[SignalOne] SignalOne Digest, Vol 50, Issue 5

W0OGM at aol.com W0OGM at aol.com
Tue Mar 16 02:19:32 EDT 2010


Anyone looking to buy a CX7A ?
 
Gary W0OGM
 
 
In a message dated 3/15/2010 11:00:45 A.M. Central Daylight Time,  
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Today's Topics:

1. Re:  CX-7A repairs (Ron.K3PID)
2. CX-7 Display (EDWARD  SCHUMACHER)
3. Re: CX-7 Display (Singley,  Rodger)
4. Re: CX-7 Display (John  Abercrombie)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message:  1
Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 12:22:02 -0500
From: "Ron.K3PID"  <ron.k3pid at sbcglobal.net>
Subject: Re: [SignalOne] CX-7A  repairs
To: "Singley, Rodger" <rbsingl at ilstu.edu>,  <SignalOne at mailman.qth.net>
Message-ID:  <7BD486D1A4CD4814A7DCCD73EC54C9ED at CYCLOPS>
Content-Type:  text/plain;   charset="iso-8859-1"

Congratulations Rodger! FB  on the CX-7A restoration. The readout board in 
my CX-7A has been a source of  trouble since I got it about 15 years ago. I 
thought about replacing it with a  "modern" 7 segment LED readout but 
haven't worked up enough frustration to  tear into it. It has been my experience ( 
for what it's worth ) that the nixie  tubes are pretty reliable but the 
driver IC ( SN7441AN) isn't. I've also had  problems with the circuit board. It 
doesn't handle multiple solder/desolder  jobs and the trace peels right 
off...

73 es GUD LUCK
K3PID Ron  H
-- 
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------------------------------

Message:  2
Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:08:08 -0700 (PDT)
From: EDWARD SCHUMACHER  <edwa9gqk at yahoo.com>
Subject: [SignalOne] CX-7 Display
To:  SignalOne at mailman.qth.net
Message-ID:  <721367.58621.qm at web45211.mail.sp1.yahoo.com>
Content-Type:  text/plain; charset=us-ascii

Congrats on finally acquiring your Signal  One, Rodger! I too ended up with 
one a few years back, from the estate of one  of the old DX'ers from my 
first radio club no less. Be advised, changing the  display to LED's will 
require adding a resistor to stabilize the power supply  because the nixies 
provide a continuous load for the 300v supply. See the  archived newsletters for 
the details. 

I had some minor troubles with  mine due to something having been spilled 
into the display board that left  dried residue under the ic's. I had to lift 
each one, clean the socket and the  reinsert the IC. This was when I found 
the corroded off lead on one of the  driver ic's. The good news is that 
Mouser still has the chips and they are  cheap! I also lucked out bigtime on my 
one and only trip to Dayton year before  last and found a guy with a small 
box of nixies that turned out to be the  correct ones for the CX-7 and also 
very reasonably priced. I could not believe  finding what I thought would be 
next to impossible from my wish list for spare  stuff for the rig. I got 
several so you can bet I will probably not need them,  HI!

I was very fortunate in that my rig had been well cared for and had  none 
of the issues with the PTO's but some of the other things I had to solve  
more than made up for it. At least I finally upgraded some of my bench  
equipment so I guess that's good. Hope to hear your rig on the air one of  these 
days.

73 ... Ed, WA9GQK





------------------------------

Message: 3
Date: Sun, 14 Mar  2010 18:31:57 -0500
From: "Singley, Rodger"  <rbsingl at ilstu.edu>
Subject: Re: [SignalOne] CX-7 Display
To:  "EDWARD SCHUMACHER" <edwa9gqk at yahoo.com>,
<SignalOne at mailman.qth.net>
Message-ID:
<AA28191F88740543A764089198FF86DE9A27C3 at COBEXCHANGE.ad.ilstu.edu>
Content-Type:  text/plain;   charset="iso-8859-1"

Ed,

Thanks!   

I plan to stay with the Nixie tubes for this unit if possible.  I  have one 
spare tube and thank you very much for the hint about Mouser  concerning 
the display driver ICs.  I missed the part on the first search  but then found 
the NTE equivalent and ordered a few for spares.  I have a  feeling a lot 
of these legacy parts will soon be no longer available from any  of the 
standard supply houses since it isn't worth making RoHS compliant  versions.

I picked this one up at the Peoria hamfest last year and I am  glad to have 
it operational.  During checkout of my Alpha 274 amp I found  the 
electronic bias switching isn't working so it is now on the bench and  hopefully will 
be pretty easy to repair.  It certainly is much less  involved than the 
CX-7A. 

We aren't far away from each other so chances  are very good you will hear 
this one on the air.  I spend a lot of time  operating vintage AM and CW 
with a Johnson Ranger/Desk KW and Viking 500 but I  have been getting more 
involved with some of the vintage SSB gear.

73,  Rodger WQ9E



-----Original Message-----
From:  signalone-bounces at mailman.qth.net on behalf of EDWARD SCHUMACHER
Sent: Sun  3/14/2010 5:08 PM
To: SignalOne at mailman.qth.net
Subject: [SignalOne]  CX-7 Display



This list is for discussions regarding collecting,  repair, use and sale of 
Signal/One radios and accessories.  

Documentation on Signal/One radios can be found at  
http://www.hamanuals.com and several other sites on the Web.  

.
Congrats on finally acquiring your Signal One, Rodger! I too  ended up with 
one a few years back, from the estate of one of the old DX'ers  from my 
first radio club no less. Be advised, changing the display to LED's  will 
require adding a resistor to stabilize the power supply because the  nixies 
provide a continuous load for the 300v supply. See the archived  newsletters for 
the details. 

