[TenTec] CorsairII obsolescence - MCU copying

[Steve Hunt]

OK folks - I'm a bit overwhelmed by the interest!

Here's a few comments on the various questions:

* Way back when - the late 1970s - I programmed Motorola 8-bit NMOS 
micros in Assembler, so the 16F84 PIC wasn't a totally "cold start"; 
mind you the brain is now 30 years older! The hardest part was timing 
the various paths through the programme to ensure I got an accurate 
gating period.

* PICs are so flexible that I'm sure the same approach could be taken 
for the CorsairI, but it would be tricky to develop a solution without a 
radio as a test bed.

* I don't have facilities for producing PCBs, but once it is all 
finalised I'm happy to publish the schematic and the code. Anyone with 
the facilities is then welcome to produce a PCB and programme the PIC; 
but as you can see from the photos it's fairly easy to simply hand-wire 
a board.

Finally, I have a question: my CorsairII manual inter-board wiring 
diagram shows a link between the DSB board and the MCU board carrying 
the "SPOT" function. I can't see why this would be needed, it doesn't 
show up on the MCU board schematic, and there's no sign of the 
connection to my physical board. Does anyone know if that is simply an 
error in the inter-board wiring diagram?

73,
Steve G3TXQ