ZL2CTM Charlie Morris on “QSO Today” with Eric Guth 4Z1UG

Eric Guth 4Z1UG had a really nice interview with our friend Charlie Morris ZL2CTM. Charlie shared with Eric a lot of wisdom about how to homebrew radio gear. I especially liked Charlie’s comments on keeping most of his rigs on the wooden prototype boards. He said something important when he talked about the benefits of taking a break from a difficult problem, then coming back to it with a rested and refreshed mind. I noted, however, that he said most of these frustrating problems have to do with software.

I got got several chuckles out of Charlie’s comments on the difficulty of building stable analog LC VFOs (here he seemed to be channeling our good friend Pete Juliano). I chuckled because as I listened I was happily building the analog LC VFO for my Q-31 Quarantine receiver. The centerpiece of this project is a variable capacitor that Pete gave me; Pete took it out of an old Galaxy V transceiver. Believe me guys, no rotary encoder could possibly look as nice or have as much soul as that capacitor from Pete, with all its gears, reduction drives, and anti-backlash mechanisms. It even smells of machine oil. Call me a Luddite, but I will stick with the coils and capacitors.

Listen to the interview here:

https://www.qsotoday.com/podcasts/zl2ctm

Thanks to Charlie and Eric.