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Reviews For: Central Electronics 20A Multiphasic Transmitter (sideband genera

Category: Transmitters: Amateur radio

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Review Summary For : Central Electronics 20A Multiphasic Transmitter (sideband genera
Reviews: 4MSRP: 249.50
Description:
One of the earliest commercial ssb xmiter/generator.
Product is not in production
More Info: http://
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
0045
WB0SNF Rating: 2015-01-20
A fine old radio Time Owned: more than 12 months.
Hi. I got my 20a and 458 so long ago I can't really remember when it was. 20a has supplied beautiful, trouble free audio ever since. A real tribute to Schum and Bachelor. The 458 is reliable and solid on 80 and 20 meters, my primary bands.
I had to partially disassemble the 458 and shine up all the mechanical connections as it was getting jumpy. B+ and filaments are regulated on it and now from a cold start it drifts up about 250 kc and then comes back down to the starting point, all in about a half hour. Stability is then about 10 kc either side of wanted frequency. After all these years it's just amazing that it sounds so good and is so reliable. Yaecomwood will never achieve this. WB0SNF
K5MO Rating: 2010-09-10
Still working 55 years later Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I purchased one of these about 10 years ago, cleaned it up and checked the electrolytic caps...all were still fine. Shortly I added the matching VFO . The whole affair worked quite well out of the chute. I added a WRL sweep tube linear (the LA1) that matches it quite nicely and also operate it periodically on the VSSB net. It's a wonderful piece of gear that is still usable today.
K9EID Rating: 2006-08-14
CE 20A Multiphase SSB Transmitter Time Owned: more than 12 months.
The CE 20A is a marvelous piece of equipment. Designed by Wes Schum in the late 40's, I look upon Wes as the true father of SSB. I built his 20A kit in 1958. I bought the surplus BC 458 jeep transmitter (paid $5.00 from Harvey Radio) and did the Wes Schum modification. I now had a VFO. You certainly didn't want to be rock bound and for five bucks you could move anywhere ! The 20A became a part of my electronic education. I learned so much from building, operating and maintaining it's phasing generator, mixer and finals. I designed and built a 6 and 2 meter switching transverter that was featured in a 1962 CQ article. This gave me 160 through 2 meter SSB operation. I later added the incredible C.E. 600L. Think about this a minute. Wes designed this NO TUNE 500 watt linear in 1958. It only has a bandswitch and works so well with the 10 watts from the C.E. 20A. So much fun. How cool !

I still have this 48 year old technological wonder. It's usually on the air every Sunday during the K5LYN Vintage SSB net (14.292 1400 CDT). Hope to catch you on the air with it and the Collins 75A4 receiver. With it's phasing generator providing some of the best sounding SSB audio, you will have a difficult time telling it from some of the modern day transcievers.

CE 20A IT blaszed the trail for all SSB transmitters.

BOB HEIL, K9EID
AH6FC Rating: 2006-08-14
First time on ssb Time Owned: more than 12 months.
This boat anchor was fabulous. I had one for about a year before I figured out why it "didn't" work. Of course no instructions were available. This rig was old in 1969. Had it hooked up with a Knight T-150 am/cw transmitter. The 20A used a surplus vfo, BC248 or something like that. I tried and tried, could only copy a very weak signal on my ultra hot Heathkit GR64 receiver. Finally, after a year, I realized I had been transmitting on a harmonic frequency. I guess the fact that I never received a citation was a testament to my lousy antenna, hi hi. Anyhow, once I figured out what was wrong, it worked! Boy what a blast. My first QSO was on 15 meter SSB with DL...though it was 35 years ago, it was one of those thrills you never forget. Never spoke to anybody who used one of these. Had good ssb quality and was easy to use...once I got rid of the dummy hat...

Like all the rest, wish I had kept this one!

73, Bill