40m Pixie

Yesterday I found my rechargeable 12V battery and charged it up. I also checked the Pixie I built as a kit for dry joints and shorts. As all looks good, I hope to test this on the air over the weekend or early next week.

There are a couple of locals I’d like to test with initially, although I am expecting to suffer from AM breakthrough mainly from broadcast stations very close to our 40m band. Probably there would be less breakthrough in the daytime? My antenna is short and low on 40m (a Par triband end-fed covering 10m/20m/40m) so any contacts will be good!

I can test it first on a signal generator and then a power meter. If it works, I’d expect a sensitivity of around -100dBm and a power out of around 200mW on 40m. We’ll see. Even -80dBm and 100mW would be enough to work locals as long as AM breakthrough is at a manageable level.

Roger Lapthorn, G3XBM, is a regular contributor to AmateurRadio.com and writes from Cambridge, England.

One Response to “40m Pixie”

  • Ron ka2rrz:

    When you power up you Pixie, turn on your HF rig and tune to what ever your crystal freq. is in Pixie. If you hear the tone it’s a good guess all is ok.

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