"Rig here is homebrewed, OM."
Don't get excited, we haven't set up a still, we're not talking about illegal suds here.
In the world of amateur radio, Homebrew is the art of building homemade radio equipment. Whether you design and build it "from scratch" in the basement workshop or garage, or construct a kit of parts on the dining room table, homebrewing equipment is not hard to do, and a double whammy of a lot of fun - you get to use the equipment when you're done building it! I think I have more fun building a piece of equipment and making it work like I want than I do operating.
I know what you're thinking; "okay, so it's a lot of fun, but how much will this fun cost?" Not as much as you think! You can spend as little or as much time or money as you want. It's true. You can build complete working equipment, like simple transmitters or test equipment, for less than $10 in parts. So now if I say I "roll my own," you know I mean I make my own radio equipment, not... that other thing.
Okay, let's say I've convinced you, and you'd like to get started. So how do you start? I found the best place to begin building your own radio equipment was by reading books and collecting circuits from magazine articles of equipment others had built. Not necessarily to copy them, but to learn from them. You know, educate some of that gray matter upstairs.
Some of the best books I know come from the ARRL (the American Radio Relay League, amateur radio's national organization). Below I've listed a book or two, and a few magazines and articles that I have found useful. BTW, these lists are not an ultimate guide or anything. They are simply the resources I know and like to use.
Books
"Experimental Methods
In RF Design" by Wes Hayward, W7ZOI, Rick Campbell, KK7B, and Bob
Larkin, W7PUA. Published by the ARRL.
"Solid State Design
for the Radio Amateur" by Wes Hayward, W7ZOI, and Doug DeMaw, W1FB.
Published by the ARRL.
"W1FB's Design Notebook"
by Doug DeMaw, W1FB. Published by the ARRL.
"W1FB's QRP Notebook"
by Doug DeMaw, W1FB, 2nd edition. Published by the ARRL.
"Introduction to Radio
Frequency Design" by Wes Hayward, W7ZOI. Published by the
ARRL, originally by Prentice-Hall.
"The ARRL Handbook
for the Radio Amateur," any recent edition. Published by
the ARRL.
"Handbook of Simplified
Solid-State Circuit Design" by John D. Lenk, 2nd edition.
Published by Prentice-Hall.
"The Art of Electronics"
by Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill, 2nd edition. Published by Cambridge
University Press.
"RF Circuit Design"
by Chris Bowick. Published by Newnes, originally by H.W. Sams.
"Communications Receivers"
by Ulrich L. Rohde and T.T.N. Bucher. Published by McGraw-Hill.
This book has been updated and now lists Jerry Whitaker as coauthor.
"Single Sideband Systems
and Circuits" edited by William E. Sabin and Edgar O. Schoenike,
2nd edition. Published by McGraw-Hill. This book has been updated
and retitled "HF Radio Systems and Circuits."
"Electronic Filter
Design Handbook" by Arthur B. Williams and Fred J. Taylor, 3rd
edition. Published by McGraw-Hill.
"Electronic Communication"
by Robert L. Shrader, 5th edition. Published by McGraw-Hill.
"Reference Data for
Engineers: Radio, Electronics, Computer and Communications," 7th
edition. Published by H.W. Sams.
These books and others like them may be found at the ARRL website.
Magazines
QST, published
monthly by the ARRL.
CQ, published
monthly by CQ Communications.
Microwave Journal,
published monthly by Horizon House.
RF Design,
published monthly by Intertec/Primedia.
Applied Microwave
and Wireless, publish monthly by Noble.
Microwaves & RF,
published monthly by Penton.
The last four magazines are what they call "trade magazines," intended for RF engineers and technicians. I love trade magazines. You can almost learn as much from the ads as the articles in these things.
And speaking of articles...
Articles List
Almost all of these are from QST, the magazine published by the ARRL.
A Structured Engineering
Approach to the Design and Construction of Electronic Equipment
QST August 1983, pp. 18-22
Written by Jerry Pittenger,
K8RA. Still a great design philosophy all these years later.
One of my favorites.
A High Performance
Communications Receiver
ARRL Handbook 1990, pp.
30-8 to 30-15
This article also appeared
in QST November 1981. A 5-band, SSB receiver construction project.
Wes Hayward, W7ZOI, and John Lawson, K5IRK, authored this one.
The Principles and
Building of SSB Gear -- Parts 1 through 5
QST September 1985, pp.
