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write your own review of the Small Wonder Labs SW+ Series.
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AD6KA
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Rating: 5/5
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Jan 26, 2012 10:46
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LItele Rig, Big Signal
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Time owned: 3 to 6 months
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This is yet another terrific kit from Dave Benson. Parts, PC Board Quality, and Documentation second to none. Elecraft Quality.
Super simple but fun build.
Hears great, and I get almost 4 watts output (!)measured with my Elecraft W1 digital SWRBridge/Wattmeter, but I cranked it down to 2.5 watts and PUT A HEAT SINK ON THE FINAL PA
TRANSISTOR. I think this last item is important.
Winding L1 in the VFO exactly according to the manual put me exactly where I wanted to be, smack in the middle of the Novice Band. And knowing that I can change the base frequency simply by removing an L1 turn or adding a small cap is nice, should I change my mind later.
People I chat with on CW give me good reports for
tone, and can't believe I'm barely running 3 watts into a multiband vertical or 40m dipole.
(I mostly use the vertical because the dipole is setup for the phone band).
This kit would be PERFECT for a new ham or one new to buildig who "wants to get his feet wet".
I can't remember the last time one of Dave's kits had a missing part. And even if you screw
up part yourself, he simply drops it in the mail for you. He is always there by email
for Technical Support if needed, which it was not needed with this kit.
I plan to add a Pico Keyer kit for this rig from HamGadgets.com and also a .5w LM386 audio amp to drive a small speaker. Am also going to have jacks for either straight key or paddle. I see no need for a frequency counter display, but other guys have added them to theirs.
This is the PERFECT inexpensive project for the ham itching to build a small, USEFUL project
for his shack, and it would make a superb portable/backpack rig as current drain is very low.
It's hard to come up with more superlatives when describing this rig.
If you have any questions about this rig or
how I built and modified mine, please feel free to qrite me.
My email is good at QRZ.com under AD6KA.
73, Ken AD6KA/5R8GQ
PS JUST GET ONE!!!
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K1AVE
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Rating: 5/5
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Jan 3, 2012 09:00
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Great Kits
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I've built, own and still operate the 80, 40, 30 and 20 meter versions and all are a blast to build and use! Great RX with sharp edge bandpass. MSRP is now $60 not the $90 as noted. I'd recommend anything that Dave sells - he knows what he's doing and he cares.
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2M0CFB
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Rating: 5/5
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Jan 3, 2012 05:55
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Great kit, great value, great support.
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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I ordered the SW+20 from Dave on 19 December thinking I'd get it in the new year some time. The kit arrived here in Scotland on 29 December; I was incredulous. Opening the well packaged carton and finding everything there as listed, I set the kit down for a while. Unable to contain myself for long I made a start. Reading through the manual identified one errata, R17 must be installed the opposite way to the silk screen.
Alignment was quite straight-forward; I'd not done this kind of thing before, but got there eventually. I also embodied a RIT mod from the instructions that are on Dave's website. This works well; if you plan to do this it's worth building it in so you only need to select C7 & C8 values once. I get 43kHz (14.022-14.065) of the band and the RIT gives about plus or minus 1kHz. I changed C29 as my sidetone was down at 500hz, a 220pf ceramic gave me very close to 800hz, which is where the audio peak seems to be. Finally this thing has a rock stable VFO, I've applied a few coats of nail varnish to L1 and it can sit there for hours without wandering any more than about 100hz.
If you want to have a good time building a wonderfully reproduceable design go for it!
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AB4ZT
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Rating: 5/5
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May 1, 2011 05:20
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SW-40+ A Great Kit
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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This is my first QRP kit, so I don't have others to compare it against. However, I am giving this a 5 for the following reasons:
- The kit was complete, no missing parts
- The instructions were well written and thorough
- Quality PCB - soldering was very easy
- Alignment was very simple and straightforward
- Great circuit design and features. The radio performs very well, and there is plenty, plenty of audio
- Most important of all, I thoroughly enjoyed building and using it. It worked right off and my first QSO was with an XE2 station about 1,200 miles distant. I have mine set to as close to 1.5 watts output as I can measure.
Bottom line, whether you have done kits before or this is your first one, you will really enjoy building, and just as important, using this radio. One piece of advice: If you don't have one yet, one of those "helping hands" circuit board holders makes a world of difference. Get yourself one.
By the way, in a separate post in Company Reviews I noted that I received very prompt service of my order, so no fears there, either.
