thats all fine an good. I am not going to take a working computer go sit on an airplane and crush my battery

Just an additional note, there have been times after the mod I had the squelch off and had to click key a repeater to see if the radio was on, mine is very quiet although I wouldnt want to do that again

I did it and it works although its not for the faint at heart, its all surface mount stuff so you need a good soldinering station, good eye sight and a very steady hand

Before anyone comes back and talks not legal issue, I know that, what I am saying is if you run on frequency and in power nobody is going to care or know. If I were running an ICOM 7800 at 5 watts on channel 10, who would know it was a ham radio instead of a CB? Thats the point. I agree with those who say no self respecting ham even cares about CB

Using ham gear on 11 meters isn't what is illegal, running more than a certain power, which by the way CBrs do anyway, is what is not legal. There is nothing wrong with running a ham radio on 11 meters as long as it is at the right freq and at or below the max power allowed. That being said who wants to listen to all the filthy language that takes place on CB? We have some of that type of problem to take care in our bands but its nothing compared to CB.

Understand, and I thank you for what you do. Partial manuals are better than no manual and in general provide the needed info 90% of the time. When possible, is all I am saying, we should try to do the whole manual.

No actually I have yet to find a manual I couldn't find somewhere, in good shape, for free by some ham providing it as a service. Bama has thousands, many are only partial and they put "BAMA" on some of their manuals and say they are copyrighted, assuming they mean their page and not the whole document, but they have a lot of manuals

If you look far enough you will find SOME hams who will provide the information as a free service, real hams. We are starting a site that will offer a lot of manuals.....for free.  We will be glad to send a CD or print out for the fee of materials but you will be able to download everything for free

no your right nobody owes me a thing so lets all go out and take stuff we had no input in writing, in some cases throw a copyright on it like we own it and then turn around and sell it. Yep thats is the American way lately, screw thy neighbor

Id rather help people out with the information I have in hopes that they can benefit from what I gather together than make money off them. We are setting up a free site

I have noticed many many sites "selling" manuals for download. To put it bluntly that is as wrong as you can be. This is the day of information and it doesn't cost a lot to put up a web site or to maintain it. Most of these sites would have the site running even if they didn't SELL manuals. If someone wants to download a manual let them do it for free!. I see nothing wrong with donations, or a small fee if the individual would like the manual sent via the mail or on a CD, but to sell manuals that fellow hams can download flys into the face the Amateur community. There are some sites out there that do it right and allow downloading. BAMA does it, the only thing I have against their site is they add a page to their document and then try to write protect it so the page can't be removed from the manual. Thats to is wrong but its not as bad as charging for information.
To all who seek out this information, look around and look hard you WILL find in most cases you can find a site with a good download of what you are seeking.
If you have a manual and feel like making it available, copy all the pages into a pdf and upload it to BAMA or some other free site. In the case os kits, upload the entire manual, not just the pages you think people "need". I found in the case of one manual someone uploaded a partial heathkit manual BAMA which did not contain the construction pages of the kit. The information I needed was in the pages they left out. I found the manual eventually but I refuse to "pay" for information unless I am asking the guy to make an effort or expenditure like printing the manual out or sending it to me on a CD. Yes it takes time to maintain a manual library but you know what, thats no excuse there are those who do to help others out instead of making money off it.

Sounds like you are not putting the pl259s together right. To do it right first be sure you have a good grade pl259 because it takes a lot of heat and the plastice center ones melt. You want the ones with the teflon of ceramic centers.

1. cut the coax cover bac 1.5 to 20 inches, do not hurt
   or move the shield.

2. tine the shield from the black insulation out about    
  .5 inch. You want the shield to "Just" wick the sold    
   in place. When this is done right you will see the
   strands of wire covered with solder and held
   together. It will not be smooth and shiny.

3. with a box cutter os something slice the solder
   about 3/8 inches from the black coax outer case.
   You do not have to go all the way to the center
   conductor as a matter of fact you dont want to
   go all the way in order to protect it. When you
   finish this step you will see a very nice squared
   off cut with the tinned coax in center insulator
   being even and sharp. The center insulator will
   not and must not extend beyond the tinned shield.

4. with hose pliers, twist off the end piece of coax
   and insulation. Twisting the end of the center
   insulation will finish the breaking of the center
   insulation without damage to the center conductor
   and you can pull it off.

5. slip on the PL259 and use the hose pliars to
   "screw" the PL259 on the end of the coax. Turn it
   until the tinned coax bottoms out on the inside
   of the PL259

6. Solder the center conductor in the tip.

7. This is where you heat things up. It takes a good
   amount of heat here. keep the coax fairly straight
   i.e. laid out on a table top, and solder the PL259
   to the shield by making sure the solder gets into
   PL259 holes and is wicked into the shield as well
   attached to the PL259.

8. When done set it aside, do not bend the end as the      
   outer and inner insulation will be very hot and as
   such can be damaged until things cool down but once
   things are cool enough for you to hold the end in
   you hand you will have a perfect 50 ohm connection
   that will be darn near impossible to get off so
   remember to put the outer portion of the PL259 on
   the coax before you attach the plug because you
   only leave it off once using this method.

There are lots of software programs out their to do packet with a c computer, all software. I have used them a couple years ago and they work fine. We are getting back into it in this area so I'll be using it again. research packet in google. There are dome types of pactor that require a special TNC. Unfortunately there are some organizations that have decided to require the use of the packet that uses these special modes and the units for them cost a lot of money. The thing they have forgot is the key word volunteer I guess. I may be mistaken but I think mars is one of the groups that require an expensive unit. They are loosing operators because of this requirement

One thing I ran into is phonelic connectors, don't know if its spelled right but you get the picture. stay away from them above a couple hundred watts, they tend to burn quite easily. Use a good grade pl259 with the teflon in it

search google on the subject sb1000 schematics, there are several places you can download a reasonable schematic fo the SB1000.