Thursday, August 31, 2017

Ergonomic BITX Enclosure -- 3D Print


Wow, Michael's amazingly cool BITX enclosure looks like you could use it to ask Scottie to beam you up. 
Put an end to those freakish contortions -- 3D print yourself an Ergonomic BITX box! Very FB Michael. Thanks. 

Hi Bill and Pete:

I thought you’d be interested to see my ergonomic enclosure for the BITX40. While operating homebrewed regen radios, I noticed that my hands/arms/shoulders were becoming uncomfortable after a while. After thinking about this for a few days, I realized that the dials on the front of these small radios were forcing my hands into freakish contortions—and having both hands on the dials at all times while tuning made matters worster faster! So I did some homework and determined that our arms and hands most naturally hold things toward each other, as though they are holding a small cylinder by the ends. But the conventional “dials-and-speaker-facing-front” radio case forces us to twist our hands up and outwards from our bodies to twist things. See my blog post http://blog.generaleccentric.net/?p=2009 for illustrations of this problem.

My enclosure design for the BITX40 re-orients the volume and tuning knobs toward the sides of the radio, making their operation much more natural—and pleasant. Although it’s not retro, it does have an unconventional appearance and should fit in quite naturally with all the other homebrewed solutions featured on SolderSmoke. 

You can visit my post at http://blog.generaleccentric.net/?p=2082; the box is available for download and printing at Thingiverse: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2508147

By the way, I also have a 3D printable mic for the BITX40: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2500483

73, Michael VE1LEB

Saturday, August 26, 2017

Speech Processor and Antenna Tuner/SWR meter for BITX



Check out the blog of homebrew wizard K.P.S. Kang.   OM has a nice speech processor based on the LM386.   He also has a very simple antenna tuner and SWR bridge.  FB OM.  

http://smallwonderqrp.blogspot.com/2017/08/two-essential-add-ons-for-bitx-and.html