Nowadays, to manufacture an HF RX, with all the concomitant
high density ICs that are around, the biggest design chore
is to cut out the opening for the LCD display on the front
panel.

But, looking in detail at this EA12, almost every facet of
it has involved intricate design and manufacture if only the
mechanical components are considered, and all this from the
days of pencils and drawing boards, long before the era
of computer aiding.

Firstly, there is the aliminium casting for the front panel, and
secondly is the rotary arm coupling to the tuning condenser
to linearise the frequency coverage, amongst many other mechanical
achievements.

Clearly the Stratton people knew their onions when it came
to designing and producing radios.

My gast has never been so flabbered; no wonder it had taken me
so long as a tyro machinist to not (yet) succeed in my own efforts!

"gareth" wrote in news:lt1tsc$8ie$1@dont-
email.me:

Firstly, there is the aliminium casting for the front panel, and
secondly is the rotary arm coupling to the tuning condenser
to linearise the frequency coverage, amongst many other mechanical
achievements.

Clearly the Stratton people knew their onions when it came
to designing and producing radios.


I limit my CAD for mechanics to an early version of SketchUp, the main
advantage beign an ability to make clean lines, erase faults as if they'd
never been, try new ideas and revert painlessly, and to turn the model in
three dimensions. In the past, the fact that makers likely had to do design
and also handle real parts they made, meant the brain fed back detail that
kept their vision clear. Even so it is admirable.

On the other hand (not radio related, exactly), I have built from expired
patent and base principle (I find other's code utterly impenetrable so have
not plundered any), an entire polyphonic, multitimbral FM (actually, phase
mod) synthesiser, with a few tricks that not even Yamaha managed.

In short, while it is amazing what people in the past acheived, it is also
true that in 1980, to do what I can do alone, it took a university professors
(John Chowning) and a large multinational company (Yamaha), and 10 years of
research and development to do! It's still taking me a few years, but it is
at least possible, and not so long ago it was beyond any practical dreaming.

There is real art in old radio parts though, especially the tuning
capacitors, and those old hybrid canned parts with chokes and caps and such,
especially in the context of a small forest of valves.... The intricacies of
my PhaseMod synth, while fun and no ends of cool, are hard to sell to a
public who woudl see even LESS of that wonder than they do when confronted
with an actual hardware dedicated IC. But such is the price we pay for the
power....

"Chronos" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 11:38:57 +0100
"gareth" wrote:

Nowadays, to manufacture an HF RX, with all the concomitant
high density ICs that are around, the biggest design chore
is to cut out the opening for the LCD display on the front
panel.

I have to say that anyone who can make a decent looking front panel has
my admiration. My attempts at chassis bashing have always looked like
something salvaged from a rather nasty car accident. The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

Always used to be a problem until I clamped down the workpiece in a drill
press and stopped trying to do everything freehand. Also, the old adage of
measure
twice and cut but once helps!

Being impatient myself, I did make a "PCB" by grinding out the lands using a
Dremel-equivalent
miniature grinding wheel, but where I transgressed with that was to grind
each land as I needed it,
after soldering in the previous component, with the result that the board
slowly curved.

On Wed, 20 Aug 2014, Chronos wrote:

On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 11:38:57 +0100
"gareth" wrote:

Nowadays, to manufacture an HF RX, with all the concomitant
high density ICs that are around, the biggest design chore
is to cut out the opening for the LCD display on the front
panel.

I have to say that anyone who can make a decent looking front panel has
my admiration. My attempts at chassis bashing have always looked like
something salvaged from a rather nasty car accident. The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

That's why they created bezels, to cover up what lies behind.

Michael

Chronos wrote in
:

The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)


As I found too, once. Try Proxxon instead. Works for me...

Chronos wrote:
On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 11:38:57 +0100
"gareth" wrote:

Nowadays, to manufacture an HF RX, with all the concomitant
high density ICs that are around, the biggest design chore
is to cut out the opening for the LCD display on the front
panel.

