As we are moving out, most of my really
good stuff has gone to my trusty Brother's House.
Such as the wonderful AMT-3000.
So what's left here?
In the junk pile there was a Ramsey AM-1 that
didn't work.
Before you laugh too hard, I will mention that
this transmitter was modified, and I was able
to get it to go 1/3 to 1/2 mile away from the house.
I don't remember the actual distance, but it was
pretty good for a transmitter of this kind.
A stock AM-1 will FM like crazy, or at least mine did.
Still, for yardcasting it was OK even with the FMing.
Later, I built an oscillator from the Medium Wave Alliance
website (remember them?) the crystal controlled kind.
I took the VFO LC out of the AM-1 and fed the crystal osc.
into that point.
It worked. Now there was no FMing anymore.
The transmitter required some EQ, and I did that.
I also built some huge loading coils on buckets from
the hardware store - I even made a variometer.
(This is a big coil that rotates inside an even bigger
coil - you rotate the smaller of the two - and you can
tune the thing - the coils are hooked together in series.)
Anyway - until I got the SS-Tran AMT-3000, the AM-1 was
tons of fun.
So just this night I found it in pieces in a pile.
The crystal osc. had been ripped off, a choke was
halfway off the board, some wires were broken -
there was no case, and no power indicator light.
(I had a nice yellow one.)
Anyway - I patched it together and put in 9 volts.
(It might really need 12 - I don't remember.)
I hooked up an IPOD which was playing "Hey There,"
by Sammy Davis Jr. (1954?) and it came though the
radio. It sounded very good. "Though she won't
throw a crumb to you... you think someday she'll
come to you........."
I ran about half the song through in the test, and I
was quite satisfied. No transmitting antenna has been
put on yet. (Another homemade tunable loading coil would be
required.)
So there's another Part 15 rig working.
I thought the crystal was on 1700 kHz, but
it turns out it is really on 1670. I'm glad the
1670 rock survived the junk pile existance.
Crystals from 1590 and 1700 have been lost.
Oh well.
There is a weak highway TIS station on 1670,
but if my signal doesn't leave the house, it
doesn't matter.
These crystals are very expensive, but I think there
are 1650 rocks on the net for very very little money.
1650 must be a common crystal needed for present
day technology. (Am I right?)
It was really fun getting this old thing going.
It was all I had 8 or 9 years ago.
Best Wishes To All,
Brooce, WLP