Dave Kirby said:
>It is clearly almost impossible for an amateur to repair commercially
>produced radio equipment. I don't think it will be too long before it
>will be hard for him to make his own.
I don't disagree with David here at all, but I don't see the the problem
being merely restricted to amateurs. It's getting much harder for the
professional lab to prototype anything, too. OK, so we supposedly can
simulate with great accuracy ( and not insignificant cost!) PC layouts etc,
but at the end of the day, the prototype has to be de bugged. If one talks
in terms of large volume production, that's probably not too bad - just
order yet another spin of the 6 layer board or whatever, but for some
specialised gear that's only going to get a run of maybe a couple of
thousand, there's a definite cost and time problem for the small
manufacturer. Already, in many cases, it's cheaper to go a FPGA than an
ASIC, but still very expensive, while as functions in 'discrete'
CMOS/TTL/ECL disappear, the options there get more limited. In analogue
circuits, the situation is even worse, with many of the small scale
integrated circuits just disappearing off the market. It makes the start up
business much harder, too. Even here, we're getting to the stage that a new
IC has to be sent outside to be assembled onto a board so that it can be
evaluated.
I suppose the situation is analogous to the development of the motor
industry. Maybe it will soon be easier to find the parts to build a tube
transceiver than a solid state one! Looking at the prices being charged
over here for air variable caps, of all sizes from miniature receiving
upwards to 'toast rack' transmitting variables, I figure I've got some
valuable assets sitting on the shelf!
73
Peter G3RZP
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