#1354 Pixie 40m Transceiver Kit

Episode 1354
kit time!

[davebleamwabxy]

I built Pixies for about all of the HF ham bands. 80 meters puts out almost a watt, 10 meters about .25 watt. Sensitivity threshold is about -15dbm. The output transistor doubles as a diode product detector in receive. I haven't made any contacts with any of them yet, but I'm still working on that.

[johnwest]

I bought 3 of them for $7 each. I built 1 so far. They are pretty junky little low performance rigs, but they do in fact work. Hook them to a good antenna, be prepared to send out a lot of CQ's, expect to hear local AM radio stations, and don't expect glowing signal reports, either strength or audio. I got mine with the intention of modifying them just for fun, (input receive and output transmit filters, higher RF output, 2 or 3 watts, a couple of switched crystals for wider freq range, etc.) Then I figured I'd give them to new General Class hams to play with, but I'd keep 1 and plug my Vibroplex Zephyr into it, take a couple of pictures and work some stations, and tell my contacts I was running a brand new $7 rig with an antique $250 key. :)

[MUAW_IO]

I love watching your videos and listening to you talk, ramble and reminisce.

Season's greetings, merry Christmas etc.

[robinbrowne]

A pretty cool kit. I like the way they used circuit-board for the front and back of the case.

[MrBanzoid]

Interesting circuit. The tune control uses a diode as a crude varicap to pull the crystal.

[acestudioscouk-Ace-GACE]

I am building one, so yet to find out about the harmonics. The YouTuber, Radio Prepper built one; the harmonics were so strong his WSPR report looked like he was operating on several bands at the same time! Good for a learner like me to build. Thanks for the video and season's greetings to you and yours.

[fredmitchel]

Nice to see you have the little Tek scope in the 503 chassis on the bench...and not forgotten ...

I wonder if the Pixie receiver is sensitive enough...?

It seems like the signal generator can't go down to microvolt levels...

I was thinking you would have connected an antenna....and CQed ...

What a cute little simple rig...

Merry Christmas...

73

Kind regards

Fred

[Manf-ftzk]

Thank you for the video. It is a nice piece of equipment but I think there are a lot of 40m transceivers around. What might be even more impressive is the beeper as a non-contact material detector.

[PeetHobby]

Kits are always fun to build, but not if you miss parts. That happens often to me, halve of time I miss or loss a part. :D
Maybe you can put some bandpass filtering on the inputs, don't know if that will work, you will know that probably better than me, I'm not HRF guy.

[Broken_Yugo]

I'll hazard a guess the filter network is inadequate if one wants a legal transmitter. Would be fun to do a FFT or put it on a spectrum analyzer to find out how far out of whack it is.

[Kae]

It still worked - despite the fact that you forgot to say "Nice" after you got it out on to a tray. ;)

[paulcohen]

I like very much the chinglish translation.

[RideGasGas]

Actually, just going from the face plate, I would say it is a 7032 kelvin hertz device. Normally I wait till the end of a video before commenting, but it always kills me when a manufacturer screws up on the SI units - lay persons I get, but if you're going to market something, get it right.

Or maybe they did and the actual operating operating frequency is adjusted by changing the ambient temperature. If nominal room temperature is 20 deg C, that is 293.15 K (kelvin). So the frequency presumably would be 7032 * 293.15 K * 1 Hz = 2, 061, 430.8 Hz.

To get it to operate down at 7032 kHz (kilo hertz) you would need to operate the device in a 0.29315 K environment or just above absolute zero. Now I used to work with amplifiers operated in a cryogenic environment that was typically 17 to 19 K but this device doesn't strike me at first blush as being designed to withstand such an environment.

So, my first impression, that they've mislabeled the device, is probably the correct one.

[jordana]

They should have called it Chirpy...!!

[JosephLorentzen]

i wonder what the minimum parts count would be on a single band SSB transceiver. Nice video, but the way.

[shARyn]

Another foray into pedanticism: People who insist on the use of full (vs truncated names) --- It is ROBERT, not Bob; Katherine, not Kat; William, not Bill or Will; Arthur, not Art, ....
A Millenial/Gen Z thing, methinks ....

[Edisson.]

Hi, the kit is nice, but the Tek is luxurious 👍,
With the Zener diode it is the same as with the LED diode (when I hear it I see red 🤬), recently I explained the abbreviation LED to an "engineer" and what kind of nonsense he actually says when he says LED diode. I also did not understand the established name in the Czech Republic for External TV tuner - Set Top Box
I have experienced Zenerka, LEDka, Oscík, etc.

Nice day 🙂 Tom

[frankowalker]

Ideally you'd want 2 of these. One for you and the other for the neighbour. That's probebly going to be the maximum range. LOL.

It looks great though. :)

[bobkozlarekwasqq]

What happens when you connect it to an antenna?

[daveald]

That's a nice case? ABS sewer plastic, warped, misaligned and PCB for front/back covers. I don't think so, i know it's a kit and all and some might be in to it but it's an embarrassment.