[time-nuts] Wenzel Oscillator Repair

[John Miles]

> The problem with the oscillator turned out to be even easier to fix than
> I could have hoped for.  There's a ferrite transformer on the output -
> possibly a balun.  The wire is about the thickness of a hair.  The
> ferrite isn't tied down - it's just held by the leads.  I don't know if
> it took a physical hit or if the solder just dissolved the wire over the
> years, but one of the leads had broken.  I resoldered it and instead of
> a wobbly level of -20 to -30 dbm into 50 ohms, I now have a much more
> satisfying level of ~ +12 dbm.  And the levels in the rest of the unit
> now make sense.  Instead of hitting a Minicircuit RPD-1 Phase Detector
> with a level around -30 dbm, it's now seeing a level of +7 dbm - just
> what it should be.
>
> I'd like to thank you, John,  and everyone else  for their ideas.  They
> were a great help.

You're welcome; that's exactly what was wrong with my ULN, actually.  The
output balun had a broken lead.  They should be gluing those down, I guess.
Someone had also broken the trimmer by shoving an alignment tool in too far,
but that wasn't the main problem.

-- john, KE5FX