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Equipment / Panaxis FME 500 issue
« on: August 08, 2018, 1618 UTC »
Going to take a shot in the dark and hope someone is familiar with the older Panaxis FME 500 exciter.
Mine was build years ago and worked perfectly.I had put it away working about 20 yrs ago and recently took it out to play around.
It powers up,but PLL does not lock.Searched around for a replacement PLL to see if that was bad,actually found one but was not easy.
Swapping that out did nothing new.
Finally went through all solder joints,swapped out the 470uf electro and both 10uf`s...a slight better improvement but still no lock.
Swapped out the 2 main RF transistors and all 3 trimmer caps and even re-wound a new coil and tap.
Although it appears to tune better and wants to lock,still drifting all over.Green LED lights on/off/on/off ...etc.
Depends how close my hand is to circuit or what I touch.
Sometimes it acts like it will lock,but never stays that way.
I just ordered new 47uh cap and all tantalum`s to see if they deteriorated over time.
After that...not sure what else to do and hope someone has an idea I am missing.
Jim
Mine was build years ago and worked perfectly.I had put it away working about 20 yrs ago and recently took it out to play around.
It powers up,but PLL does not lock.Searched around for a replacement PLL to see if that was bad,actually found one but was not easy.
Swapping that out did nothing new.
Finally went through all solder joints,swapped out the 470uf electro and both 10uf`s...a slight better improvement but still no lock.
Swapped out the 2 main RF transistors and all 3 trimmer caps and even re-wound a new coil and tap.
Although it appears to tune better and wants to lock,still drifting all over.Green LED lights on/off/on/off ...etc.
Depends how close my hand is to circuit or what I touch.
Sometimes it acts like it will lock,but never stays that way.
I just ordered new 47uh cap and all tantalum`s to see if they deteriorated over time.
After that...not sure what else to do and hope someone has an idea I am missing.
Jim