Torn apart HT1000 finals

[SAMD65]

Hi all,

I recently acquired 3 UHF HT1000 for a very good price, so good that I knew there would be something wrong. I opened each one up, and I discovered the previous owner decided to remove some components from each. The strange thing is that the only ones removed were the choke providing bias to the final PA and some filter/bypass caps on the DC line. All 3 have the same parts removed. It didn't look like anything else was touched. Is there a reason someone would do this?

Sam

[FireCpt809]

Because they were told to disable them before sold at auction by some department. God forbid some person gets ahold of a radio that can be used on a police channel. Its easier to clone them with a generic codeplug. Being lazy is to pop the cover with a screwdriver and jam it across the board.

[MTS2000des]

Well it could have been worse, they could have just drilled a hole straight through them...

[SAMD65]

Because they were told to disable them before sold at auction by some department. God forbid some person gets ahold of a radio that can be used on a police channel. Its easier to clone them with a generic codeplug. Being lazy is to pop the cover with a screwdriver and jam it across the board.

I can't imagine they still do that now. Considering the cost of a baofeng it really doesn't pay to destroy good radios.

But damn....well, let's see if bridging the coil and getting power back gives me output!

[mike m]

Don't ever buy used radios from Arizona Dept. Of public safety from e-bay, there is a monkey who works there and drills holes thru the radio cases into the controller and RF boards. It makes me sick seeing a newer Motorola or GE/Harris radio for sale with a hole drilled thru it. I mean why even sell it if your going to damage it and make it non repairable?

[SAMD65]

I can't imagine they still do that now. Considering the cost of a baofeng it really doesn't pay to destroy good radios.

But damn....well, let's see if bridging the coil and getting power back gives me output!

Well, placing a good blob of solder where the choke goes gets me almost 4W on two of them. Radio 1 has good transmit audio, and radio 2 has (as expected) an "epic amount of hum". The third radio I picked up not only had the components removed but also had a lead cut off of the PA. Some careful soldering let me get a wire to what remained on the transistor itself. I'm only getting 1.5W out and didn't actually try it on the air yet, but 2 out of 3 isn't bad.

Now the real fun begins. Radio 1 may have great TX audio, but I had to change the setting for the level of deviation. The larger problem is that the squelch won't even open. I'm hoping that it's just a problem with programming.

Radio 2 has crummy TX, but the receiver works great. It's going to be getting some actual chokes later tonight, so we'll see if I can have at least one radio that works 100%.

Don't ever buy used radios from Arizona Dept. Of public safety from e-bay, there is a monkey who works there and drills holes thru the radio cases into the controller and RF boards. It makes me sick seeing a newer Motorola or GE/Harris radio for sale with a hole drilled thru it. I mean why even sell it if your going to damage it and make it non repairable?

Are there people that actually buy them? I guess if the knobs or a screen or keypad are still ok....


Sam

[SAMD65]

I can't believe it, but it looks like I have 2 radios for $5 each. There seems to be some minimal hum on some frequencies, but it's barely noticeable. I had a long conversation with someone transmitting 2 minutes on / 1 minute off for a good half hour with each radio. I'm still getting only 1.5W out from one of them, but the audio is good so I'm not questioning it.

The third one has the best transmit audio without any hum, but it's receiver is totally shot. Squelch won't open at all, and if the monitor is open when there's a signal present there's a horrible squealing. Oh well. 2 out of 3 isn't that bad. Now it's off to be properly aligned with a good service monitor and they'll be officially airworthy.

Thanks to all who replied.