Built new portable homebrew HF radio

[mw0uzo]

Made a portable operation homebrew HF radio, with internal battery and internal raspberry pi. This really is a 'Shack-In-A-Box'!
http://mw0uzo.co.uk/index.php/kit-proje ... ransceiver

SV205807.JPG

It's a uBITX V5 transceiver board, which was built on top with copper clad and some aluminium brackets made from old heatsinks. A flat large finned heatsink stolen from a junked amplifier makes up the rear while a somewhat annoying arrangement of metal brackets, copper clad and touchscreen make up the front. It has a 14.8V 2200mAh battery, a 24V PA PSU and a RPi for datamodes (and future SDR), internet etc. It is packed full to the brim with electronics and is practically a brick.

[madman1027]

That's Epic!!!

I'm ordering a kit to build the uBitx at the end of the month, it won't be that elaborate just yet but seeing that and reading through it has me buzzed for a new project.

Thanks for the inspiration!

[Blackolive]

awesome

[thedeerhunter270]

Very very nice.

[mw0uzo]

Thanks all! Had a hiccup with it overnight, blown fuse in the 24V PA supply and heated insulation on a wire leading off to the charge board. Put a 3A fuse inline in the problem area and a few bits of precautionary tape inside the case. I think the charge unit supply shorted to gnd via USB plug, which is above it.

[Auldgeek]

Looks excellent.
I have a V3 & a V4 in their boxes still to build, although the V3 is the version with the suspect audio amplifier that requires modding to reduce the amps supply voltage before use. I built the Bixt40 just before the Ubitx was released and that works well enough.
Would be interested in finding out more about the colour TFT, as the stock display is in my mind, one of its drawbacks. I see a number of options available as displays.
Anyway, good work.

[Lybarger]

Thanks all! Had a hiccup with it overnight, blown fuse in the 24V PA supply and heated insulation on a wire leading off to the charge board. Put a 3A fuse inline in the problem area and a few bits of precautionary tape inside the case. I think the charge unit supply shorted to gnd via USB plug, which is above it.

Color me impressed. It's not too complicated to change blown fuses with your setup, is it?

[mw0uzo]

The firmware is by KD8CEC, he also released software for the Nextion LCD touch displays, it's brilliant. See website here http://www.hamskey.com/2019/04/release- ... ubitx.html, quite a bit of reading to do, double check you have latest versions etc. Probably best to use KD8CEC's GitHub, download and compile direct in Arduino IDE https://github.com/phdlee

[mw0uzo]

Thanks all! Had a hiccup with it overnight, blown fuse in the 24V PA supply and heated insulation on a wire leading off to the charge board. Put a 3A fuse inline in the problem area and a few bits of precautionary tape inside the case. I think the charge unit supply shorted to gnd via USB plug, which is above it.

Color me impressed. It's not too complicated to change blown fuses with your setup, is it?

Thx, no it's not too bad to change fuses, they're all accessible from the top. There's a big one on the back, one on the 24V psu, one to the charge board. There are two switching supplies for non-rf critical circuits a 5V and a 13.8V, each of which have good s/c protection that's faster than a fuse and tested well so I omitted fuses after them. I have been worrying about the battery, there's a lot of energy and lithium in there, there is a battery management board which prevents overcharge, over-discharge and overcurrent, and it cuts out well when the battery is shorted out, really fast. The back of my head is shouting put a 10A fuse inline! Do it!! But there is not much room and if it blows, current can still flow from the battery balance leads and go on fire, unless I fuse all the leads, there is no room for that. The battery management board is designed to have no fuse (maybe it uses through hole vias as a fuse). Any advise welcome.

[mw0uzo]

Made a matching speaker for it!
http://mw0uzo.co.uk/index.php/homebrew- ... ransceiver

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SV205830.JPG

[Buick Mackane]

Impressive workmanship, Iv'e got one of these kits still in its box, Lot of radio for the money, I Paid around £100 for mine and it was delivered in around two weeks, Which isn't bad going from india, I'll get round to building it one of these years,

[Auldgeek]

The firmware is by KD8CEC, he also released software for the Nextion LCD touch displays, it's brilliant. See website here http://www.hamskey.com/2019/04/release- ... ubitx.html, quite a bit of reading to do, double check you have latest versions etc. Probably best to use KD8CEC's GitHub, download and compile direct in Arduino IDE https://github.com/phdlee

Thanks for the info. Some reading to do then.

[mr-robot]

seen a few of these .. how do they stack up against the FT- 817 ?

[mw0uzo]

seen a few of these .. how do they stack up against the FT- 817 ?

The uBITX is definitely an 'enthusiast's board'. It's a dual conversion superhet, with minimal components and it needs a fair bit of work and tinkering to get it up to scratch, there's some fairly serious niggles with the IF crystal filter on the V5 board (carrier rejection and shape causing poor RX audio) and some switching RX->TX RF transients that will be an issue with an amplifier connected. But in perspective, it is a great transceiver board for the cost and the niggles can be ironed out. The board is supplied built and tested, so a good deal of time is saved on construction. The FT-817 is a good commercial radio with the optional filters fitted. Of course, you can't build an FT-817, it costs a lot more and has a large team of engineers behind it. And it does VHF-UHF. Apples to oranges.