RadioBanter - View Single Post

April 15th 04, 12:18 AM

(GO BEARCATS) wrote in message

Brought back the joy of using my first piece. What do you think about just
leaving a receiver on all the time? A friend of mine said "it wouldn't hurt
it".....but my thinking is "why have it on if I'm not home or thirty miles
away?"

My 706 is on nearly 24 hours a day. The only time I turn it off is to
clean my battery connections, or lightning scares...At the moment, my
TS-830 is on too...
A scanner I have is on 24/7 too...It's never off, and sits on the
local PD freq, in case hoodlums are in the area...I heard a police
chase that ended 4 blocks away last night...

Once it warms up good (hour or two) it doesn't drift, so I don't see the
thinking in leaving it on all the time unless I want a short lived mint DX100.
;-)

It's kind of a two way street the way I see it. Both methods have
advantages...It stresses componants to see a inrush when turned on. So
turning something on a lot of times is stressful. But leaving
something on all the time does add some wear usually heat related to
caps, and semiconductors probably do age faster when running, than
when not. But overall, I prefer that to a constant life of inrushes.
"turning something on, many times". I also leave my puter and monitor
on about 24/7. In the case of my radio, I am listening to it nearly
constantly, so it's not a waste. It's also my usual "everyday" ham
rig, so it gets used that way also. With a solid state portable, the
voltages, etc are low, and the thing will probably last for a long,
long time no matter how you use it. It would not bother me at all to
leave it on all day. I don't even think they build up much heat...But
I'm not familiar with that particular radio...Tube rigs, if I use them
a lot, I prefer to leave them on. When I ran drake twins as my usual
ham rig, they were on 24/7. MK