CB reatards 68xl mod

[bigred222]

ive looked over the mod on Cbretards for my 68xl and ive been thinking about toying around with it since hopefully mr and mrs clause will be manufacturing me a galaxy dx2547 and an antron a99. has anyone ever tried any of their mods and done them successfully. the one that i plan on doing seems very simple, its the one where you don't need to wire up any switches or anything. you just spread out L8 and turn vr5 all the way up. i just would like to clarify with you guys to see if any of you have done it before. the guy seems to really know what he is talking about. and does anyone know how much extra power ill be able to get out of it?
73's

 

[FL Native]

all that will do is make the meter smile and you sound like crap.

 

[DTB Radio]

Be careful spreading the coil, you shouldn't need to spread it very far. The other mods he listed with the cap/resistor I would stay away from for the most part. His variable power deal is ok, but don't use larger than about a .1uf cap across the transistor, or you'll end up with the same results as the resistor/large cap mod.

 

[Butcher318]

There is way more to tuning a radio then spreading a coil and cranking the modulation pot.

 

[Switch Kit]

Same ole song and dance routine here , Big Red , unless your going to be running power with this , I would pass ,but that's the only reason I would. For all of you whom seem to think this is closer to rocket science then not ? Forget it ! because it not ! You got a half decent meter Big Red ? or a decent dummy load to go with it ? because those would surely help your cause,if not , you can take out the plug in front of the final and tweek the coil on the other side of that slightly and turn the modualtion VR up all the way , you will basically get anywhere between 5 and 6 watt DK and pretty good audio and swing to 20 or slightly over , will it be perfect ? I doubt it , but it will be close enough . There's a mic gain on the radio if you should be to loud , even then ,you can let your homeboys be the judge of that. if you can't trust yourself enough with that ? you can always pay the piper. Good luck to you and have fun. if I didn't have the cash to pay somebody , i would surely give it a shot from a none tuned radio at all , yes Butch there's more to it then that , but whatever happen to having a little fun with your stuff ? You live and you learn , I feel as if IM falling into a pattern again lately , swing kits have been around for a long time , they work weather the machines say different or not !! you can tell that to the guys with there fancy S-9s and all the other high dollar pieces of crap out there that will DK 1 and swing 60 !! You know what ? They like them and that's all that really matters. So where a amplifier is concerned , I don't see or hear a problem with a cap/resistor mod on cb radio , I never have and I never will. Theroy or no Theroy ,Machine or no machine. Laws or no Laws.There all broken one way or the other. Peace

 

[SkipJunky]

I've done those mods quite a bit lately (CBRETARDS) and got good reports on all radios done.

If you're not putting the variable in, just follow the instructions and try different value resistors until you get a DK 1/4 of max swing.

Example: DK 5w Swing 20

For the 29's I usually get that with a 220uf cap and 33ohm resistor.

If you wanna do it like DTB and only crank VR5 about 80% open that's fine too.

Experiment! I was afraid to open a radio for years, But with no good shops around here, it was either learn or wait a week or 2 to ship it out and get back.

Have fun with it!

Next stock radio I get, I'm gonna do DTB's mod and see how that works.

 

[Switch Kit]

good for you Skip ! Next thing will be hearing is that we wouldn't know what a good radio sounded like if we heard one. Peace

 

[bigred222]

can i run the mod where you spread the coil and stuff barefoot(im guessing that means Without an amp) i plan on running an amp with the galaxy im hoping to get. unfortunatly switchkit i dont have a meter all i have is a radio and a power supply and a multimeter
73's Thanks alot switch kit. i appreciate it man 73's to ya happy dxing

 

[Switch Kit]

L10 power (in front of final ,usually has a dab of wax on top , you can carefully dig it out ,then remove the slug,in your case ,with a screw driver that will fit the slot on top (save the slug)) you can slightly open L8 coil (in your case , I would leave that alone as is, sometimes it gives more other times not but you don't have a meter to tell anyway ,removing the slug in coil L10 will give you more, a few watts more of DK power) VR 5 is audio pot , in your case I'd turn it up all the way clock wise , once all the way up you can back it off a "few hairs". Your more then likely ballpark ready to go then Big Red and extra audio will give the radio the swing. Take your time and be careful with your stuff , Let us know how it works out for you and remember you have a mic gain on that radio. Happy Holidays to you and have fun.

