- 2025
- Apr
- 2
The 69th Annual CFARC Hamfest is this weekend.
This Saturday marks the sixty-ninth Cuyahoga Falls Amateur Radio Club Hamfest.
Located in the Emidio & Sons Party Center at 48 East Bath Road, Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, this show has always been pleasantly surprising in the stuff that shows up for sale. It even includes a well stocked “pay what you want” table where people can leave donations and, of course, pay what they want!
If you’re into this kind of thing, and are close by, this is a good show to attend. It’s Saturday, April 5th, from 8AM to about 1PM, and admission is $8. Assuming nothing gets in the way, I’ll have plenty of pictures for you soon.
Promo flyer is located here: https://www.cfarc-ha … fest.org/hamfest.php
See you there!
- 2025
- Mar
- 28
A PACO G-30 RF Signal Generator - Part 2: Revisiting
Late last year, this PACO G-30 RF signal generator landed on my bench. You can read that original article here: https://wereboar.com … rf-signal-generator/. Since I’m waiting for parts for the Heathkit AF-1, I decided to take a fresh look at this guy and get it ready since it’s next up on the plate.
This was a purchase from the 2018 Cuyahoga Falls hamfest, and I purchased a number of devices from this vendor. He said he had been using the device up to the time of sale, but needed to clear out some space. Seeing as how it was in really great shape, I bought it and some other devices he had for sale. He has also indicated that it had some work done to keep it running, but not much.
Physically, this unit resembles all other PACO devices, and is in pretty good shape for the age. I’d rate this a solid 8/10.
It goes to a decently high frequency range, although the output at those higher bands is probably not of much use. We’re more interested in the lower stuff, primarily the AM band - even though this says it’s a sweep and marker generator as well. Sure thing.
Inside, it’s pretty clean, and relatively sparse. This uses two tubes, a 6AU6 as the RF oscillator, and a 6C4 for the internal audio modulator. Power is provided by a solid-state rectifier, and everything else is passives.
Looking at this unit, you’d think that some of the components had been replaced - and some have. There are a couple of modern film capacitors in there, and a modern…stack? of electrolytics. Everything else is original, including the ceramic disc capacitors and the suspiciously modern looking resistors. There are carbon comps in there, however, so they’ll probably need to go. I’m not sure what the other style of part is.
So what needs to go here? Well, that electrolytic stack is ugly. While it works, I’d rather replace it with single units of the proper values. That’s easy enough. The selenium has to go, as does the three-leg safety capacitor. Why that thing hasn’t split and burnt is beyond me. That’s literally all we’d need to keep it going, and someone has already determined that the resistor in the power supply after the rectifier probably should be ~3.3kΩ. So, the following parts are needed:
1x 1N4007
1x 3.3kΩ 2W
2x safety capacitors
A note on Selenium rectifiers: I've seen varying things about these little devices. Some will say they're probably never going to go bad on you, and the big ones are your worry. Others state that you should replace them regardless. Some are hysterical in their need to change them out. I'm going to change it as a matter of course, because I can and someone else has already done the legwork. YMMV, of course.
While I’ll probably replace all the resistors eventually, the short parts list is all we need for now.
What’s the output of this device look like? Well…it’s not great.
Yeah. That sucks. And that’s 100% correct for this device. Why? This uses harmonics to generate it’s signals, and that’s what you get. It’s fine for an older device like an AA5 radio, but if you’re going to be doing modern work you’ll want to not use this. This is probably going to be more a labor of love than a useful, everyday device.
I have a second unit of this type, which was purchased at the Columbus Hamfest in 2024 for a buck. This unit is a parts donor (should any be needed) and is in pretty bad shape overall. You can tell it’s been used. A lot. It’s dirty, the front dial is gritty and bent, and it has the former owner’s markings on it. (That’s kind of cool, wish it was in better shape! Depending on how the dirt cleans up, this may go on the working model.)
But, you can also clearly see that most of the parts in the good unit are of the correct vintage.
