FREECELL! Where is my stuff! Waiting since Jun 23

[pumphouse]

If the ssb offset frequencies are just a bit off, you get this behavior. This is normally part of the alignment procedure. CBTricks has the alignment procedure for this radio.

BTW, my Fluke frequency counter hasn't been calibrated in forever, but it's always been good enough to align a CB. I know that's it's not recommended to go that long, but I do alignments for myself and friends, so it's not that big of a deal. Besides, it's CB and Ham radio we're talking about...not commercial radio

Thanks mole. That would explain the "uneven watts" on both sidebands.

Fluke makes good test equipment. Expensive, but good.

 

[pumphouse]

You didn't get all your equipment on the first shipment either? It took an announcement of US MAIL FRAUD until I got all my stuff I pre-paid from him. It took about as long as well.

I dont know the circumstances behind your dealings with Freecell, but glad to hear you got ALL your stuff back. Im still waiting for my antennas, mounts and mic that i also PREPAID for MONTHS AGO! At the very least, i got the radio back.

You should see my PM box with similar "stories" with people regarding dealings with freecell. . At this time, those stories are unverified but we will leave it at that.

If "they" want to start a thread "Has anyone ever dealt with Freecell" they are free to do so.

 

[Robb]

I dont know the circumstances behind your dealings with Freecell, but glad to hear you got ALL your stuff back. Im still waiting for my antennas, mounts and mic that i also PREPAID for MONTHS AGO! At the very least, i got the radio back.

You should see my PM box with similar "stories" with people regarding dealings with freecell. . At this time, those stories are unverified but we will leave it at that.

If "they" want to start a thread "Has anyone ever dealt with Freecell" they are free to do so.

I think you have shown a lot of patience and restraint up till now. I still think you are acting properly - considering this situation. If I had given money for a product from a business, and they didn't come up with the goods in 1/8 of the time you've waited - I would be off of the hook!

At this point, one would think that he would refund you the money owed for your purchase, so that you can both go on with your own business and be done with it all. It would be in his best interest to do that too - as a reputation can be marred by not acting as he promised. When he refunds you, you will have these funds free to find those items somewhere else and deal with another business. Seems to be the best way to remedy this situation semi-amicably. If not that, then at least put a stop to it.

Quote: "You didn't get all your equipment on the first shipment either? It took an announcement of US MAIL FRAUD until I got all my stuff I pre-paid from him. It took about as long as well." -end quote
Holds a lot of water, that does...

 

[pumphouse]

I think you have shown a lot of patience and restraint up till now. I still think you are acting properly - considering this situation. If I had given money for a product from a business, and they didn't come up with the goods in 1/8 of the time you've waited - I would be off of the hook!

At this point, one would think that he would refund you the money owed for your purchase, so that you can both go on with your own business and be done with it all. It would be in his best interest to do that too - as a reputation can be marred by not acting as he promised. When he refunds you, you will have these funds free to find those items somewhere else and deal with another business. Seems to be the best way to remedy this situation semi-amicably. If not that, then at least put a stop to it.

Quote: "You didn't get all your equipment on the first shipment either? It took an announcement of US MAIL FRAUD until I got all my stuff I pre-paid from him. It took about as long as well." -end quote
Holds a lot of water, that does...

Well said! I didnt ask for a refund once because I really want those antennas, the mounts and and the mic. Freecell says he will ship soon. And you bet im gonna update this post and let everyone know when he does.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch.........,

pumphouse is still waiting for freecell to ship his antennas, mounts and mic.............

 

[74IN]

It took an announcement of US MAIL FRAUD until I got all my stuff I pre-paid from him. It took about as long as well.

He did better than Justin.

 

[freecell]

Alignment test- Tested aganist my Kenwood TS140S. Both radios were on for 1 hour before test was begun. Kenwood set on channel 6 (27.025 00)

Realistic TRC 453 NOT ALIGNED ON FREQUENCY AS REQUESTED! RESULTS:

LSB *27.024 76 The WATTS OUTPUT WITH STEADY TONE 11 WATTS AVG
USB *27.024 70 The WATTS OUTPUT WITH STEADY TONE 14 WATTS AVG

Confused? How was this test done? I transmitted the realistic radio on LSB and USB thru my base antenna and the Kenwood was monitoring the transmit on LSB and USB. For the watt reading, tested thru a wattmeter.

This tells me that
1. Radio was not aligned and balanced- more watts on USB than LSB? Supposed to be the same output.
2. LSB and USB not aligned to 27.025 00 as tested aganist my kenwood TS 140S.


you can't use the TS140 readout, it doesn't display the ssb offsets.

for channel 6, 27.0250 the lsb tx offset is 27.0238 and the usb tx offset is 27.0262, 1200 hz. offset. power balance between the sidebands is dependant on the shape of the crystal filter. the only way to correct the tx power imbalance is to slide the offsets up or down across the filter passband which leaves the ssb transmit off frequency.

the offsets are only displayed with an inline frequency counter as the transmitter is modulated with the proper tone/s @ approximately 30 mv. audio input. my bench counter is accurate to within + or - 100 hz. > 45 min..

since the 140 doesn't directly display the ssb offsets it doesn't qualify as a piece of test equipment. in addition, the power output measurements in ssb mode are inaccurate unless pep measurement is used. the bird 43 without the adapter is unable to track pep output. furthermore, to maintain the balance of tx power across the entire 40 channel band, alignment is performed and all measurements are taken at 27.205 into a purely resistive 50 ohm dummy load exhibiting no reactance, either inductive or capacitive, not an antenna.

your ssb frequency measurements tell you nothing. on the other hand, even using the 140 which does not directly read the ssb offsets i can tell i did a pretty damn good job because there is only a 60 hz. discrepancy* between the two of them.