73,
Richard, AB4ZT
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N6MUK
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 19, 2010 10:17
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Great Kit, SW-80+
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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In the past I have built and used a Ten Tec 1300 series transceiver on 40 meters and an MFJ Cub transceiver on 20 meters. I also own an OHR Explorer II transceiver on 30 meters, that I bought used on ebay (assembled by someone else). Each and every QRP rig has its quirks for sure...
Saddened by the fact that I was lacking the ability to operate QRP on 80 meters, I ordered a Small Wonder Labs SW-80+ kit from Dave Benson.
-Assembly is straight forward. Not as involved as the TT 1300, but definitely more involved than the MFJ Cub. While the instructions and the kit are well thought through, I can't quite recommend the SW+ series for the first time builder working on their own.
-My SW-80+ worked straight off but the audio in the headphones was low. I contacted Dave about it and he lead me in the direction of finding the problem. I had accidentally inserted a wrong value capacitor somewhere in the audio signal path. After I changed that, the rig provided plenty of audio to drive ear buds or headphones.
-Even before I fixed my error in the audio chain, I was making fine business QSOs with this great little rig. In fact, my first CQ call on 3.527 mHz brought an immediate reply from a station a few states away, and a nice little rag chew ensued.
-This rig has no RIT. I can't honestly say that I've ever missed it. RIT is something I rarely use anyhow.
-This rig has no Automatic Gain Control. That concerned me when I bought the kit but it shouldn't have. The "volume" control on the SW series is actually an RF gain attenuator. I was skeptical of this but it really works great. Its easy and natural to adjust the gain and I've never missed (or noticed) that AGC is lacking. I suppose in a hot contest it would fall short but that's not what this type of rig is for.
-A good QRP receiver (in my opinion) has a quality of clarity on the band. What I mean is, I feel I'm operating closer to the band and the signals. It feels more life like, more dynamic, more 3 dimensional in my ears. I get drawn in. Dave's single conversion superhet design, with it's rich sounding audio chain and smooth QSK, is great in this respect.
-This SW+ rig outputs a clean 1.5 Watts of RF that is shockingly effective! With most state-side QSOs, when the band is in decent shape, I'll give a 589 or 599 and typically receive a 569 or 579. That's not bad considering most hams I work on 80 meters are running 100W or more. As with all QRP radios, your antenna is the most important thing.
-This rig is not really a DX machine because 1.5 Watts is thin for DXing on 80 meters. I've worked Alaska, Hawaii, Canada and The Caribbean and with a better 80 meter antenna I would probably do more. For real QRP DX fun, 40 meters has been my power house band. This rig on 80 is smooth, relaxed, fun and great for rag chews.
Overall, a solid performer with a GREAT little receiver, good instructions, good economy and the GREAT support of Dave Benson. Highly recommended!
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WB5L
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Rating: 5/5
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Nov 15, 2010 13:09
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My “first” radio, building the SW40+
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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I was going to build “my own” radio. An original WB5L design, allowing me to gain a deeper understanding of not only how it works, but providing something more. I had built various projects for the shack; two versions of soundcard interfaces, DC power controls, etc., but not a single radio. Yes I was bitten by the builders bug. I researched and decided that a good primer was the Pixie. I picked up two of them at the local Hamfest for a song.
After a several months of playing around with various Pixie designs, I had decided that the Pixie was good to understand the basics of direct conversion receivers, but not so good of an operating radio. It has an annoying constant tone, which is transmitted all the time, albeit in the micro-watt range, but I could still hear it in my “big rig” with the antenna disconnected. The design, although simple, was just not what I envisioned as my first home brew rig.
After researching on-line, I decided on the SW series of mono-band CW radios from Small Wonder Labs. Dave Benson, K1SWL, has quite a reputation with his radio kits. I ordered the SW40+ kit from Dave on November 1st. I had already scavenged a nice box from an old computer serial port switch. I also purchased the K-PCB Tiny CW Keyer Kit from K1EL. I had already put that together originally for the Pixie radio. The K-12 keyer board is only 10 bucks, what a deal! It has memory, and all the options one would need to use an Iambic keyer. After all the research on-line, I also ordered a 100k ohm 10-turn pot for the tuning of the SW40+, and a 5k ohm pot with an on-off switch for the receiver gain from Mouser Electronics. I had a 10-turn dial in my junk box, given to me by my Elmer K4COF Phil (now SK), way back when. I always kept that little black dial, and just “knew” that I would use it someday. With that black dial, I decided to paint the re-purposed switch box black as well, it looked much better than the dull tan color of the original enclosure.
