[time-nuts] Lucent KS-24361, HP/Symmetricom Z3809A, Z3810A, Z3811A, Z3812A GPSDO system

[Dave M]

Stu,
Many thanks for the heads-up on htese units.  Great deals.

Can you advise the size of these units?  Are they full-size 19" rack mount 
or the half-size units like the Z3801A?
Can the REF-1 unit (the one with the GPS receiver) be operated separately 
from the REF-0 unit?

There is a mod on Didier's site to add the 10 MHz output to the RFTGm unit 
at 
http://www.ko4bb.com/manuals/download.php?file=05)_GPS_Timing/Lucent_RFTGm_RFTGm-II-XO_GPSDO_modification_to_add_10MHz.pdf. 
I don't know if the mod will apply to the units on Ebay right now, but it's 
quite possible that it does.

Cheers,
Dave M


Stewart Cobb wrote:
> Fellow time-nuts,
>
> This (long) post is a review of the HP/Symmetricom Z3810A (or Z3810AS)
> GPSDO system built for Lucent circa 2000.  I wrote it because I looked
> for more information before I bought one, and couldn't find much.
> It's relevant because (as of this writing), you can buy a full system
> on the usual auction site for about $150 plus shipping.  For those of
> you lamenting the dearth of cheap Thunderbolts, this looks like one of
> the best deals going.  The description of these objects does not
> include "GPSDO", so time-nuts may have missed it.  Search for one of
> the part numbers in the subject line and you should find it.
>
> So what is it?  It's a dual GPSDO built by HP as a reference
> (Redundant Frequency and Time Generator, or RFTG) for a Lucent
> cell-phone base station, built to Lucent's spec KS-24361. Internally,
> it's a close cousin of a later-model Z3805A.  Externally, it looks to
> be almost a drop-in replacement for the earlier RFTG system built to
> Lucent's spec KS-24019.  That was a redundant system containing one
> rubidium (LPRO, in the one I have) and one OCXO in two
> almost-identical boxes.  That spec went through several revisions with
> slightly different nameplates and presumably slightly different
> internals.  You can generally find one or two examples on the auction
> site (search for RFTG or KS-24019).
>