FDIM 2023 Buildathon = Pocket PAL ][+Price: $40.00 |
5/05 UPDATE!
I received confirmation that we can access the Holiday Inn Express Internet service via Ethernet cable and LIVE stream the Buildathon! Steve, N1SH, will man the *booth*. We will attempt a 2 or 3 camera setup to capture the goings on in the room and on a volunteer *pace* builder. I did a LIVE stream Buildathon from FDIM years ago but we had to hold it at midnight to get the media room. Even then, we had 18 builders in the room and another 50 or so around the world either building or just tuning in.... This LIVE stream will happen during the actual Buildathon on Friday the 19th of May at 4:00 PM. There probably isn*t enough time for shipping kits to overseas QTHs but US and Canada destinations are fairly safe bets.
This item is for a SEAT AND KIT at the FDIM Buildathon. If you want a kit sent to your house see:
FDIM PocketPAL ][+ MAILED TO YOUR QTH
The original POCKET PAL][ description:
The PocketPAL II is a mint tin based shirt pocket friendly tester for all kinds of hamfest goodies that you cannot ordinarily test with a DMM. Several constant current and voltage sources can be used to test panel meters, LEDs, and many other current or voltage driven devices. An on-board oscillator can running at 14.31818 Mhz and a divide by 2 circuit is used for testing oscilloscopes, receivers, frequency meters and other RF devices using the square wave RF signal. A Picaxe microprocessor is also on-board and is programmed to act as a frequency counter with Morse code audio output, and an audio frequency sweep generator for testing headphones, speakers, piezo elements etc. A crystal oscillator ties to the frequency counter circuit for measuring quartz crystals.
I have turned it into the POCKET PAL ][+ to add more testing functionality and we will be building this NEW version for the FDIM Buildathon!
Changes:
1 The fixed 14.318 oscillator can & divide by 2 square wave circuit can has been updated to a Pierce crystal oscillator circuit with 2 jumper selectable crystals. TWO HC-49US crystals come with the kit but they are installed into sockets so you can change them any time you like!
Added a simple test keyer output
Added option control pot
The documentation for the original Pocket PAL ][ version have titles starting with Pocket PAL II, whereas documents pretaining to the BUILDATHON will have a ][+ postfix.
I have NOT generated any of the NEW documents yet but the overall design is the same as the older version so you can get a feel for the kit by looking at the older docs. THE NEW VERSION WILL BE EVEN BETTER!
Documentation
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