 

[seedkey]

you tell em freecell

 

[GLR]

Some people just have no patience. Complaining about not getting your stuff after only a few months? come on now!

 

[pumphouse]

Thank you for the explaination freecell. From what I understand, you aligned my radio to specs. My kenwood is indeed NOT a piece of official test equipment and i posted my results as i saw it. The radio you did for me TRC 453 is currently in transit to a local broadcast engineer who will evaluate the radio for me on official test equipment. I will keep you posted.

For those of you who are following this post, my complaint was that freecell did not align my radio properly. Here is my original post:

1. Alignment test- Tested aganist my Kenwood TS140S. Both radios were on for 1 hour before test was begun. Kenwood set on channel 6 (27.025 00)

Realistic TRC 453 NOT ALIGNED ON FREQUENCY AS REQUESTED! RESULTS:

LSB *27.024 76 The WATTS OUTPUT WITH STEADY TONE 11 WATTS AVG
USB *27.024 70 The WATTS OUTPUT WITH STEADY TONE 14 WATTS AVG

Confused? How was this test done? I transmitted the realistic radio on LSB and USB thru my base antenna and the Kenwood was monitoring the transmit on LSB and USB. For the watt reading, tested thru a wattmeter.

This tells me that
1. Radio was not aligned and balanced- more watts on USB than LSB? Supposed to be the same output.
2. LSB and USB not aligned to 27.025 00 as tested aganist my kenwood TS 140S.



Freecell answered the above observation with:

1. power balance between the sidebands is dependant on the shape of the crystal filter. the only way to correct the tx power imbalance is to slide the offsets up or down across the filter passband which leaves the ssb transmit off frequency.

2. power balance between the sidebands is dependant on the shape of the crystal filter
the offsets are only displayed with an inline frequency counter as the transmitter is modulated with the proper tone/s @ approximately 30 mv. audio input. my bench counter is accurate to within + or - 100 hz. > 45 min..

since the 140 doesn't directly display the ssb offsets it doesn't qualify as a piece of test equipment. in addition, the power output measurements in ssb mode are inaccurate unless pep measurement is used. the bird 43 without the adapter is unable to track pep output. furthermore, to maintain the balance of tx power across the entire 40 channel band, alignment is performed and all measurements are taken at 27.205 into a purely resistive 50 ohm dummy load exhibiting no reactance, either inductive or capacitive, not an antenna.


Conclusion:

From reading freecell's explaination, he did align my radio properly. If I knew that power output would be different on LSB and USB because of the shape of the crystal filter in the radio, I wouldnt have brought this up.

Freecell did a wonderful job on the receive and the AM transmit. One of the better sounding radios I have had in a long time. If freecell could work out his delivery time issues, I MAY even think of sending him more radios to pump up the future. (AFTER he sends my antennas, mounts and mic)

Pump

 

[freecell]

pump,

how did you like the dual amc controlled pep power levels (hi-low) that i incorporated into the nb/anl push-pull switch?

 

[pumphouse]

pump,

how did you like the dual amc controlled pep power levels (hi-low) that i incorporated into the nb/anl push-pull switch?

I like it alot. Wonderful job. Its the first time I have seen someone use that feature in the way you did. Loud, clean audio when i need it (just pull switch out) Im using a stock mic but when the switch is pulled out, it sounds like a power mic. Even monitoring stations around me (mostly HAMS) made positive comments about loud and clean the audio was with the stock mic.

The local HAMS around the area keep tabs on me audio wise and they said whoever did the radio did a good job on the audio.

By the way, what did you do to the audio section? Change the audio IC? We are trying to figure that out.

Justin DePolis did a radio for me (got stolen) that he called "hot IC" where he changed out the stock audio IC and put in another one. (this was for a cobra 29) Couldnt tell what type of audio IC he used because he defaced the numbers (scratched out the part numbers so no one could figure it out).

BTW, thanks for calling me on the phone and explaining to me more in detail about the power off balance issues and the alignment complaint I had. Also, thanks for updating me on the antenna, mic and mounts shipment.

I will update this post when antennas, mounts and mic arrives.

 

[74IN]

Justin DePolis did a radio for me (got stolen)

Haha, those words belong in the same sentence.

 

[mackmobile43]

Justin DePolis did a radio for me (got stolen)

Haha, those words belong in the same sentence.

OMg! I never thought that name would come up in a casual conversation but since it has Justin, well not really Justin but Gale the wife of the GOOB that worked there held one of my radios hostage in a feeble attempt to get me to apologize for ripping their asses about not shipping my radio after I had paid.

You guys should know me better than to let a radio stand in my way of outing a bunch of crooks as I did back in the days and now we have another member here that is repeatedly allowed to do nearly the same thing.

From what I've gathered of this guy Free cell he is an arrogant asshole who thinks he can push people over and do as he sees fit with their equipment and (IF) I were stupid enough to allow him to work on something of mine and not get it in a timely manner he would get the same warning I issued Gale and that was I was looking for a good reason to come visiting them and it would not be a happy occasion.

As far as I'm concerned free cell is a crook and should be rode out of here on a rail.

 

[Lazybones1222]

very interesting.....seems like AMPower should get a mention in this thread as well. lol

 

[74IN]

very interesting.....seems like AMPower should get a mention in this thread as well. lol

Careful, he'll kill you with his bare hands.

You'll become victim #51.