I had some minor troubles with mine due  to something having been spilled 
into the display board that left dried  residue under the ic's. I had to lift 
each one, clean the socket and the  reinsert the IC. This was when I found 
the corroded off lead on one of the  driver ic's. The good news is that 
Mouser still has the chips and they are  cheap! I also lucked out bigtime on my 
one and only trip to Dayton year before  last and found a guy with a small 
box of nixies that turned out to be the  correct ones for the CX-7 and also 
very reasonably priced. I could not believe  finding what I thought would be 
next to impossible from my wish list for spare  stuff for the rig. I got 
several so you can bet I will probably not need them,  HI!

I was very fortunate in that my rig had been well cared for and had  none 
of the issues with the PTO's but some of the other things I had to solve  
more than made up for it. At least I finally upgraded some of my bench  
equipment so I guess that's good. Hope to hear your rig on the air one of  these 
days.

73 ... Ed, WA9GQK




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------------------------------

Message:  4
Date: Sun, 14 Mar 2010 17:06:26 -0700
From: "John Abercrombie"  <tekwest at sbcglobal.net>
Subject: Re: [SignalOne] CX-7 Display
To:  "'EDWARD SCHUMACHER'" <edwa9gqk at yahoo.com>,
<SignalOne at mailman.qth.net>
Message-ID:  <2E4245FEE9BB4DB8A69F4B18870BFA53 at TEKWEST5150P>
Content-Type:  text/plain;   charset="us-ascii"

Congratulations Rodger, I've  had my CX-7A for about 14 years now and it's
still fun to use on occasion.  Nice build quality and innovative for the
time. The Nixies are pretty easy  to find surplus as they are the same as
used in several HP counters which  cheap these days, the HP 5327 series has 
8
of them. They may even use the  same drivers. I've had issues with the power
XFMR (I think all early radio  SN's had this issue)which I replaced with a
Peter Dahl unit, the series  inrush thermistor which I replaced with a CL-11
12A unit SKU# 16F5006 from  Newark-in-One. Transistor PA driver, Modified 
the
power supply with several  3tab regulators. I also modified the Driver board
by applying negative bias  from the switched -15Volt supply through
appropriate resistive decoupling  and capacitive bypassing cutting of the
drivers until the transceiver is in  the TX mode which reduces the heat
dissipated significantly from the  regulator supplying the driver voltage. I
don't understand why they didn't  do this in the first place. I've also had
an issue with one of the crystal  filters (common issue with many old 
crystal
filtered radios) which center  frequency drifts over time up a few hundred
Hertz causing tinny low  frequency response on LSB...I removed one of the
filters and replaced it  with a resistive network with good results.
The counter board 68K and 56K  resistors were replaced with ceramic higher
wattage resistors and I found  the same issues mentioned to you in a earlier
email with board thru  plating. The whole size should have been a few
thousands larger than  supplied even with vacuum de-soldering, as I used, 
you
may loose the thru  plating, and this will result in display intermittants 
if
the both the top  and the bottom of the resistors aren't soldered to restore
the connections.  
I also built a removable fan and shroud that slips over the heat-sink  which
runs slow and quiet when the heat sink reaches 110 degrees F. I used  a
normally open adjustable temperature switch found in commercial dryers  
which
has mounting tabs and will handle about 20A...a bit overkill, as the  fan
draws about .1A @ 120VAC.
I hope you have as much fun bonding with  your Signal One as I have,  good
luck.

John
WB6DAX


-----Original  Message-----
From:  signalone-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:signalone-bounces at mailman.qth.net]  On Behalf Of EDWARD SCHUMACHER
Sent: Sunday, March 14, 2010 3:08 PM
To:  SignalOne at mailman.qth.net
Subject: [SignalOne] CX-7  Display



This list is for discussions regarding collecting,  repair, use and sale of
Signal/One radios and accessories.  

Documentation on Signal/One radios can be found at  http://www.hamanuals.com
and several other sites on the Web.  

.
Congrats on finally acquiring your Signal One, Rodger! I too  ended up with
one a few years back, from the estate of one of the old  DX'ers from my 
first
radio club no less. Be advised, changing the display  to LED's will require
adding a resistor to stabilize the power supply  because the nixies provide 
a
continuous load for the 300v supply. See the  archived newsletters for the
details. 

I had some minor troubles  with mine due to something having been spilled
into the display board that  left dried residue under the ic's. I had to 
lift
each one, clean the socket  and the reinsert the IC. This was when I found
the corroded off lead on one  of the driver ic's. The good news is that
Mouser still has the chips and  they are cheap! I also lucked out bigtime on
my one and only trip to Dayton  year before last and found a guy with a 
small
box of nixies that turned out  to be the correct ones for the CX-7 and also
very reasonably priced. I  could not believe finding what I thought would be
next to impossible from  my wish list for spare stuff for the rig. I got
several so you can bet I  will probably not need them, HI!

I was very fortunate in that my rig  had been well cared for and had none of
the issues with the PTO's but some  of the other things I had to solve more
than made up for it. At least I  finally upgraded some of my bench equipment
so I guess that's good. Hope to  hear your rig on the air one of these days.

73 ... Ed,  WA9GQK




______________________________________________________________
SignalOne  mailing list
Home:  http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/signalone
Help:  http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm
Post:  mailto:SignalOne at mailman.qth.net

This list hosted by:  http://www.qsl.net
Please help support this email list:  http://www.qsl.net/donate.html



------------------------------

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