[MRCA] Gilbert GRC-106

[Ray Fantini]

I have my 106 in spread all over the workshop right now, although the radio appeared in good condition with no obvious signs of damage in the R/T or the amplifier I have discovered issues like a master oscillator that’s intermittent and won’t always start and huge issues with the synthesizer working on all frequencies but producing birdies (Spurious products) in the translator that appear right at 1.75 MHz This produces heterodynes and masks all but the strongest receive signals and although I thought I purchased a fairly complete set that included most of the cables and accessories am also in the spending mode buying additional junk like the mounting plate and the CX-11016 adapter cable to be able to operate everything out of the case. Things like the 15 pin jumper and the like I am building in house.  Best thing so far is that this is a way easy radio to work on compared to much of what replaced them and the internet had provided all documentation free of charge. Have not gotten to the point of pairing the R/T and the AMP together yet and until I get all the issues worked out in the R/T but will be looking at the RF output real close. Somehow assumed that all the problems with this radio would be mechanical but all that stuff works correctly, but all these birdies living in the translator do appear to be an issue. If I pull any of the three synthesizer mod out the interference decreases but will not go away completely but with all three pulled see a fairly clean output of the translator on the IF port, have a spectrum analyzer looking at the IF port on the front of the radio. The next set of big problems will be installing all this stuff in an M-151A1 and all the associated DC power problems that will be involved being the jeep is currently the piss week 25A generator system. The plan is to have everything installed and working next year at Gilbert, maybe as early as Aberdeen and be able to operate HF/SSB, 51.0 FM and VHF all from the 151 using it as the power source for everything.

Ray F/KA3EKH

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