Those green paper caps are all Dumont branded. That’s also kind of cool.
Once I take inventory of everything I’ll need - and possibly obtain a manual as the one online is of miserable quality and must have been scanned with a 100dpi potato - I’ll get started on this one. I don’t expect it to take long, stay tuned!
Next part of this series: Coming soon.
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … rf-signal-generator/
- 2025
- Mar
- 26
The Heatkit AF-1 Analog Frequency Meter, Part 9 - Testing the rebuild.
It lives! After a quick check of my work, I plugged the device in to the isolation transformer and received this wonderful sight:
For testing, I used the manual’s suggested 3/4 scale for all bands. Here’s what I discovered - everything except for the 300Hz band will dial in as expected, with the parts that are currently installed in the unit. I was able to get close to the specified value on the 300Hz band, but I ran out of potentiometer before getting to the right value.
So - in order to get where I need to be, these are the potentiometers that should be specified:
100Hz - 200Ω
300Hz - 10kΩ
1Khz - 200Ω
3Khz - 5KΩ
10Khz - 200Ω
30Khz - 5KΩ
100Khz - 200Ω
The device probably could have sufficed with just the four 1xxx bands.
I’m currently waiting on a 10kΩ potentiometer of a similar style to what I purchased for the other bands, as soon as that arrives I’ll install it and do a final test and calibration post, as well as a wrapup. I’ll have a final corrected schematic at that point, stay tuned!
Next part of this series: Coming soon.
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … ding-the-rest-of-it/
- 2025
- Mar
- 25
Some thought on nostr after a few months.
A while back, I discovered a completely decentralized social network that fixed the centralized blocklist problem that a lot of federated social networks seem to have. After all, it doesn’t matter to me if you don’t like it, maybe I’d like to make that decision for myself.
You can read that post here: https://wereboar.com … etworking-via-nostr/
And, the nostr outlet I’m using is located here: https://satellite.ea … 0s9sn9xgulwfqsy6uf4w
Anyone is free to post, I’ll see that in my mod queue and approve it if it’s in the spirit of the community.
So what are my thoughts on this service? Well…
- It’s for techies, by techies.
This service isn’t well geared towards people who “simply want to use a social network.” It’s not friendly in the sense that URLs are long keys, and not something you could easily type in and go to. That is how the system works, however, and that’s not going to change unless some abstraction layer is placed on top of the service.
- It doesn’t have reach.
In part, that’s probably because of the daunting URL scheme, but it’s also because the market is so saturated with services that another one isn’t really needed or accepted, except by the aforementioned techies. It’s never going to have the reach - people say that they want to move to a new service every time their little bird does something to make them angry, but they always flood back. It’s going to take an extended outage for something to make that change.
- Spam. Lots of spam.
The service literally has no way to control spam. Anyone can submit things to a community you own or moderate - that’s the idea. But if it’s spam, there’s no way to shunt it off to the side. It simply sits in your modqueue forever, waiting for you to approve it. Anyone else can see it, and if you don’t keep up you’ll find there are hundreds of messages just sitting there. Some method of identifying and pushing this into a spam queue needs to be implemented, otherwise you’re just going to have abandoned communities full of spam waiting to be approved.
So…the long and short of it is that it’s not ready for primetime, even though it’s an interesting idea. Will it ever be ready for primetime? Who knows…but I’ll make the random post on the /oldtech community for you, and I invite you to do the same.
See you there!
- 2025
- Mar
- 25
The Heatkit AF-1 Analog Frequency Meter, Part 8 - Rebuilding the rest of it.
Since rebuilding the filter didn’t fix some of the issues, and I was planning on replacing everything else - let’s just go ahead and do it.
The same film capacitors and high-tolerance resistors were used for this section as was used in the filter. I simply started at the top and worked down, replacing each part in turn.
This just leaves the potentiometers, but those may require some special attention. After a work check, I’m planning on testing things out. Stay tuned!
