Dennis Cobbe, was the founder of Transworld Electronics (1975) based in Escondido CA.
He designed the Metron HF amplifiers because, as an avid radio amateur, he was unsatisfied with the HF amplifier selection for amateur radio in the 1970s. The Metron product line was based on a Transworld government/military product lines.
Interesting story about Dennis Cobbe's youthful adventures.
http://ketekawerau.peoplesnetworknz.info/sir_james_fletcher_kawerau_museum/topics/show/57-television-comes-to-the-bay-of-plentyDennis sold his company, Transworld to Datron and continued to work there for a few years.
He passed away (sk) in 1997. Helge Granberg (designer of Motorola solid-state RF transistors) had died the previous year (1996).
The Metron 1000B HF amplifier was also known as a Transworld MA1000.
The Transworld amplifiers were 28 VDC powered and used house marked MRF-422 RF transistors.
The Metron ampliiers operated from 12.5 VDC (mobile capable), so it used the MRF-454 RF transistor.
Datron World Communications no longer supports these amplifiers (NO manuals, parts, schematics, etc.).
There are a couple of Yahoo groups that focus on support for these units, this is the Transworld Yahoo group.
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/transworld_radio/The Metron 1000B used four, two device (MRF-454) modules with combiners and 6 bandpass filters, and could be fully remoted. Although the WARC bands were not listed on the bandswitch, it has been reported that the 1000B model will cover them.
This 1000B model has these known drawbacks.
http://www.k0bg.com/amplifiers.html1. There were no cooling fans and unless you wanted to replace the finals on a regular basis,
you had to add fans to increase cooling.
2. The input circuitry used swamping resistors to reduce the drive power to the finals.
3. If you find one of these used, make sure it works perfectly.
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