The excitement peaked as I received a package from Small Wonder Labs in the mailbox last Friday, November 12th. I could hardly eat dinner as I opened the package from Dave. It had a nice looking printed circuit board, a CD with the docs, along with a bag of parts with various internal bags, of which I decided to finish up dinner before un-packing. I told the XYL, “I guess you know what I am going to be doing this weekend, see you later”, and with that, I disappeared into the depths of the basement man cave, as the wife calls it.
Dave’s documentation was quite good, the “first things first” piece is something that is lacking with most kit building documentation. Failure to plan is a plan that fails, they say, so I proceeded to cautiously remove the various components and place them where I can identify them quickly. This turns out to be a great idea: I printed a copy of the parts list on some good thick paper, and started punching holes with a piece of wire, for the components. I inserted the correct components in the holes, next to their respective names. What do you know? Everything was accounted for! This took an hour or so, however I decided that this time, I was going to take my time and do things right. After feeling good about my parts as placed, I warmed up the soldering iron. Soldering with plated through holes was a real treat. It took a few parts to discover that if I held the iron on the pad just a second longer, the solder would fill the hole through the other side. I finished about one fourth of the board, before my eyes started getting blurry, and went to bed.
Saturday morning, I could hardly wait until I got back into the shack for the SW40. I took my time, double checked the parts placement, and finished the board around 3 PM. Looking good! After wiring in the various controls, along with the K-PCB keyer, it was time for the smoke test! There’s nothing quite like the first sounds coming from that pile of parts you just soldered together. I’d say it was much like that first QSO after finally getting your license. There was only one problem, it would not tune! Looking at the schematic, the 10-turn pot was checked, and I discovered that it was not changing the 8-volts as mentioned in Dave’s troubleshooting section of the docs. So after considering that I was just getting tired, I left it again for the night.
Sometime early in the morning of Sunday the 14th, I had an epiphany. A vision of the schematic of a variable resister was floating in my head. There has to be 100k across the resister for pins 1 and 3, all I have to do is find which two pins have 100k ohms across them, and that 100k reading does not change while turning the knob. That would be the next thing to check after breakfast. As it turns out, I was right, the pin out was 2-1-3, instead of the proverbial 1-2-3. After connecting the tuning pot the correct way, I had tuning! Imagine that! The alignment went as prescribed afterwards, and I have a nice 2 watt output signal from 7.000 through 7.035 Mhz. Rather than mess around with the rig, I decided that was good enough. I could turn the power up to over 5 watts, but decided to keep it back at 2 where it was designed.
After getting it all buttoned up, I proudly displayed the new rig to the XYL. “All is well”, I proclaimed. I finally had built my own radio. “All the planets are in alignment”, I joked. She was very supportive, and applauded my accomplishment. (Is this still a dream?). I spent the rest of the afternoon listening to the crisp sounds of CW on my new rig. The 4-pole crystal filter has some ringing, but can be eliminated by simply moving the tuning dial just a little. The 10-turn pot was worth all the trouble, and that little black 10-turn dial, well, it’s finally got a purpose in life besides filling a drawer in my junk box. K4COF, The Crafty Old Fox is somehow looking down and smiling. The bandwidth, as measured by Ham Radio Deluxe from the sound card, shows to be around 600 Hz. The side-tone comes in around 800 Hz, pretty much in the middle of the pass-band. I could actually hear some signals that was too far down in the noise with my “big rig” (TS-450). I heard many stations from all around the world!
While not my own design, this has been a great experience. Not only have I proven to myself that I could actually build a radio, I now have a renewed interest in brushing up on the code. I have accomplished the goal of learning more about how a radio works, and now I am ready for tackling more advanced projects. I can see myself using the little SW40+ at field day, or just anywhere while traveling or camping. It will be a treasured piece of the shack forever.
Glenn Kilpatrick
WB5L
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NS2X
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Rating: 5/5
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Jul 18, 2010 19:11
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FANTASCTIC QRP RIG !
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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The Small Wonder Labs SW40+ is a FANTASTIC little QRP RIG... I purchased the 40-meter version and the wait was short. Ordered; April, 25, received; May, 17. It went together very nicely. It took me +/- 2 hours per night, for four nights. I mounted / soldered one component at a time. I used the very good detailed instructions from K7QO; "Building the Small Wonder Labs Sw-40+ ver.1.0”. I had no issues with anything. I had lost one small cap when I dumped everything on my floor, but Dave, K1SWL, sent one out immediately, free of charge. That's Great Customer Service!