17-19
QST October 1985, pp. 27-30
QST November 1985, pp. 16-19,
43
QST December 1985, pp. 37-40
QST January 1986, pp. 29-32
This is an intermediate
level series is aimed at those who want to build SSB equipment and learn
how it operates. Doug DeMaw, W1FB (SK) wrote this one.
Some QRP Transmitter
Design Tips
QST February 1988. Pp. 30-32
Full QSK is beneficial and
easy to achieve without relays at low power levels.
Another one written by the all-time king of ham homebrew, Doug DeMaw, W1FB
(SK).
An Optimized QRP Transceiver
for 7 MHz
ARRL Handbook 1993, pp.
30-37 to 30-40
This article also appeared
in the pages of QST August 1980. This rig provides a real challenge
for the QRP home builder. It's a classic circuit and a favorite
in the QRP community. Roy Lewallen, W7EL, penned this one.
Roy also produces a terrific antenna modeling software package called EZNEC.
Check it out.
A QRP SSB/CW Transceiver
for 14 MHz -- Parts 1 and 2
QST December 1989, pp. 18-21
QST January 1990, pp. 28-31
Exotic circuitry and hard
to find components aren't necessary if you want to build excellent performance
into a home-brew SSB/CW transceiver: Careful design
is the key. From the reigning king of ham homebrew, Wes Hayward,
W7ZOI.
The QRP Three-Bander
QST October 1989, pp. 25-30
Another personal favorite
of mine. From Zack Lau, W1VT (formerly KH6CP), a ARRL Lab Engineer.
High-Performance Direct-Conversion
Receivers
QST August 1992, pp. 19-28
A ground-breaking article
from Rick Campbell, KK7B, that I'd say single-handedly brought DC receivers
back into vogue for QRP homebuilders.
High-Performance,
Single-Signal Direct-Conversion Receivers
QST January, 1993, pp. 32-40
This approach to DC receivers
just got better. Also from Rick Campbell, KK7B.
Many of these articles may be found as PDF files at the ARRL.
What's next? Well, while you're educating your brain, you'll want to educate your manual dexterity by learning how to solder and use tools for building electronic equipment. No reason to wait until you're a pro, just jump right in and build something. Let's see, a soldering iron (or a temperature-controlled soldering station if you can swing it) and some solder, a set of good hand tools, a work table and plenty of light is a must to start. And you'll need at least one piece of basic test equipment. I think a good DMM (digital multimeter) is essential. Later on, after you're more experienced, I'd recommend getting a decent oscilloscope. Everything else you can build if you like.
As far as hand tools are concerned, I recommend getting the best you can afford. If you take care of them, they'll last nearly a lifetime. I personally favor tools designed for electrical or electronic work, from either Klein hand tools or Xcelite by Cooper Tools. Both of these brands are excellent. I currently use quite a bit of Klein tools because they're readily available at most Home Depot stores. Greenlee also makes some excellent tools.
What tools will you need? I think the absolute basics are:
Hand Tools
4" diagonal cutters, flush
cutting type
6" diagonal cutters
4" and 6" needle nosed pliers
#0, 1 and 2 Phillips screwdrivers
1/4", 3/8" flat blade screwdrivers
A set of nut drivers, 1/8"
to 1/2"
Wire strippers
A small vise
A set of combination wrenches,
3/16" to 5/8"
A ratchet wrench and socket
set, 3/16" to 3/4"
An electric drill and set
of high speed drill bits, 1/64" to 1/2"
A hacksaw with an 18 TPI
metal cutting blade
A set of files for metal
that includes a rattail, half round and a double cutting flat
A nibbling tool
With these tools, you can cut and strip wires, poke holes and cut on metal, and turn fasteners. As you gain more experience building, you'll no doubt want some of the more specialized hand and powered tools available in the world. But much creating and repairing can be done with just the tools on this list. Also, unless you need them for repairing manufactured equipment you may already own, you won't need metric tools, good ol' American SAE will do just fine.
The next stop for me was building a kit or two. I liked kits quite a bit, still do. Everything you need in one package.
My very first kit was a crystal radio kit my father bought for me when I was about 12 years old. That was neat. Listening to distant broadcast stations in bed at night was great... for awhile. After that small success, I thought I could tackle something more advanced so I purchased a Heathkit HR-10B amateur radio receiver. Those kits from Heathkit were great, they came with all the parts and a book of instructions written so well, you couldn't hardly mess up. I built this receiver in about a week of idle time, but was a bit disappointed when I turned on the power. All I heard was a bunch of garbled voices. Darn, where did I mess up? I took the radio to the local Heathkit store where I bought it and told the service man there what my problem was. He checked it out, and said "except for a few cold solder joints, it works fine." Huh??
