CCI Amp

I now have about 5 homebrew or kit QRP rigs lying around in the 1-7W range and a 5W Flex-1500.  My antennas at 20m and above are pretty efficient.  Okay my antennas are bogus, pathetic and sad for someone who lives out in the rural landscape and owns 35.63 acres of land.  But they are much better that the typical suburbanite with less than 80' trees has.  (I'm from the Midwest.  where are there 90' tall trees to get your wires up 80' at anyway?  30'-40' up in trees is that best I've ever done in Illinois, Indiana, Wisconsin and Iowa...)

Having said that.. I've done some decent DX on 20m on my Cushcraft A3 (or slightly redesigned by me version).. but also missed a couple of rare ones while on the Flex-1500 on PSK.  On 40m and 80m.. I'm weak even to stateside stations at 5W.  My antennas there work but aren't terribly efficient.  At 100W, I've done Australia, Guam, New Zealand and Hawaii at 40m on my half square.  So.. you see... a little more power makes the difference in a lot of cases.  Missing Indonesia and China on 20m PSK when 10db more would have nailed them makes me think that operating with the least power necessary means that it's OK when more power is necessary.  There are times that life is too short for QRP.

I've decided that, since I was 16 years old, I wanted to build a solid state PA.  The Communication Concepts parts kits for the AN762 amplifier looks like the best way to go.  The EB63A is another version of the same amp but the "single diode" biasing isn't really a good way of doing that.. and all I'd give up on the AN762 is the on board COR... which I could do on a hand etched PCB or perf in about an hour anyway.

I just received updated pricing.  It's $108 plus $14 a band for filters (which I may build myself with relays and microprocessor control anyway) and then $10.50 to ship.  Since I'd want a filter bank to test it out.. I'd likely buy a 20m filter (maybe 40m too..) that's about $132.50 for one filter bank or $146.5 for two.. it's tempting.  I imaging that the 20m filter would work at 30m and the 40m would work at 60m.. so.. maybe that would be a good start to a bigger project.

My mother sent me $100 for Christmas and told me to buy something fun.. this may be it.  Thanks Mom.

I should state that the ultimate in a 100W QRP afterburner is the unit designed by Juha of the SDR-Cube fame.  He really designs stuff like I'd do it if I didn't have as much ADHD as I do and had the time.  If I had more money (see first post about one-income and a wife and four young kids) I'd order off the $600+ kit (with shipping, money conversion, etc.) and have the most beautifully designed and kitted amp I've seen...  but I don't and will have to go "ghetto" on this one...

I didn't really mention this before.. but I want to build a HF rig to do my primary operating with.  Will it be the SDR-Cube, (a 5W module to replace the TXPA), the CCI amp and the rebuilt SB-200 at 700W on 20m???.. well it could be....