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Maxar 80 with CommSpec pl board - need help

Posted: Mon Dec 20, 2004 5:33 pm
by TOM-RAD
Hi,
I need some advice on this one....
I just bought a Comm Spec SS-64 pl board for a uhf Maxar 80. The original pl with this unit is the reedless (programmable) type. I disconnected the old pl (brown/white), and tied the tone in at this location (P), per the service manual. Did not work. So, I moved it to the varactor diode. This spot won't work either, no tx audio.
Any advice appreciated. Is it the splatter filter? I thought it was low pass, and would work.
Thanks very much for any help with it.
:o

spending too much time.

Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 9:18 am
by raymond345
These radios are so old that they are not
worth the time to work on them
The caps go on them and labor is
too high.
Great priced used radiops out there.
Save time and money and upgrade.

Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 10:11 am
by cathoderay
my manual shows the brn/org wire to be the pl output from the origional pl board but the tone out from the comspec board should go to point "p" have done this numerous times and has worked

Posted: Thu Dec 23, 2004 3:26 pm
by richyradio
....couple of thoughts: I'm assuming you need a different pl on tx than rx? (why else would you go through the trouble of adding an external 'deck when it's so easy to re-program the factory deck w/ a few resistors...) granted maxars are 'kinda old and crusty, not the best in a mobile environment (even when they were new) , but they make decent control stations to this day...never had a bad cap or whatever... just not that versatile...I used to make a diode matrix to shift the tx pl code if I needed it...if you do use a external deck, it would be nice to find a point on the original deck to take advantage of the reverse burst circuitry if your (external) deck does not have it....(forget wether that's possible w/ the reedless deck...) p.s. don't get near the varactor: the impedance of the deck is so low you'll kill everything; usually it will kill the osc all together...stick a 100k in series and it usually works, but why go there anyway?

thanks for the info....

Posted: Sun Dec 26, 2004 8:27 am
by TOM-RAD
Thanks to all for the info. richyradio, I just need tx pl, I did not know that the orig. programmable board was easy to reprogram. Do you have the details, or know where I can find the info? Thanks again & Hope all have a great holiday.

cathoderay: I agree, I had tried at point 'p', and had no luck there, but could not understand why.

Posted: Mon Dec 27, 2004 5:54 pm
by richyradio
Hi there....hope everybody had an ok holiday, , as for me. I can't wait for Jan 2nd....thats my holiday! i.e. life back to normal.....as for programming the "reedless' pl deck, it's the same as the mitrek reedless deck, which I thought was documented here, but I can't seem to find it ...maybe i found it elsewhere...when I get home, I know I have the info in my filing cabinet from 2 different sources on how to do it, and i will foward it to you...one that does the standard codes, another that can do any freq you want....basically, w/ a small quantity of 100 k resistors you can do any tone you want....I have a quantity of those "elements" at home, which I would give away, but it's more fun, and a learning experience to do it yourself....I'll get on tomorrow w/ the info, or you could look up "mitrek repeaters" on the web and probably find it... (along with all the HACK jobs people do to mitreks turning them into repeaters....it pains me to see holes crudely drilled into the side of the case...someday I'll post here the right way to do it....)

Posted: Tue Dec 28, 2004 3:38 pm
by Will
Lightning (Mike Morris) wrote two very good articles on the PL and DPL boards that use the resistor module and how to 'program' a different PL or DPL.

check at:

http://www.repeater-builder.com/mitrek/ ... n4181.html

or http://www.repeater-builder.com/



Mike used to work for me way back.