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Reviews For: Oak Hills Research 100A

Category: QRP Radios (5 watts or less)

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Review Summary For : Oak Hills Research 100A
Reviews: 51MSRP: 129.95
Description:
The Oak Hills Research OHR 100A single band CW transceiver kit
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.ohr.com/ohr100a.htm
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
00514.9
K2PJT Rating: 2002-12-23
Great rig, enjoyable to use Time Owned: 6 to 12 months.
My wife purchased an OHR100A kit as a Christmas gift last year. I had not assembled a kit in years and initially installed an IC socket backwards. After that, assembly was flawless. Tune up was achieved using a caibrated receiver and voltmeter. Since then I have confirmed that tune-up with a frequency counter. In about 6 months of 20 meter operation I have contacted over 50 countries using wire antennas. This includes Central Asia, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and Mauritius. The receiver is very stable, quite sensitive, and reasonably selective. I do use an external DSP now and then though. The transmitter works well too. I especially like the QSK. My only gripe is that power output drops to about 3 watts during hot summer days. Thus, the 100A does not get a perfect 5.0 from me but everything else is so good that it still rates as a great rig. It is enjoyable to use and an excellent value.
KF6YB Rating: 2002-06-23
Great Radio! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
Alot has been said here before me so I wont repeat everyone else however I do want to add my two cents to the pile. I purchased my OHR100 and within 3 days, had the kit complete. I couldent get the receiver to work but an E-mail to the help group at OHR solved my problem...an 8 pin chip inserted backwards! I turned it around and the radio came to life and tuned up within minutes with no problem. On to the transmitter, again, no joy. A phone call to the help desk and guess what, the radio started transmitting...I was tweaking the wrong cap. As you can see, I am a novice kit builder but OHR would not let me fail. Now I have a great radio with a hot receiver and a full 5 watts of power for a reasonable price. This is a fun radio to build and bring to life. Get one soon!
WB8CAC Rating: 2002-01-07
Fantastic radio / value Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
I agree with all the other great comments in these reviews. The receiver is outstanding!
Can't say enough about the ease of construction. I was on the air with the 40 M radio 8 hours and 32 minutes after opening the box! ( This may not be an average for other builders... I have been working in the two-way radio field for over 25 years and have a decent amount of soldering / aligning experience ).

DON'T HESITATE... get one of these radios today if you want a great value in a fun, easy to build / operate, high performance QRP rig!!!!!
WB1DMK Rating: 2001-11-15
This is an excellent QPR rig for 30M. Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Oak Hill Research 100A (30m): This is an excellent QPR rig and the receiver is very sensitive. The receiver is just as good (if not better) that my commercial QRO rig. I have owned the 30 meter rig for over three years, and during that time, I have kept a weekly 30 meter QPR schedule from Connecticut to Kansas with other station also running an OHR-100A. The only thing that I would change is to increase the audio output. The headphone jack does not have an audio amplifier (which helps to keep the current draw during receive to a minimum), and as such, I find that I need to drive my headphones via the external speaker jack (which does have an audio amplifier). However, a little more audio drive would be beneficial for both the headphone jack and the speaker jack. Regardless, this radio is still an excellent rig!

N5ZE Rating: 2000-08-11
Full Featured Monobander Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
Assembling the 30-meter kit I was quite pleased with the quality of the instructions, screened and solder-masked circuit board with plated-through holes, the components, and nicely finished case. The circuit board has about 230 passive and active components, including 11 toroids, but doesn’t feel too crowded during construction. Pre-wired connectors are used to attach the circuit board to the front panel controls. To remove the circuit board from the case requires unsoldering but a single connection to the SO239 antenna connector and disconnecting the plugs from the connectors. Alignment is best completed with an external full-coverage transceiver and frequency counter (in addition to DVM, dummy load, and wattmeter) yet can be completed with less if you improvise. You can optionally send it back to OHR for alignment for a small fee. Marshall Emm, BTW, is an absolute pleasure to deal with.

As others have commented, the receiver is excellent - far better than I expected. On those days when the solar activity is calm and the weather is good (minimal QRN) you’ll be shocked at how quiet the receiver is. Signals seem to literally pop out of the background. The performance of this rig is good enough to be my main transceiver in the shack for 30m. With a wire antenna at 25’ I’ve worked 30m QRP DX from my north Texas QTH that includes French Polynesia and Malta. The varactor diode tuned VFO has a wide 70 kHz range (more than needed for 30m!) and is very stable. The QSK is smooth enough to be all but invisible – I’m not at all conscious of it when I use the rig.

