[Drake] Anyone else out there building the Hageman Drake R-4 Xtal Elim?

[Tom Hammond]

Hi Tim:

>I have not started building one as yet primarily of some of the concerns 
>I've read about, poor quality boards from FAR Circuits

That part HAS been taken care of... guaranteed! The new boards are MUCH 
improved and much easier to solder to as well... the first board offered by 
FAR Circuits was designed by the author, and was intended for use as a 
double-sided, plated-thru-hole board. But FAR doesn't do plated-thru holes 
and the pads which were on the original board were small enough (don't need 
large pads if plated-thru) that many had been virtually 'drilled out' 
during the drilling process, leaving little copper for soldering to. The 
new boards, (I know the fella who re-drew them) have much larger pads which 
offer lots of available copper for soldering to. You will still several 
instances where you'll need to solder to the pads for a thru-board lead on 
BOTH sides of the PC board, but the copper's now there to allow you to do 
it... there are a few (maybe 3-4, mostly electrolytic caps with leads out 
the bottom of the vertical cap) components which may require soldering to 
both sides of the board but which will have the be 'lifted' slightly above 
the PC board in order for you to get to the pad under the component itself. 
But this is NOT a problem if you take your time and work carefully... the 
caps only have to be raised about 1/8" (max.) above the board and then bent 
over to one side to allow you to solder to their bottom pads. Then you bend 
'em back upright and you're good to go. It really IS a simple process.

>... and parts that are not available or easy to get.

I believe that ALL of the parts are still available, though there have been 
some (essentially identical) replacements made. And the rotary switch which 
was originally specified, while it is still available, may not be the best 
choice anyway. The originally specified rotary switch made an output every 
45 degrees... this means that you have to crank it thru a number of turns 
in order to get from one end of the spectrum to the other. The manufacturer 
offers several virtually identical switches (same quadrature output), but 
with more detents per turn, so you can traverse the spectrum MUCH more 
quickly. I'm using the same switch, but which offers an output every 22.5 
degrees. I like it a lot and would have NO PROBLEMS at all using it again, 
or even one of the higher output (more outputs per turn) versions in the 
next two (2) Xtal Eliminators I'm getting ready to build.

The author has a number of feedback comments in the FAQ on his web site:

       http://www.geocities.com/hagtronics/r4.html

and I have a bunch of notes on my web site as well at:

       www.n0ss.net

I can't think of any parts which cannot currently be located at either 
Mouser, DigiKey, Newark, or Jameco... the vendors the author specified. 
Most come from Mouser. I can supply a spreadsheet which , I think, is still 
up to date with regard to part numbers and prices for all of the components 
I believe you'll need.

>I have a friend who also wants to build one.  If you have any further 
>information, good news that is, then I would be happy to hear it.

I hope this has been the good news you're looking for.

I just hooked the Xtal Elim I've been building for a local up to his R-4B 
and it sounds WONDERFUL!  No spurs or anything... just able to receive all 
500-kHz segments from the bottom of the band up thru 30 MHz.

73,

Tom Hammond    N0SS