


Parts List
Reference Description FEC Part No. Quantity C1, C2, C4 5.5 - 50p miniature ceramic trimmer (green) 148-161 3 C3 100p ceramic disc 50V NP0 dielectric 896-457 1 C5, C6, C7 100n multilayer ceramic 50V X7R dielectric 146-227 3 C8 100u 35V electrolytic radial capacitor 667-419 1 C9 500p metal clad capacitor 500V 1 C10 1n ceramic lead through capacitor capacitor 149-150 1 C11 16 - 100p mica compression trimmer capacitor (Arco 424) 1 C12 25 - 150p mica compression trimmer capacitor (Arco 423 or Sprague GMA30300) 1 C13 300p metal clad capacitor 500V 1 C14, C17 25p metal clad capacitor 500V 2 C15, C16 50p metal clad capacitor 500V 2 L1 64nH inductor - 4 turns 18 SWG tinned Cu wire on 6.5mm dia. former, turns length 8mm 1 L2 25nH inductor - 2 turns 18 SWG tinned Cu wire on 6.5mm dia. former, turns length 4mm 1 L3 6 hole ferrite bead threaded with 2.5 turns 22 SWG tinned Cu Wire to form wideband choke 219-850 1 L4 210nH inductor - 8 turns 18 SWG enamelled Cu wire on 6.5mm dia. former, turns length 12mm 1 L5 21nH inductor - 3 turns 18 SWG tinned Cu wire on 4mm dia. former, turns length 10mm 1 L6 41nH inductor - 4 turns 22 SWG tinned Cu wire on 4mm dia. former, turns length 6mm 1 L7 2 ferrite beads threaded onto lead of C10 242-500 2 L8, L10 100nH inductor - 5 turns 18 SWG tinned Cu wire on 6.5mm dia. former, turns length 8mm 2 L9 115nH inductor - 6 turns 18 SWG tinned Cu wire on 6.5mm dia. former, turns length 12mm 1 R1 10K cermet potentiometer 0.5W 108-566 1 R2 1K8 metal film resistor 0.5W 333-864 1 R3 33R metal film resistor 0.5W 333-440 1 D1, D2 BZX79C5V6 400mW Zener Diode 931-779 2 TR1 MRF171A (Motorola) 1 SK1 BNC bulkhead socket 583-509 1 SK2 N type panel socket, square flange 310-025 1 Diecast Box 29830PSL 38 x 120 x 95mm 301-530 1 Heatsink 16 x 60 x 89mm 3.4°C/W (Redpoint Thermalloy 3.5Y1) 170-088 1 Double sided Cu clad PCB material 1.6mm thick A/R Copper Tape or Foil 152-659 A/R M3 nut, bolt, crinkly washer set 16 Non-Silicone Heat Transfer Paste 317-950 A/R
Photograph of Prototype Amplifier
Notes
Farnell Part Numbers are for guide only - other equivalent parts can be substituted. Metal clad capacitors are either Semco MCM series, Unelco J101 series, Underwood, or Arco MCJ-101 series available from, amongst other places, RF Parts. MRF171A available from BFI (UK), Richardson or RF Parts (US) Arco or Sprague trimmers are available from Communication Concepts (US) 18 SWG (standard wire gauge) is approximately 1.2mm diameter 22 SWG (standard wire gauge) is approximately 0.7mm diameter To make the inductors - wind the required number of turns round an appropriately sized former, initially use one wire diameter spacing between each turn. Then pull the turns apart to get the length required in the parts list table. Finally check the value using a network analyser and adjust accordingly. The exception to the above spacing rule is L4, which is close wound. Copper foil is available from craft shops (used in stained glass making) A/R = as required
Low Pass Filter TestingAny RF power amplifier must be followed by a low pass filter (LPF) to reduce the harmonics to an acceptable level. What this level is in a unlicensed application is a moot point, but as the output power is increased, more attention must be be paid to the harmonic suppression. For example, a 3rd harmonic of -30dBc on a 1W unit is 1uW, which is unlikely to cause any bother, whilst -30dBc 3rd harmonic suppression on a 1KW output results in a 1W of power at the third harmonic which is potentially problematic. So for the absolute level of harmonic radiation in the second example to be the same as the first, we now need to suppress the third harmonic by 60dBc.
In this design I made the decision to implement a 7 pole Chebyshev low pass filter. A Chebyshev was chosen as the phase and amplitude ripple within the passband was not critical, and the Chebyshev gives a better stop band attenuation than compared to say, a Butterworth. The design stopband was chosen to 113MHz, giving a 5MHz implementation margin from the highest desired passband frequency at 108MHz and the start of the stopband at 113MHz. The next critical design parameter was the passband ripple. For a single frequency design it is normal practice to choose a large passband ripple, for example 1dB, and tune the peak of the last passband maxima to the desired output frequency. This gives the best stopband attenuation because greater passband ripple results in more rapid stopband attenuation. A seven pole filter has 7 reactive elements, in this design four capacitors and three inductors. The more poles, the better the stopband attenuation, at the expense of increased complexity and more passband insertion loss. An odd number of poles is required as both the input and output impedance was designed to be 50R.
As this design is wideband, this constrains the passband ripple to a level such that the passband return loss does not become to horrible. Using the excellent Faisyn shareware filter design utility (available from FaiSyn RF Design Software Home Page) allows these trade-offs to be easily investigated, and I settled for a passband ripple of 0.02dB. This program also calculates the filter values for you, and outputs a netlist in a format suitable for inputting into the most popular linear circuit simulators. With 7 poles, the choice was available to use 4 capacitors and 3 inductors or 3 capacitors and 4 inductors. I chose the former, on the grounds that it results in one less component to wind. The capacitor values given from the faisyn program were examined to check that they were close to a preferred value, which they were. If they had fallen between preferred values, the options would include paralleling two capacitors together, which unnecessarily ups the component count, or subtly tweaking the stopband frequency and passband ripple to get a more desirable set of values.
To implement the filter, I decided to use standard size metal clad capacitors made by Unelco or Semco. The inductors were made from 18 SWG (standard wire gauge) tinned copper wire. In my experience there is little to be gained from using silver plated copper wire. The inductors were formed round of the centre of a standard RS or Farnell tweaking tool (FEC 145-507) - this has a diameter of 0.25 inch, 6.35mm. Otherwise use the appropriately sized drill bit. The outer two inductors were wound clockwise, the inner one was wound counter-clockwise. This is an attempt to reduce the mutual inductive coupling between the inductors, this tending to degrade the stopband attenuation. For the same reason the inductors are arranged at 90° to each other, rather than all in a straight line. The inductors are soldered directly to the tabs of the metal clad capacitors. This keeps losses to a minimum. A carefully constructed filter of this type can exhibit a passband insertion loss of better than 0.2dB. Here are the test results for the prototype unit.
The first stage BF199 amplifies the weak signal from the vco and functions in constant load. The second stage BFR90 amplifies the rf signal to load the antenna wich will radiate the radio frequency power.Antenna can be one wire, 70 cm long. L1 coil has 1mm thick copper wire, 3.5 turns, 5 mm diameter and 1mm space between turns.You can use BF199 instead of BFR90 and MV104 instead of the 2 varicape diodes.
This is a universal 1 Watt RF class C amplifier that is ideally suited for low power FM transmitters. Input should be at least 100mW to achieve 1W output. It is recommended to enclose the amplifier in a metal case.