was released and the thing worked, so I guessed that I had assumed NPN correctly.  Sure enough, perhaps aware of the PNP ancestry, the manufacturer had marked my board "BC123 NPN"! 

The author of the book I linked to above dubbed this circuit the "All Japanese 6"  -- an obvious allusion to the All American 5.  

I see real potential in these AJ6s.   A few mods to the front end and you could be shortwave listening, perhaps on 31 meters!   


BTW:  The space on my handlebars formerly occupied by that little AM radio is now taken up by a Bluetooth speaker that plays tunes streamed to my I-phone from Pandora as I make my way down the same old Washington and Old Dominion bike path.  Progress. 



Sunday, April 16, 2017

Micro-Shocks (and QRP Power?) from Nearby High Voltage Lines (video)



I spotted this on Hack-A-Day.  It caught my attention because many time, while riding my bike along the Washington and Old Dominion bike path, I have felt electrical shocks from the handlebars. 
Now, before you all conclude that OM Bill is losing it and start suggesting that I wear an aluminum foil hat, realize that the bike path is directly under some seriously high voltage power lines.  And that esteemed UK newspaper "The Daily Mail"  confirms that these shocks are, as the kids say, a thing.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2655190/Cyclist-told-grab-metal-bike-time-rides-overhead-power-line-gives-ELECTRIC-SHOCK.html
So think these Russian dudes are onto something.  How long will it be before the QRP community starts exploiting this power source?   (Please be careful about where you put the antenna!)

Wednesday, November 12, 2014

Tricycle Mobile Contact


I couldn't resist posting this picture of the vehicle used by Budd, W3FF.   I talked to him yesterday on 17 meters -- transcontinental -- as he pedaled home in California on his magnificent trike.  He wasn't using the quad in the picture (he was on a vertical). The  six meter quad is fantastic.  He worked Japan with this rig on six. He has a trike trailer that carries his linear amplifier. 

More on Budd and his trike mobile operations here: 
https://sites.google.com/site/w3ffhomepage/

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics" http://soldersmoke.com/book.htm Our coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmoke Our Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Monday, November 25, 2013

A British Bicycle (and Workshops)


Experiments in Speed from SpindleProductions on Vimeo.


Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics" http://soldersmoke.com/book.htm Our coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmoke Our Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Thursday, October 31, 2013

Brooklyn Bike Generator -- Want one!



Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics" http://soldersmoke.com/book.htm Our coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmoke Our Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Monday, October 14, 2013

SolderSmoke Podcast #155 BITX17, TEK465



Podcast # 155 is available for download (or you can listen by clicking on the button above):
http://soldersmoke.com/soldersmoke155.mp3

October 14, 2013  (Delayed Back-to-School edition)

Topics covered:

-- BITX Beauty -- Building a BITX17

-- VFO woes, and the wisdom of Doug DeMaw's love for crystals

-- Why does a 55 year old man NEED clear nail polish varnish?

-- How the VFO KILLED the Tek 465

-- Trying to fix the Tek 465 (not for the faint of heart)
 
-- New products:  Justin Beiber Duct Tape, bifocal safety glasses,
magnetic reading glasses, Ward Silver's new book

-- Backwards British Bike Brakes

-- MAILBAG 

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics" http://soldersmoke.com/book.htm Our coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmoke Our Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Monday, August 15, 2011

Bike Radio II

Thanks for all the suggestions on the bike radio. I googled around a bit and found a schematic that seems very similar to the little receiver I'm working with. I almost certainly would be better off starting anew (perhaps keeping the AF circuitry). But it is interesting to see how a simple AM receiver works. That first transistor is an autodyne circuit -- both a mixer and a oscillator.

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Bike Radio

As I mentioned on the podcast, I've been riding my bike to work lately. I really enjoy it. We have great bike trails in this area. They use paths of defunct railroad lines -- I ride Washington and Old Dominion Trail.

My bike is a bit of a boatanchor. It was made in Japan. I bought it 22 years ago when I was in Spain. I've used it in Spain, The Dominican Republic, the UK, Portugal, Italy, and in the U.S.

Of course, my thoughts have turned to putting some sort of HF radio on the bike, probably just a receiver. I still have a little handle-bar AM radio that I added shortly after I bought it. The handle bar mount is still good. See above. I'm pleased to see that it looks very simple, with discrete components. The AF amps are obviously off to the left of the speaker. To the right of the speaker we obviously have the RF and IF circuits. There are some nice tuned transformers there (from the "Chop Shing" company), and three transistors and a diode. What would the standard lineup be for a simple AM radio of this type? Maybe just an RF amp in the front end, a local oscillator, one stage of IF amplification and the diode as the detector?

What do you guys think? Make use of some of the existing circuitry? Start over?

Our book: "SolderSmoke -- Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics"http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Knack on a Bike: Steve Roberts Video

Oh man, this is great! The Winebikko! Gizmology! He even had an Oscar 13 satellite station on the bike. You guys are gonna love this:
Designer: Douglas Bowman | Dimodifikasi oleh Abdul Munir Original Posting Rounders 3 Column