 

[King Mudduck]

I thought that spreading the coil and turning the modulation all the way up basically showed you a false meter reading because of over modulation ( VR wide open ) and the radio transmitting on more than one frequency ( spreading the coil ) at the same time? I believe this is whats called a Golden Hammer mod! The only thing you can accomplish by doing this type of mod is a shaty sounding radio and then whats the point of spending the money on the radio or amp if no one can understand you?

............but what do i know im just a duck :roll:

 

[Butcher318]

Nothing wrong with having alittle fun on a cheap radio Switch, and it's all good but I'm not buying into everything stated here. I know money can be tight, if thats the case bump VR5 alittle and then run it and leave it alone. The guy has no meter and then he's gonna remove slugs and crank this and spread that and then wonder why the radio sounds like crap and is all jacked up. Like I said, fun is fun but I'm just not reading anything here that comes even close to a proper tune-up on the radio. I guess to me it's worth taking it to a local guy and spending 20 bucks to have it done right. Now if it's a radio that was intended to play and mess with and then if it smokes, so what, then hey go for it. The other thing is there is no simple free twist this and spread that mod that the guy can do and all his friend will say, wow your radio is just kicking butt on the air. If anything they will say, hey your kinda overmodulated and muffled, what happened to your radio?

 

[Switch Kit]

IM starting to think that you guys don't read threads from the beginning ? You guys think it's rocket science and that's the only way a guy can go ? I don't ,and I never will. Nowadays more so then ever , I like nothing better then going against the grain of reason , or the my ways or the highway approaches. Weather it's perfect or not , CBRetards tricks will work along with many other tricks over the years. That's like trying to tell me a class c amplifier X-force and all the rest along those lines are clean amplifiers , It's almost as if a guy isn't allowed to mess with his 50.00 dollar radio without getting a God Damned history lesson in why he shouldn't along Einstine's Theroy of relativity. I basically told him not to tweek the coil , and yes I told him to remove the slug , and yes I told him to turn the VR5 up and then back it off a few hairs , I'd tell him that or anybody else the same thing , that didn't have a meter or didn't have the money to ship and pay somebody else basically to do the same damned thing. what's it really going to do here fella's ?5 or 6 to 20 or so , big damned deal !! Now how close we talking here fella's ?? Off freq ? How do you figure ? but like I said in the beginning of this post , I often wonder how many folks tend to post without reading through the threads before they do so ? IM done.

 

[bushwacker]

The thing with spreading coils is your never sure if its REAL power. Just like a capacitor a coil can hold a charge. When you tune or detune any inductance (COIL) there is a chance that the power you are seeing on the meter is not real power.... but reactance.... in other words the energy thats trapped in the coil is getting realeased and the meter is picking it up as radiated power.
The same goes for harmonics.. the meter will see any type of radiated power as output power making you think you have more wattage but its not usable power... just harmonics.

The thing you have to ask is " what are these coils for?" and "what am I doing when I spread them"... your tuning an LC or basic tuning circiut... What alot of these coils and caps do in the rf circuit is match impediances and filter out harmonics as well as rf chokes.

So you can spread coils if you want, just remember that once you go so far the power you see on your meter isn't real or useable on the frequency you want.
Spreading a coil is a quick way of tuning the inductive part of an LC circuit. Really,if your just starting to learn about radios and are starting to work on spreading coils and other basic stuff,I don't see anything wrong with it as long as you know your radio could be spitting out more harmonics ....if your just tuning the coilsand not anything else the coils don't need much of adjustment... some might need to be spread open... others need to be compressed together.

 

[Peddler]

Thread cleaned for content.

Stay on topic and watch the wise ass remarks.

 

[PLUTO]

I myself dont like to spread coils......but I have to admit I used to, so that being said, if you are going to.....don't spread them by "stretching" what I used to do was take a round wooden toothpick and go between each wrap or wire of the coil. Do it a little bit at a time (go shallow with the toothpick on first pass, check watts/swing, if not satisfied, go a little deeper each time until it starts going the other way, if that happens you can squeeze the coil back a little) No matter what you've been told (I'll probably catch it for this) don't cut the modulation limiter....it looks good on a watt meter but that's about it. It does more harm than good.