Ramsey Electronics - Kits

[WN4V]

       I've read reviews on Ramsey Electronics kits and it seems as though you either love them or despise them. Has anyone on this site had good results with them, particularly the kits related to ham radio ?

[K1CJS]

Their reputation isn't bad--but it isn't great either.  It's been a while, but I believe that the sore point is their instructions--and their support.  The kits are fairly good except for those two points.

[KJ7WC]

Well said, K1CJS. I've enjoyed assembling a few of their kits. The instructions could benefit from some technical and grammatical proofing.

As to their service, I thought to make a contact before assembling the DDF1 Doppler Direction Finder kit, which is a direct replica of WA2EBY's original design. I asked if Ramsey could see any issue with using proper sockets during construction. Ramsey instructs consumers to solder chips directly to the project boards. The response I got was very short, and simply stated that some RF circuits needs limited lead length and I was strongly advised to assemble as per the instructions. Well, a little searching for the original QST article proved that WA2EBY used sockets, and analysis of the circuit will show that the chips work at audio frequencies. Any guesses as to what I decided to do?

I'd say that Ramsey can satisfy some kit building itches. Just be aware of your construction technique.

[AD0AR]

I built this kit many years ago while I was in the Navy.  I had much time to build this as I was on a 6 month Med cruise.  I measured every component and assembled it on my bench with all the "2M" tools which the Navy refers to as soldering tools.  I found a few resistors which were on the fine line from being in/ out of tolerance, so I used some resistors from some broken consumer electronics to get everything as close to schematic stated values. 
  The result?  I have never in my life made any kit that was more "dead on" and did not require ANY tweaking at all! 
  I just kinda wish that the antenna assemblies were a little better made.  The ones provided will not stay on a car unless you glue them to the roof!