An Easy TiCK

The Easy TiCK is more compact than the standard TiCK on its PC board, which is roughly an inch square. If the Easy TiCK is stuffed in a rig, power can come from a separate battery or from the main power source, via a 3-Volt Zener diode.

When it came time to replace my venerable Curtis 80488 keyer recently, I looked around for a smaller and more up-to-date model that I could easily tuck either in a rig or an outboard keyer assembly for use with several rigs.

I stumbled across the answer at a hospitality suite at Dayton: A TiCK-1 chip that came programmed for a variety of functions, was smaller than the Curtis version (8 pins versus 14 pins) and cost about one-third ($5 versus $17) of what I paid for a Curtis chip in the 1980s.

Rather than buy the whole kit (p-c board, components, chip and manual) I opted for the chip

alone,figuring I’d do my own layoutand board.The wiring sketch Iproduced looked

amazingly like the layout of a 14-pin DIP socket, so I rearranged a few connections and found everything fit perfectly on the bottom of the socket.

An Easy TiCK was born.

In addition to easy wiring of components on the under side of the DIP socket, I found I could plug the keying transistor (2N2222) and the piezo element into the top of the socket for easy removal, if necessary. I used an Augat socket with machined pins, and No. 30 wire made connections a breeze.

The socket will accommodate standard TiCK1 chip, which has no memory, or the TiCK2 or -4, which do. The K1EL-K9 chip also can be wired on a DIP socket with the addition of a couple of small capacitors.

My home keyer is powered by a 3-Volt coin battery in a holder. A companion keyer for portable operations is built in a die-cast aluminum box and is powered by two AA cells. It is rugged and compact.

The Easy TiCK is more compact than the standard TiCK on its p-c board, which is roughly an inch square. If the Easy TiCK is stuffed in a rig, power can come from a separate battery or from the main power source, via a 3-Volt Zener diode.

More information on TiCK chips and key kits, see www.kangaus.com and data on the K1EL offerings can be found at www.k1el.com

[email protected]

All material in HOMEBREWER is copyright 2005 and may not be reprinted in any form without express written permission from the American QRP Club and the individual author. Articles have not been tested and no guarantee of success is implied. Safe constructions practices should always be followed and the builder assumes all risks. HOMEBREWER Magazine is a quarterly journal of the American QRP Club, published on CD-ROM. Each issue typically contains over 200 pages of QRP-related homebrewing construction and technical articles intended for builders, experimenters, ham radio operators and low power enthusiasts all around the world. HOMEBREWER features include construction projects for beginners all the way up to the advanced digital and RF experimenters. Annual subscriptions are $15 (for US & Canada) and $20 (for foreign addresses). For information, contact editor/publisher George Heron, N2APB at[email protected]or visit HOMEBREWER Magazine home page atwww.amqrp.org/homebrewer.

George Heron, N2APB Joe Everhart, N2CX

Atlanticon 2005

… in recap

This year was 7^th time for this annual QRP weekend, run by the NJQRP Club and sponsored by AmQRP, and what a great time

was had by all.

Once again, Atlanticon was a terrific success and everyone had a really exciting time! Although it was raining like crazy outside most of Saturday, over 140 QRPers were warm and cozy in our spacious meeting room and heard from some of the smartest and most entertaining hams in our hobby.

A wonderfully-spacious banquet room at the Holiday Inn Select in Timonium, Maryland served again as this year’s

center for the all-day QRP presentations

The Presentations

Each of the presentations was a wonderful treat, but perhaps the most exciting highlight of the weekend were the presentations from our keynote speaker, Dr. Paul Shuch, N6TX. Paul was absolutely amazing! He is a longtime QRPer, and as part of the SETI organization, he develops advanced digital signal processing techniques in search for the ultimate DX - extraterrestrial signals that are very weak when received on Earth. Paul's presentation was a dazzling technical overview of the problems confronting humans searching for communications from other world, and some of the techniques to overcome those challenges. Much to the surprise and extreme enjoyment of everyone present, Paul would occasionally pick up his guitar and break into a song explaining more about the topic he was currently addressing! We heard stories about the NRAO (National Radio Astronomy Observatory) sung to the tune of John Denver's "Take me home Country Road". It was hilarious! All in all, there were some twelve songs presented like this as we all gained a much better appreciation of the technology and pioneers of this branch of science. All of us thank Dr. Shuch for spending his valuable time with us this year.