The OHR100A puts out a “full QRP gallon” at 5 watts. The transmit power can be easily lowered via a back-panel pot to more battery friendly levels. The OHR100A has a wealth of front panel controls that allow you to constantly optimize the radio’s operation for changing band conditions. Both RF and AF gain controls are available on the front panel. A center-detent RIT control is standard. The front panel adjustable variable-bandwidth crystal filter is just super when things start getting crowded and also for lowering the intensity of the QRN. An optional 10-turn pot is available for the main tuning control. I found with a gentle hand at the tuning knob it’s really not required. There’s also a back-panel connection supporting an optional external digital frequency counter (the OHR DD1 or others) for those who choose the 10-turn pot or desire high precision frequency control.

The OHR100A is not the smallest QRP monobander you can stuff in a backpack but it certainly is a candidate for the best performance-features-price-size. If you’re a car/truck/van/trailer camper or frequent traveler and want a small full-featured QRP rig to take with you for the weekend, the OHR100A is ideal.

Disclaimer: I’m not affiliated with Oak Hills Research or Milestone Tech. Just a satisfied customer.
*Lew*, N5ZE
WV8AH Rating: 2000-07-30
Great Performer Time Owned: more than 12 months.
About a year ago I worked N0RC on my QRO rig. A nice cw qso on 30m (CO to WV on 30 is quite a trip). I coudn't believe he was operating QRP. That week I ordered an OHR100 30m kit. The recieve is cleaner and more sensitive than my FT-847 and I have to remind my contacts that I am running only 3.5 Watts. Great fun to build as well.
KG4EMM Rating: 2000-05-21
Good First Kit - Very Good Performer Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
This was a first kit for me, as well as my first QRP rig. Building was straight-forward, not too difficult, and FUN!!
Fantastic customer support, had a problem during testing, and e-mail help was very fast and helpful. Receiver is almost too good, out performs my QRO (Kenwood TS-520s).

See my web page for photos and details of construction at http://www.qsl.net/kg4emm/

73 - Terry, KG4EMM
WB0YPO Rating: 2000-01-11
A high performance radio and a great kit Time Owned: unknown months.
After looking around at the available monoband QRP transceivers, I settled on the Oak Hills Research 100A for 30 meters. I hadn't built a kit in many years (since Heathkit days) and found that the OHR kit reminded me a lot of those old Heathkits, with clear instructions, organized parts, accurate parts count, and excellent PC board quality. The kit went together in a weekend. I sent it back to OHR for alignment and it has been a super performer. The features I like are full 5 W adjustable output, RIT, and the continuously variable filter. CW tone is excellent and the QSK is very smooth. I have been using the rig at home and portable, and it is my only rig for thirty. I highly recommend it.
KC2CMA Rating: 2000-01-11
Great Radio Time Owned: unknown months.
My first HF radio was an Oak Hills 100A 40 M. I got the kit in the mail and built it (With no prior experiance!) in about a week. It worked the first time I powered it up. I got some help from a friend to align it, and bang on the air. First QSO was with my Elmer, KA2OWZ. What a way to learn CW! To Date furthest DX is NJ to Mich on a dipole about 6 ft off the ground!

Radio is 2 years old now, about a year ago I wrote Oak hills for the parts to align it for the general class portion of 40 and they sent the parts right away, free of charge! I would recommend it to anyone.
KK7GP Rating: 1999-10-11
Tougher than it looks... Time Owned: unknown months.
I'm new to QRP kit building, although I have been building other types of kits at work for years. The board went together fairly easily, aside from having to swap soldering irons because the first one broke in the middle of construction. Toroids were a new thing to me. I had no idea they were so sensitive when it comes to frequency rectification. I put everything together and was a bit dismayed to find that instead of operating from 7000-7070 khz, my radio worked from 6850-7025 khz. Don't ask me how that happened. It works fine other than that, so after I send it back for proper alignment it should be just fine, but it's a bit tougher than it looks. You really should have it professionally aligned by OHR considering that most QRP builders (at least new ones) don't have an HF frequency counter and oscilliscope to tune the kit.