I have to say that anyone who can make a decent looking front panel has
my admiration. My attempts at chassis bashing have always looked like
something salvaged from a rather nasty car accident. The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

http://www.frontpanelexpress.com

Now, they don't do any fancy 3-D work, so if you are of a mind to have
heatsinks in the panel or fancy bezels around your slide rule display
along with the mounts for the pulleys built into the front panel, you
will be out of luck.

But if you don't mind machining the pulley mounts separately and having
a second metal plate with the scale bolted on standoffs to get your
frequency display for the tuning, it can work out nicely.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 16:26:12 +0100, Chronos wrote:

The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

But does look nice on the bench :-)



--
M0WYM
Sales @ radiowymsey
http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Sales-At-Radio-Wymsey/

On 8/20/2014 1:45 PM, Wymsey wrote:
On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 16:26:12 +0100, Chronos wrote:

The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

But does look nice on the bench :-)



In one of the Smoke and Solder segments of Ham Nation, George Thomas
made a jig for his Dremel so it works as a cross between a table saw and
a radial saw. Allows him to cut nice straight Mitered cuts in PC board.
Alas have no clue as to which episode it was http://twit.tv/hn

--
Home, is where I park it.

---
This email is free from viruses and malware because avast! Antivirus protection is active.
http://www.avast.com

On Wed, 20 Aug 2014, John Davis wrote:

On 8/20/2014 1:45 PM, Wymsey wrote:
On Wed, 20 Aug 2014 16:26:12 +0100, Chronos wrote:

The Dremel doesn't
help - it just makes making a mess faster ;-)

But does look nice on the bench :-)



In one of the Smoke and Solder segments of Ham Nation, George Thomas made a
jig for his Dremel so it works as a cross between a table saw and a radial
saw. Allows him to cut nice straight Mitered cuts in PC board. Alas have no
clue as to which episode it was http://twit.tv/hn

Are you talking about using a cut-off wheel? I think the real problem
with those is that the wheel is too small, so unless you are cutting off
edges, the rest of the Dremel/rotary tool gets in the way.

I think some of the newer models allow for a closer use.

I thought of getting a Dremel tool for about 20 years, they looked so
neat, but I couldn't justify the cost. I had no concrete need for it.

Then suddenly I did buy one (a Sear's one, which I think was a rebadged
Dremel) when it was on sale, and once I had it, I found a use for it.
Those cut-off wheels are great, go through the jar of bolts to find the
right diameter, and if it's too long, just cut off the extra, nice and
quick.

Michael

Michael Black wrote in
news:alpine.LNX.2.02.1408202237200.14425@darkstar. example.org:

I thought of getting a Dremel tool for about 20 years, they looked so
neat, but I couldn't justify the cost. I had no concrete need for it.


The small high speed ones? They're cheap enough, but you're right not to. I
had two, they vibrate hugely, and at those frequencies this is dangerous to
eveything, our biology, the tool, the work, nothing escapes it safely. I
later got a Proxxon IBS/E drill which even at top speed runs clean and smooth
like Rolls Royce aircraft engines in comparison with the Dremel which was
like a screaming two-stroke in comparison!! Add the small KT-70 two-axis
milling table to their cheapest drill stand, and it makes a tool that can
reliably use the same 0.7mm cabide PCB bit to drill FR4 fibreglass board full
of as many holes as you have the patience to drill. A Dremel could never do
that, it would likely break on first contact between drill and work.

One nice thing about the setup I described is it will accurately place fine
holes around the perimiter for small connector holes with any shape wanted,
with minimal filing needed to clean up. The precision is so good that
knocking the waste metal out of the hole before filing was very easy too.
Print out a panel design on paper with a cheap Laserjet printer, then stick
it on the panel, line it up on the table, and for a one-off design it can get
results you could sell in a high end retail shop.