Located in Kennebunk, Maine, USA

Updated: 8 June 2008 Copyright@ 2008, Alex Mendelsohn, All rights reserved.

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The native American name Kennebunk means "long cut bank," a name that's probably a reference to Great Hill at the mouth of the Mousam River.

Hundreds of years ago, Great Hill was a landmark to Indians navigating the coast in ocean-going canoes. Great Hill was also a place where these early Americans congregated for an annual shellfish harvest.Great Hill was recently ravaged by so-called developers, in spite of attempts by townsfolk to preserve the land as a park. Cookie cutter (ugly) upscale houses, in a tract dubiously called "Admiral's Point," now dot the land.

On this page you'll find links to the notes for the Keep It Simply Sideband (KISS) transceiver, as well as its 20-M predecessor. Scroll to bottom of page for KISS construction info buttons.

You can also read about the Albacore submarine radio room restoration.

Click here to view my progress building a G3XJP reference-design

SDR transceiver (the rig and the Web pages are UNDER CONSTRUCTION).

Click here for some notes on the 2-wire Beverage receiving antenna in the woods at AI2Q.

Click here to jump to a 455-kHz product detector application (updated 28 July 2005).

Click here to learn about the famous K8IQY Model 2N2/40 all-2N2222 40-meter CW QRP rig.

Click here for details of the HF RTTY system at AI2Q. It uses a Teletype Corp. Model 28 KSR teleprinter, a CMOS/TTL converter board hitched to a Kantronics UTU terminal unit, and a Western Electric 202 polar relay.

Click here to check out a 1930s vintage "qrp" 6L6 rig with regenerative receiver.

The chief op at AI2Q doesn't live by QRP alone. Click here to view the fire bottle rigs.

Some articles I have written, plus other info (via Google).

Send comments or suggestions to ai2q@arrl.net

Construction is underway on a G3XJP-based STAR (Software Transmitter And Receiver). The exciter portion is up-and-running. Watch this Web site for photos and descriptions.

The "Blue Mainie" is a 1960 Mk.I Austin-Healey 3000. Click here and here for photos of the chief op at AI2Q at the wheel. Click on the driver-and-dog image above to see "my other car." Here's a new addition to the LBC (Little British Car) barn. Click here to see my right-hand drive 1946 MG TC, car #1321. Number 1321 was among the first 1000 such vehicles built immediately after WW-II, and is more original in most respects than many TCs. The MG Car Company in Abingdon started exporting to the United States in 1948.

Click here to see a launch-day image of the sloop Sea-Q. Many QRP operations have taken place aboard the Sea-Q, most using a Ten-Tec Argonaut 509 or Argo 515. The antenna was usually an end-fed wire hauled aloft on a spare halyard, and fed against the worthy vessel's 1500-lb. cast iron keel. After 24 years of sailing her, we've passed the ol' Sea-Q on to new owners.

Here's "chief op" Alex with "second op" Smokey at the main operating position (May 2006). The main rig is a Ten-Tec Omni-V. It can drive one of three homebrew amplifiers or a Heathkit SB-220 .

The Model 28 Teletype Corp. teleprinter is just visible on the left. A Heathkit Apache (for AM) resides on a dolly under the operating desk to the right. An Atlas 210-X is occasionally used mobile, and a Ten-Tec Argonaut 515 runs QRP.

Receivers include a Collins 51J-4 with Hammarlund HC-10 SSB detector, a National HRO-60 (used with the Apache), a 1934 National HRO, a Stewart-Warner R-392, a Collins R-390, and a Motorola R-390A. Also visible is a 1957 Collins KWM-1 (arguably the world's first transceiver) and a Drake TR7-A.

Boatanchors include a Heathkit AR-3 (my first receiver in 1959), a National NC-57, a National SW-54, Heathkit SB-303/SB-401 twins, a Hammarlund HQ-120-X, a Hallicrafters SX-99 (my 1959 Novice receiver), a Heath DX-35, and a Hammarlund HQ-180.

The KISS Transceiver

The KISS rig is on the air! First QSOs made with KM1A and VE3VKH in a roundtable on 75-fone using 640-mW and a dipole. Also received report from Prince Edward Island.

Subsequent QSOs up and down East Coast running about 2-W PEP with revised TX strip. Latest TX pre-driver stages use broadband un-tuned circuits. Both tuned and un-tuned schematics are shown.

A common-base balanced-modulator buffer stage has been added, improving carrier suppression and drive. The latest schematics also reflect a post-IF-filter amplifier stage. It boosts drive to the TX mixer and improves IF strip sensitivity.

Click photo above for larger image of nearly completed rig (still needs panel labeling).

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The KISS project stemmed from a desire to build a simple selectable sideband SSB transceiver for one band. The goal was to achieve on-the-air performance that would be indistinguishable to a listener from that of any other transceiver heard on the band. Moreover, the rig would be simple enough to demonstrate that any Radio Amateur could duplicate it from junkbox parts and with a minimum of test equipment.

The design commenced with the rig's receiver section. The goal was performance that would make it stable and selective, with enough audio output power to drive a loudspeaker to normal room volume. A 9-MHz IF includes a steep-skirted crystal bandpass filter.

The design would also have to include an AGC system that would permit listening to both strong and weak signals without having to make an AF gain control adjustment.

It was decided to use a modular approach throughout the design and the KISS's construction. Individual modules, enclosed in small aluminum chasses, would be used, and circuit blocks would reside within these modules on appropriately partitioned sub-boards.

Here's what the completed receiver section looks like. Click here for image.

Click these tinted buttons for more circuit and construction details. The boxes show receiver circuits and modules, VFO, BFO, IF, SSB generator, TX mixer, driver and PA stages. All design goals were met.