It was then that I discovered what "BFO" meant on the front panel.
Later, as I gained experience, I tried scratch-building projects from magazine articles, so collecting electronic parts became an activity. I did this for each project as I built them. The first projects I attempted to build this way were messy to say the least. And they usually didn't work. But I kept swinging, and after a couple of successful projects, repeating the parts mining activity became tiresome. So I made a list and built up a supply of commonly used and commonly available parts.
Nowadays, I build kits or whip up projects of my own design. Oddly enough, most of the parts I use in my own designs come from my list. Go figure. ;-)
And here's the list:
Parts List (* denotes a "must have")
General purpose bipolar transistors: 2N2222A*, 2N3904*, 2N3906*, 2N4401, 2N4403.
FETs: 2N4416, J310, MPF102*.
RF transistors: 2N3866*, 2N5179*, 2N3553, 2N3053. 2N5109 and 2N918 are useful as well. 2SC1969 is a good one for a bit more RF oomph.
Other transistors: 2N3055 for power supply pass transistor and other low-frequency applications where a bit of current is needed..
The "QRP" ICs: LM386*, MC1350*, NE/SA602*. Sooo many projects use these, it's worth having a few.
Linear ICs: LF353*, 555's*, 741's*, 5532.
Regulators: 7805 through 7824, 7905 through 7924, and complimentary 78Lxx and 79Lxx versions.
Diodes: 1N34*, 1N914*, 1N4002, 1N4007* (higher PRV).
Special Purpose Diodes: HP 5082-2835, a few selected 1/2 or 1 watt Zeners are good to have (5-35 volt range), MPN3404 PIN diodes, and MVAM108 tuning diodes.
Resistors: 1/4 and 1/2 watt selection from Radio Shack*. I usually purchase a few each of the 100 assorted packs, plus packs of 51, 100, 1k, and 10k.
Capacitors: Again, assortment packs from Radio Shack*. Look for small value (1pF-500pF) disc ceramics, various values of electrolytics, and packs of .1, .01, and .001 uF ceramics or monolithics for RF bypassing, etc., and 1, 2.2, 4.7uF electrolytics for audio coupling. I also like tantalums for critical audio applications, but they tend to be a bit more expensive.
Other parts: very small quantities of toggle switches, rotary switches, LEDs, panel mount audio and RF connectors (mostly N and BNC... I dislike the so-called UHF connectors. And I don't like RCA phono connectors for RF), knobs, PCB material.
Wire and cable: various colors stranded #22*, #18 for hook-up, RG58*, RG174, #20 through #30 enameled wire* for inductors.
Toroid cores: I use T37 and T50 sizes the most. Powdered iron mixes: 2, 6, 12. Ferrite mixes: 43, 61, 67. Ferrite beads, 43 mix.
As you can see, many items on this list are general-purpose electronic devices and parts. I think that's good, availability is greater for GP parts. If a component fails or I need a part, a GP device is usually available locally. But that's not to say I don't like some of the more exotic devices in the world.
For example, I usually don't keep any of the MiniCircuits mixers, MMICs, etc., in stock, but I do like them in projects. Great company, they have all kinds of fun RF items at pretty reasonable prices. You can find these in small quantities from various distributors.
I haven't stocked any surface-mount components... yet. However, I have received some of the free SM prototyping kits offered from time to time from Phillips, and I periodically "beg" for free samples from the other semiconductor manufacturers as well. Why not? The worst response I can get is "No."
Okay, is that it? No, of course not. For more advanced homebrew pursuits, I use the following software programs:
RFSim99
EZNEC
Antenna Modeling Software from Roy Lewallen, W7EL
Some others you can find are Serenade SV, a circuit design suite of programs, and Eagle Lite PCB Editor, for designing printed circuit board layouts.
Some version (demo or feature-limited)
of each of these Windows programs is available for download for FREE!
Some of the books I listed above also come with software that's pretty
good, including Smith Chart programs, filter design programs, etc.
There, that should get you started. Have fun and don't get frustrated. If you run into a problem or have a question, drop me an email.
Homebrew Radio Links
W7ZOI
- Wes Hayward the homebrew master
W4RNL
- L.B. Cebik the antenna master
VE7CA's
Homebrew Transceiver
I4FAF's
Homebrew Gallery