Unfinished Business

I said in my previous post that I'd have something to say about the word 'finish'. I never actually got around to saying anything in the post - Characteristically, the task was left unfinished.

I have difficulty in finishing some things; many of my radios suffer from incompletion. Why? I guess that it's a combination of impatience, and distraction by the thoughts of the next project. Some things take a long time to sink in, others need to be accomplished quickly to keep pace with my train of thought. Take my latest radio as an example. It's the image at the top-left of the page; a plain aluminium box, grey primer aluminium front panel, the PA drain current meter has yet to be connected (the PA FET is still in the storage box), the frequency dial is a roughed-out piece of plastic with indelible pen markings (the dial has since fallen off) and many controls are absent or incomplete. Yet I plan to use this radio in anger this coming Thursday, as is. In fact, I checked its harmonics (they're low), and called a hopeful cq earlier this evening. At 300mW into a short magnetic loop, this was indeed a hopeful thing to do, but it meant I could check the audio with an unconnected receiver, and check the tuning of the loop.

The radio will eventually cover 160, 80 and maybe 40 metres. The three unused holes at bottom right of the front panel are for RF gain, AF gain and headphone connector. Who knows, it may all even happen!