Homebrew rig features

[brandon7861]

If you had your heart set on homebrewing the most insane rig you've ever owned, what features would you want it have?

I am looking for any and all crazy ideas. Simple suggestions like "audio compression" are great, but if you also know of a neat way to implement it, I would love to hear those ideas too.

One of the reasons I wanted those BU2630F PLL chips I mentioned in the other thread (which I decided to order) was so I could start with a single 5.12MHz OCXO and have that feed the reference on multiple PLL chips so each LO would be nearly as stable as the OCXO and could be changed on the fly for testing different filters and other experiments. All I would need to do is change a VCO coil and tank component here and there and send some new serial data, no crystal swapping. I know, thats a job for those Si5351 modules, sure, but I can't wrap my head around it's datasheet, so I'm going with what I know (3 wire serial input, no code BS).

 

[brandon7861]

I think another neat feature would be to make each stage modular, like an actual block diagram, where each main function was contained it its own shielded unit. Those blocks could be quickly removed, tested out of the radio, and easily swapped with something else. Say i wanted to go from a single balanced mixer to a double balanced mixer. And then from there, maybe swap that out with a mixer having diplexed IF ports just to see the difference.

I would want the thing to be a perpetual learning platform, not just a daily driver.

How about using one of those heavy toroid transformers out of a high power sound system as a 48v power supply and some mosfet finals? Got an old denon here with bad relays (excuse) that has a beast of a transformer.