Next part of this series: https://wereboar.com … testing-the-rebuild/
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … building-the-filter/
- 2025
- Mar
- 25
The Heatkit AF-1 Analog Frequency Meter, Part 7 - Rebuilding the filter.
Before doing any testing, I wanted to rebuild the filter section of the unit - if the parts in this area are leaky, then nothing is going to work properly. I’m not as concerned with the rest of the circuit - that’s because if it’s repeatable, then I don’t care what it’s doing as long as it does it every time. This may be a bad assumption, but since it’s going to get rebuilt at some point there’s no need to worry about it now.
I started by identifying what needs to be replaced. That amounts to 4 capacitors, and one resistor (hidden on the switch.) There’s another capacitor underneath the four I need to replace, since it’s in the way it will get replaced at the same time even though it’s not part of this circuit.
They took a little bit of doing to get out because I didn’t want to cut things - I’d like to keep these for leakage and other testing as to verify my equipment is working. “Calibration standards,” so to speak.
I did some basic testing on these with the equipment at hand. They all register fine at low voltages, mostly close to their expected tolerance ranges of +/- 20 or so percent. Even the resistor was good at 221.5Ω. No leakage tests were performed, nor were any frequency tests performed. Vloss was quite good for old parts, however.
The area was cleaned and prepped for new parts:
For this rebuild, I chose my go-to IC film capacitors rated at 630V. The max voltage in this unit is around 235VDC, so 400V units could have been used - but I’ve tried to stay as true to the original as possible. The only similar-for-similar replacement was the mica part on the end.
The new parts are significantly smaller than the old ones, and look nice in their new homes:
With the replacement of a damaged piece of wire and a quick check of my work, it’s time to move on to the potentiometers, which will be used in this round of testing.
Now that the problem preventing testing has been cleaned up and the business end of the unit has been rebuilt, I went ahead and put two new potentiometers in the unit. Both are 10-turn wirewound 2W units. 200Ω for the 100Hz band and 5kΩ for the 300Hz band - as was in the unit when I received it.
The schematic states that there should be 200Ω in all positions, so I’m not sure what’s going on here.
I’ve removed the old parts. These will go into the parts bin.
And new ones are installed:
(No, these aren’t Bourns pots…the manufacturer stole the logo, of course.)
100Hz dialed in as expected as was decently linear across the band. 300Hz, however, ran the pot all the way out and could have probably used another 1K of resistance.
I’m not sure what’s going on with that, but I do know there are several more leaky parts in here. Since I’m planning on replacing all of them anyway, I’m going to go ahead and do that before poking at this with a scope. Stay tuned!
Next part of this series: https://wereboar.com … ding-the-rest-of-it/
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … ng-the-power-supply/
- 2025
- Mar
- 25
The Heatkit AF-1 Analog Frequency Meter, Part 6b - Testing the power supply.
The power supply for the Heathkit AF-1 has been re-done, and all of the relevant components replaced. I’ve checked my work, and don’t see anything that would cause the smoke to be let out of the device. Therefore, it’s time to plug it in. It, of course, goes on the isolation transformer/variac for safety, with the master power switch close at hand.
First thing to do is identify the test points I need to check. Input voltage and Output voltage are going to be important here:
As part of the rebuild, terminal strips were added for various parts. That made it easier to lay the new parts in (since the capacitor’s pins are no longer there,) and it makes it easier to pick voltages off.
Input voltage is nothing unusual.
Ripple is now as expected. 120Hz @ ~1VPP. Certainly much better than the 11VPP we had before.
Voltage after the regulator is as expected as well.
And there’s the purple glow of the VR150 tube.
I’m planning on rebuilding the filter section of the unit before proceeding. Stay tuned!
Next part of this series: https://wereboar.com … building-the-filter/
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … -6-the-power-supply/
- 2025
- Mar
- 25
What’s inside one of those can capacitors?
Pretty much exactly what you’d expect. Nothing really exciting…
I decided to take the top off the capacitor removed from the Heathkit AF-1 that I’m working with, since it’s completely dead and as light as can be. There’s probably no wet electrolyte left in this thing at all.
