After some 30 years away from 2m and above, I decided that it was time to see what had changed. One thing that had definitely changed was the radio equipment and I was soon kitted out with an Icom 9700, something of a step-up from the Microwave Modules transverter I used to have. A dual band 11 ele (2m)/28 ele (70cm) Yagi fed with EcoFlex 15 coaxial cable completed the set-up.
I soon realised that IO84 is a long way from the activity and that the 9700's 100W really doesn't cut it these days, so my thoughts turned to more power. It quickly became apparent that 2m amps in the 400W-ish class are a) very expensive and b) there are not many suppliers out there and those that are have ludicrously lengthy waiting lists. My thoughts turned to homebrewing.
Really, I am not much of an RF engineer. Certainly when it comes to fast wiggles at 100MHz and above, design seems to be even more of a dark art form that it is lower down the spectrum. So my mind turned to amplifier "bricks" that would limit my design work to the surrounding infrastructure, control circuitry, etc. where I feel much more at home.
I've acquired a suitable amplifier module, so I'm ready to get started!
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