hilarious musical interludes

Joe Everhart, N2CX, actually led off the speaker lineup on Saturday morning with his usual eye-opening humor ... ask him sometime about the three QRPers and the three DXers on a train! First by necessity and later by inclination, N2CX has always been a homebrewer ... and he shared his insight and experience in the area of oscillators: different types, uses and ways to stabilize their frequency output. Joe's presentation was a natural extension of the "Crystallizer" - the Atlanticon Kit that all attendees receive in advance of the weekend. QRPers in attendance now know a great deal more about temperature control and uses of stable oscillators as a result of the N2CX eye-opener presentation. We are always blessed to have such a gifted RF designer and innovative thinker amongst us, and we thank you Joe for continuing to share so much with others in the hobby that you love.

A thoughtful pause during Joe Everhart’s N2CX presentation.

Lyle Johnson, KK7P was next up for presenting his material on Saturday morning. Lyle is the designer of the very popular DSPx Daughtercard used in the DSP10, Elecraft K2 and Micro908 products, and he described an approach for "Digital Building Blocks for Analog Radios" that utilize the power contained in these very capable DSP and DDS modules we homebrewers have available to us today. KK7P kept the discussion at a high level, yet provided enough detail and written material that gave the audience all sorts of insight as to the projects, kits, radios and equipment we'll soon start seeing (and using!) in proliferation. I was very pleased to have Lyle Johnson make his first appearance at Atlanticon this year, and I'm sure all those who were captivated by his fast-paced, subtle-humor presentation were too. Thanks for coming all the way from Washington State to join us this year Lyle! I think this is a start of a wonderful relationship ;-)

Lyle Johnson, KK7P delivering his Atlanticon presentation (left) and milling around during the evening social (right).

Jim Kortge, K8IQY returned by popular demand for yet another engagement as an Atlanticon speaker. Jim's presentation overviewed the design, construction, and performance of his 20-meter, discrete-component CW transceiver based on his previous award winning 2N2/40 design. Jim carefully reviewed where his new and revised circuits are employed, providing improved performance over the 2N2/40 while retaining the straight forward, Manhattan-style construction approach. K8IQY is a master craftsman of Manhattan-style construction projects and has contributed many solid and useful designs to our QRP community. He passed around components of his latest creation, and offered matched crystal sets to many of the homebrewers in attendance who wanted to build up his design. Thanks Jim!

Jim Kortge K8IQY delivering his presentation at Atlanticon

Rich Arland, K7SZ is back ... and man, is he back! By popular demand again , our Master of Ceremonies and Wit did double-duty for us this year by emceeing the seminar series, as well as by making a presentation himself addressing the topic of "Emergency Communications for QRP" and the many options we QRPers have available when we go to the field. Now you must understand, this is the "New and Improved K7SZ" ... Rich has lost more 150 pounds and he looks fabulous! Rich's presentation showed us how ham radio, and even QRPers have a track record of coming to the assistance of our communities, especially after the 9-11 terrorist attacks. We especially benefited by seeing what constitutes his own "jump kit" of radio and survival gear in the event of needing to quickly take to the field with supporting communications. Rich's emceeing of the entire day's activities was expertly done and we all appreciated his efforts in making the seminar successful.

Rich Arland, K7SZ delivered an inspiring presentation on Emergency Communications (left), as well as performing

as master of ceremonies for the weekend, introducing each speaker and presenting each with a plaque of appreciation (right).

The Grand Prize Drawing

Each year, at the end of our full day of QRP presentations, we have a grand prize drawing for some lucky winner. This year the prize was a DSW-II 40m DDS-based Transceiver Kit from Small Wonder Labs. After much drum roll and holding of breaths, the lucky winner was Dana Hager from the EPA-QRP Club. The really neat part of this is that Dana was not yet a ham but was scheduled the next day (Sunday) to take the exam for his license! We'll have to see how that worked out. Regardless, Dana has been involved with the QRP clubs for many years and was very appreciative of the prize he won.