My pipe cutter made short work of the aluminum can, and it separated into two pieces.
As expected, this thing was dry as a bone. It looks to have used some sort of tar or other dark potting material, which was also dry and hard.
The material itself was just paper and foil, wrapped with old tape. I assume that somewhere in there are dividers for for the different sections.
There’s not much else to be said about this device. I’m going to pull the old material out and keep the base for other things, but the device itself gets replaced on the AF-1’s chassis.
Stay tuned for the power supply rebuild.
- 2025
- Mar
- 13
The Linksys WML11B media player - it’s time to say goodbye.
A few years ago, I wrote a piece detailing some fun I had with a Hamvention find, an ancient Linksys WML11B media player. You can find that article right here.
This is a device from the very beginnings of the Consumer Internet Age, and is evidenced by it’s early Wireless-B connectivity. Fortunately, it also offers an Ethernet connection. But…that’s about it. Modern browsers refuse to communicate properly with this thing’s web interface, seeing as how it was designed to be used with IE6. Modern HTTPS audio streams don’t work here because HTTPS was just starting to show up in the consumer space when this was made.
The weirdest thing is that a gigabit Ethernet port, which is usually more than capable of negotiating downward, doesn’t work well with this device. The device will simply stop playing and claim it has no connection after a short period, usually around an hour. A 100base connection will play for hours until the relatively fragile buffering in this device hits a hiccup and it stops.
That’s a real shame too, because this is actually a pretty good sounding device, probably on par with the Squeezebox Boom that came much later. What’s also a shame is, while this did have a now long-gone backend that would feed it station lists, it also had it’s own internal presets. You could use this thing and not have to worry about someone pulling a Reciva on you.
Seeing as how those squeezebox devices are still viable due to the continuation of the media server by Lyrion, I’ve decided to replace this unit with a used Squeezebox Radio that I purchased online for cheap. I’m not sure what to do with it, but the amplified speakers could be useful since they’re of decent size and good sound quality.
Who knows…you may see it at a hamfest near you!
- 2025
- Mar
- 3
The Heatkit AF-1 Analog Frequency Meter, Part 6 - The power supply.
Since this device came to me with a bad power supply, the first thing I want to do is get that supply back into operation so I can do some further tests on the device. It’s a relatively simple affair, consisting of the transformer, rectifier, filter, and a somewhat unusual voltage regulator tube. There’s nothing going on here you haven’t seen before save maybe the VR150, so let’s jump right in.
Here’s all the parts that were removed:
1x 3-section 10μF capacitor @ 350WVDC
2x 470Ω 1W resistors
1x 470Ω 1/2W resistor
1x 2.7kΩ 1/2W resistor
1x 2.5kΩ 5W resistor
1x 3.3kΩ 2W resistor
The whole reason for this initial exercise, is the original capacitor being bad. The can feels like it has nothing in it at all, and 103Ω certainly isn’t good for an electrolytic capacitor!
The new parts went in to the bottom of the chassis without issues except for the leads being shorter on a few.
Spaghetti comes in handy and is used liberally here.
The top looks a bit different now:
I’m not really concerned with the one capacitor being close to the VR150, it’s a cold cathode tube and doesn’t make a lot of heat. The one close to the 6X5 rectifier may need a heat shield for longer life, however. I think it’s far enough away, but you never know.
A new power cord was added, but I want to check my work before applying power and it wasn’t plugged in yet. That’s coming in the next part, as is some testing with new potentiometers. Stay tuned!
One last thing is the size difference between old and new parts. Here’s some new 3.3k 2W resistors replacing the one next to it. The new ones are almost the same size as the old 1/2W parts, and certainly smaller than the 1W and 2W parts shown. It’s amazing how technology has changed our ability to pack more into a smaller space.
Part 7 on the way, Stay tuned!
Next part of this series: https://wereboar.com … ng-the-power-supply/
Previous part of this series: https://wereboar.com … -different-approach/