I'm so pissed right now I don't know what to do. I took the cover off of the 2995 expecting to see the same diode, and I did. So I removed it, thinking I was just going to stick it back to stock form and use it for reference (I think the only major difference is dual final vs. single final). Well then I realized that the mod limiter had been defeated, unlike the 2970. But also unlike the 2970, Q43 had not been tampered with. The collector of Q43 had been unsoldered and re-soldered on the 2970 it looked like, but on the 2995 it looked original. So the search was on!! I finally noticed that the collector of Q68 had barely been lifted from the board. So I applied a little pressure to the top of it with a dental pick and hit it with the soldering pencil and bingo, I got my modulation control back. HOWEVER, now I have no power, just like the 2970.
I bought both of these new back around the first of the year from someone who I have spent thousands with, and thought he was doing these radios right. The few local reports I got said I was clear, but not loud. I assumed it was the nature of the RCI and the locals being used to that over-modulated Connex/Galaxy sound, which I didn't want anyway. The problem was, I was running a 30-50w carrier on these radios not 3-5w like he set them up to be run. I guess ignorance is bliss, if I hadn't bought that damn scope I would have never known and I wouldn't have $1000 worth of junk radios on my desk.
All this time, I just ran his radios freeing up my time to read about beam antennas, propagation, power tubes, etc ........... I guess I should have been reading about radios instead and paying more attention to what he was doing, because I have no clue where to start looking at what else he may have removed/modded, and as far as I know there are no new manuals for the latest revision of these radios either.
I did notice that D106 is missing on the 2995 and had some epoxy looking stuff on the board in that area. C269 was also bent over that area concealing it, and not bent over in the same direction as the 2970. It looked like a rain drop that dried there. So I picked at it and it seemed rubbery, more like hot glue than epoxy because it came off after a little work. Anyway, I'm not convinced that the 2995 should have D106 because the two boards are powered from different points.
Oh yeah, and the bias on the driver was cranked WFO too, nice huh?