Dana Hager, the lucky winner of the grand door prize drawing. (Dana was scheduled to take the exam for his first ham license the next day over at the hamfest!)

Saturday evening Contests

As you know, we sponsor two contests each year at Atlanticon and the winners in each category get some pretty cool prizes.

Contest Judging #1: Open Homebrew Construction

One of the contests was the open category of "homebrew construction", whereby one brings along his latest, most innovative, or best-constructed project for display and judging. David Porter, AA3UR was this year's judge and he had a difficult time selecting the winners from among all the good entries.

The winners were …

#1 KD4PBJ Chris Waldrup, with his entry of a Vector Analyzer and R1 Receiver

#2 K3PEG Larry Przyborowski for a great-looking 2N2/20 Transceiver.

#3 AA2JZ Carl Herbert’s PSK80 a la Junque.

#4 K7SZ Rich Arland did a fabulous job with his Tube Transmitter.

#5 W1MT Michael Harnage’s ATS3 Software and Tenna Dipper was a hit.

K3PEG’s winning 2N2/20 (left) and W1MT’s Tenna Dipper (right)

N2GO.

Contest Judging #2: Crystalizer Accuracy, Stability & Novel Construction

The second contest is the one based on the theme of the weekend: the Crystallizer Kit. The idea this time was to construct this small pcb-based voltage-controlled crystal oscillator and get it calibrated as much as possible to 10.000000 MHz (WWV) and then see how well you could keep it on frequency with changing temperature. I think everyone really learned a lot about the effort required to do this, as the crowd around Joe Everhart's measurement station was pretty thick watching the testing. N2CX made a precisely-calibrated, and stable fixture based off a "DDS VFO Calibration" article written by Earl Morris N8ERO (published in the Proceedings, and included in issue #5 of the Homebrewer Magazine), and Joe was able to measure each contestant's VXO while connected to this fixture. A pair of blinking LEDs indicated when zero-beat was established with WWV (i.e., the blinking slowed to a stop) and a calibrated frequency counter actually read off the beat frequency down to 1 Hertz. Again, at the time of this writing I don't have the list of those who were the top entries, but they included water-cooled VXO's, Micro908-controlled VXO, circuit boards insulated in Styrofoam, vacuums, cooled and heated environments monitored by thermisters, and one was even insulated in a cardboard box stuffed with dirty socks (thanks K7SZ ;-) We'll have pics and further details shortly on this contest as well, but for now we can tell you that the winner was Steve Holton, N1NB who had the VXO controlled by a nifty software algorithm running in his Micro908 controller. He dubbed it the "TC-908" for its temperature controlling control characteristics and we'll be publishing his novel approach soon in Homebrewer Mag. Congrats to all entries!

There were 13+ good entries in the bakeoff. They ranged from a sophisticated microcontroller-operated, compensated oscillator to several well-insulated devices (a delaying action at best), to several “bare board”

Crystalizers. Ingenuity was the rule of the day.

The test itself consisted of using a frequency counter and a receiver based on the N8ERO WWWV calibration receiver to measure the frequency of each oscillator entry. Contestants were allowed to “tweak” their items on frequency at room temperature. The test setup monitored frequency as a hair dryer was used to expose the units tested to an elevated temperature for several minutes.

#1 Steve Holton, N1NB brought a digitally-compensated Crystalizer using the Micro908. A thermistor, thermally attached to the Crystalizer board, fed the Micro908. It was pre-calibrated to feed back a DC signal at each temperature to tune the oscillator on frequency. Frequency held to within 1 Hertz. Steve also had a “gag” entry with a Crystalizer that was temperature-stabilized by a large aluminum block with

chilled water flowing through it. This held frequency quite well … and would have continued to do so, at least until the ice melted!

#2 Charles Hallock, AA3WS. It was a very well-insulated case which delayed the effects of external temperature changes.

#3 Jim Dicso, K2SZ mounted his Crystalizer in a sealed, insulated case with a Peltier-effect heater/cooler. There was no closed loop feedback but there was enough thermal mass to the assembly such that prolonged periods of added heat did not grossly change the oscillator frequency.