I happened to finish the great little rig about an hour after the CQWPX started, so I tried the little bugger. Super Results with limited operating time. Bonaire was my first contact with the SW40+. I contacted 20 Countries: Bonaire, USA, Virgin Is, France,
Puerto Rico, Canada (BC, QC, PE, ON, SK) Costa Rica, Chile, Brazil, Canary Island, Cyprus, Aruba, Italy, Nicaragua, Hawaii, Slovenia, Slovak Rep, Cuba, Uruguay, and Honduras. Also, worked 25 States; CA, AZ, WA, MT, CO, NM, TX, HI, LA, AR, MO, MN, MI, OH, GA, FL, PA, NY, MD, DE, NJ, CT, RI, MA, NH. Now that's fantastic results from a 1.5watt QRP Rig. Used a 160-meter, horizontal delta loop up about 40 feet. Feeding it with twin-lead and a MFJ-969 Tuner.
My band spread was 7.033 to 7.072. I was hoping to install a small switch, by Field Day, so I could switch in some capacitance, for C7, to drop the band down to include 7.001 to 7.033. That switch modification, plus wire to capacitor didn’t work very, too much capacity in wire or coax. So I installed a Molex connector, in place of C7, from Jameco, and placed the 22pfd across the connector and it drops the band spread to; 7.002-7.039. Now I can get 7.002 to 7.072 just by placing/pulling the cap connector.
Other basic mods: I added a Molex connector to the circuit end of the coax, so I could completely remove the circuit board, if needed. I also soldered in a TO-220 Socket (Jameco), for easy changing of the Final Amp, 2SC2166.
Frequency Drift is very low. Almost nil. That was one of its selling factors, for me choosing the SW40+. NOTE: I considered about 5 or 6 other QRP rigs and this one didn't have negative comments like the others.
With the standard tuning pot I didn’t find any need for RIT, even during the crowded contest. The RF gain control hasn’t been needed. It is usually turned all the way back. It would be nice to wire in an AF control. The audio output was good enough to drive the MFJ-281 ClearTone Speaker on most signals.
SO…. if you are looking for a single band QRP rig to try, TRY this one, I highly recommend it. 73... Greg NS2X.
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NW9T
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Rating: 5/5
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Apr 27, 2010 20:31
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Quality Kit
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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I just finished building this kit tonight and haven't even tried to make my first QSO but just had to write a review based on the kit itself. Instructions, parts list and other documentation are very clear and thorough. PC board is well laid out, screen printing very clear and component locations well marked. Spacing is adequate and not overly crowded. There are some torroids to wind, but nothing complicated.
This rig worked the very first time I powered it up without needing to do any troubleshooting. Easily aligned and set to the recommended 1.5 watts output. Signal transmitted, which I monitored on my big rig is clean and steady. Receive is surprisingly good for such a small and simple rig, I had no problem picking up numerous signals using my attic mounted 40 meter dipole.
As mentioned by other reviewers help is an email away.. Customer service at Small Wonder Labs is a class act that's hard to beat. I'm absolutely thrilled with the results of my experience buidling the 40 meter version of the SW+ and will be looking forward to building more kits from this company in the not too distant future.
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M0BMN
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Rating: 5/5
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Jan 23, 2010 12:51
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Great Value Kit
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I have built the 80/40/30/ and 20m versions of this kit and i am really impressed with the performance and value. I am involved in the running of the UK chapter of FISTS and we used this as a club project a couple of years ago and may do again soon. It is a easy build radio with good clear instructions. ok the basic kit does not come with a case or pots and knobs but that means you can choose just how you want the finished set to look , if you wish you can buy a purpose made case and control set which looks very nice but doubles the price (still a good deal) only problem i have had and i have had it on all the ones i have built is that the offset between rx and tx freqs means that my TX freq as been to far off the rx freq, all i have had to do is change one caps value to change the offset, not hard, but it would be nice if a small trimer cap had been used to allow this to be set correctly, i have fitted one on mine and that fixed it. anyway for the money you end up with a very usable radio, not a toy. 2-3 watts output really does the trick on CW and very low current drain so the radio will run for days on batterys.
you can not beat it,
73 Paul M0BMN
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WB0FDJ
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Rating: 5/5
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Dec 24, 2009 14:39
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A great kit
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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An excellent radio! I did a few things wrong but found them without help-a true learning experience-due to excellent documentation. Once I got the receiver going I encountered a problem with the final. Sent email back and forth and was receiving replies from Dave at 6pm on a Friday evening! Once the replacement final arrived and was soldered into place the radio fired up with very minimal alignment. 2Watts. Very nice clean sounding receiver. Stable. Nice QSK. Within minutes had a 30 minute QSO with a W7 near Kingman AZ from SE MN with a 559 report. This is a great QRP kit. It does all you could ask from a simpler radio. Highly recommended.
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