40m QRP Pixie kit build for Ham Radio 

Brilliant!

super! it'll get even better when they can get on the air. have them join young ladies radio league and participate in youth on the air.

Wiltshire Man absolutely - we keep saying we will do it. Maybe once you have your new workshop built we should pop out to the woods. 73 my friend.

+Norbert Sichterman Hi, many thanks for your comment. This is an excellent point, thanks for raising this and also showing that a fix is in place. Take care, 73 Dan

I have one of those and it was a fun project. Thanks for posting very good video. :)

Yes I suggest you listen to 40 meters and see where the slow ops are working unless you can copy code fast. good luck

You will find that the QRP centre of activity is 7.030 for CW, so is a good choice.

@@Tocsin-Bang one slow freq is 7055kc. i think arrl also does slow sending practice on it.

sort of you can put it in and remove it pretty easy and the crystal stays in it...

Hi Nathan. I completed mine a couple of months ago. My results on initial power up were not promising. No audio out. I don't know if it was producing RF or not but the LED was lighting up and the side tone buzzer was buzzing on key down. I looked over my soldering and found a couple of joints that I thought were marginal so I touched them up. Also there were a few plated thru holes that had no parts in them so I filled them with solder. One other thing I did was to lift the crystal off the board about the thickness of a piece of card stock (2mm +/-) I suspect that with the crystal down against the board, the solder that wicked up thru the holes was in contact with the metal case of the crystal, causing a short. After all this completed, I had sound in the headphones! Not only that but on key down my pixie was being heard on a HF receiver in an office down the hall! I brought it home tonight and connected it to my 40 meter dipole and listened to a couple of CW QSO's on 7.023. I tried calling CQ a couple of time but got no answer. I would suggest that you use a good battery to power your set. I started with a 9V wall wart and the hum on the receive was very bad. I switched to a 12V gel cell that was collecting dust in the shop and it made a world of difference. The specs say that the set will work on 12V DC. I have heard that 12V will blow the transistors after a while. So I would start with 9 volts just to be safe (the gel cell I used had not been charged in a while). Good luck with the pixie, and let me know if any of the above helps.

***** Thanks David. I will venture out with it soon. a bonus will be if I get a QSO with it !

Steve Hartley 800mw on 40m ? it can be done right ?

Put mine together ages ago but didn,t try untill now. Used Reverse Beacon and got spoted in most western europe ,Magic LOL.

I’m trying to make PCB of a “Megapixie” - a 40m pixie with all of the Internet’s various improvements in. A sidetone circuit is just one of those improvements.

well, please tell me whats the bad advice? and what specifically is wrong with electrolytics?

+Patrick McNamee Hi Patrick, i simply inserted one end of the resistor in the centre and soldered (tacked) the other end to GND. to make a better test, simply solder the resistor across the 2 connections for the BNC socket. The test resistor will get warm if you continually key up the PIXIE, but any tests for power output can be completed fairly quickly. I tend to do a 5 second burst when testing for power, and usually tap out a CQ for checks on freq etc. Hop that is of some help - ping me a message if you are still stuck, i can send some pics etc. 73 Dan

+ColdestMoon Thanks for your reply. I'm new at this (not yet licensed) so I appreciate your help. Another question I have is about the crystal that comes with the kit. I just received the kit yesterday. It came with a 7.023 MHz crystal. That frequency is not available to technician-class hams in the US, but I've seen elsewhere that people have replaced the crystal with a 7.026 or 7.030. I haven't been able to find any 7.026 crystals, but 7.030 ones are available. But the receiver only works from 7.023 - 7.026 (I think). So I don't understand how someone can use a 7.030 crystal. Thx, Patrick

Patrick McNamee Hi Patrick, if you swap the crystal that will work for you. The tuning is based around the Crystal value. so swapping it out will work well and you should be able to tune between 7.030 and 7.036 based upon a 7.030MHz crystal. hope that helps.

+ColdestMoon Yes, that helps a lot. Thanks!

+Владимир Мамулов Hi, do you mean the power, key and audio cables ? I can create another video showing the connections and also it in use, if that would help. I have only had 2 QSOs on this kit - its very low power. 73 Dan

+LJH08Ralith Hi, yes i did manage 1 QSO - but quite honestly it was hard work, and with no side tone, i quickly got lost knowing what i sent. I will video a QSO in the near future, but i think some modifications might be in order.

+Alexey Chuvatkin Hi Alexey - no this is a full transceiver. in this video it has received a signal from My KX3 - although its not very clear. I have used it for 2 QSOs now, it is very simple, but a good kit to learn some radio basics. I hop that helps. Dan

+ColdestMoon omg, how does it receive signal? In my opinion two transistors like high-frequency amplifiers only...where is receive there? Audio output is for hearing my speech which will be transmitted. PS. Before I buyed 2 Pixies and tried to connect each another. And after my difficult useless waste of time I thought it's not transceiver it's transmitter only :) Regards, Alexey.

+Glynn H Hi Glynn. I would check with your assessor if they are happy for you to build this as your radio related project. Personally i would be happy with it, as long as you could demonstrate it working and talk me through how you built it and any problems etc. Hope that helps. Dan

+ColdestMoon cheers

The board is marked R1, R2, etc.

If you need to ask don’t bother.Electronics is not for complete idiots!

@@tonywright8294 Must not be for you then!

MUF , day or night , K index , grey line , NVIS ? Amateur ( HAM ) radio doesn't work that way " how far will it go " is not a valid question and can't be answered like it was a kids AM walkie Talkie ..Sorry , Read

The real answer is, "a few hundred miles under optimal conditions". I once worked a guy who was using a Pixie in Georgia (US), from Québec. That's about as good as it gets; he had a tower and conditions were good. Other than that, this is a local rig with regional breakouts.

sean soblixe or else what ?