#4 Carl Herbert, AA2JZ had another example of a well-insulated case. Several minutes of heating resulted only in minimal temperature change, though given enough time *that* would change.

#5 Hank Kohl, K8DD. Hank’s was the best in class of uncompensated Crystalizers that did not have insulated cases. Apparently the stack up of a good crystal and component temperature coefficients kept his frequency within less than 30 Hertz even when well-heated by the hair dryer!

N2CX at the center of the Crystalizer “stress test & measurement” table. Joe applied a heat gun to contestant entries while monitoring the unit’s frequency output against a precision-calibrated standard based on the N8ERO

WWV Receiver (an article in this Homebrewer issue) his on Joe’s own Atlanticon presentation.

First-place winner Steve Holton N1NB stands watch over the measurement and evaluation of his Crystalizer (blue box above) that was digitally-compensated by a program he wrote for the Micro908 (seen above with white front

panel.)

AmQRP Homebrewer, Issue #5 8 Copyright 2005, AmQRP, All rights reserved Be sure to take a look through all the photos of the Saturday evening festivities to see some good shots of the contestants' entries. Congratulations to everyone who participated ... there were many winners in this contest!

AmQRP "QRPers of the Year" ...

awarded to Tom W8KOX and Nancy NJ8B Feeny

As anyone who has ever opened an AmQRP kit in recent years knows, the quality and attention to detail involved with the actual kitting and packaging of the project is just superb. This is great part due to the detailed nature of the effort put in by AmQRP's main kitting engine, Tom & Nancy Feeny. These wonderful folks have completely revolutionized the kitting of our club-based kits by color-coding SMT components, carefully labeling other sub-bags and in general they provide astounding value to all of us QRPers. Recent kits to their credit include the DDS Daughtercard Kit, Micro908 Kit and its two Service Pack mailings, the Islander Pad Cutter and Amplifier, the IQ-VFO (board, partial kit and full kit), and more. Additionally, Nancy has been proofing the Homebrewer articles since issue #2, and recently has taken on a major part of the editing job for issue #5, whereby all of the articles have first been through her creative, eagle-eye before it comes to me for final composition and layout prior to disc duplication. Nancy has even started contributing original material to the magazine! We surprised the Feenys with the AmQRP “QRPer of the Year" plaque during Atlanticon and they received a standing ovation from the attendees. Thank you NJ8B and W8KOX!

The husband and wife team ofTom Feeny W8KOX and Nancy Feeny NJ8B Feeny were co-winners of the prestigious AmQRP QRPer of the Year award. Their contributions to every facet of AmQRP operation since its inception has

benefited so many in the QRP community.

The NJQRP Club staff makes it all happen

As in previous years' weekends, Atlanticon could not be conducted without the tireless involvement of a good handful of club volunteers. With thankless jobs ranging from manning the check-in table, to handing out the Proceedings, to making the nice, laminated badges before hand (see the cool logo at the top of this page for an example of what the badges looked like), to setting up the AmQRP / NJQRP table each evening, to arranging/coordinating the lunches provided for everyone during the day, to the handling of door prize drawings throughout the day ... the list goes on and on. For all this, we sincerely thank Bryan Williams AA3UR, Michael Bower N4NMR, Ed Lyon N4LRR, Denis Albiser AB2PD, David Willmore N0YMV and David Porter AA3UR.

Brian Williams AA3WM (left) and Denis Albiser, AB2PD handled the badge programming details of the weekend.

Bryan with the camer (right) handled much of the photography for us, along with David Porter. Ed Lyon, N4LRR and Michael Bower, N4NMR adeptly handled the registration and sign-in table, and David Willmore N0YMV filled in

tying up many of the loose throughout the weekend. Thanks guys!

Prize Donors make it fun for everyone!

Atlanticon attendees regularly look forward to the door prize drawings throughout the day on Saturday, and to the prizes awarded during the Saturday evening contests. We couldn't make this happen without the generous contribution by some very altruistic QRPers and organizations ... the NoVAQRP Club, the EPA-QRP Club, John

In document HB#5 (Page 84-96)