Many thanks to Pete (WB9FLW) who shares the following:
This is truly amazing, Guino PE1NNZ has converted the QRP Labs $49 CW Transceiver to SSB.
Not much to add, a ATMEGA328P plus some firmware and a few component value changes and you’ve got a $50 SSB Transceiver!
(Source: GitHub)
This is a simple and experimental modification that transforms a QCX into a (Class-E driven) SSB transceiver. It can be used to make QRP SSB contacts, or (in combination with a PC) used for the digital modes such as FT8. It can be fully-continuous tuned through bands 160m-10m in the LSB/USB-modes with a 2400Hz bandwidth has up to 5W PEP SSB output and features a software-based full Break-In VOX for fast RX/TX switching in voice and digital operations.
The SSB transmit-stage is implemented completely in a digital and software-based manner: at the heart the ATMEGA328P is sampling the input-audio and reconstructing a SSB-signal by controlling the SI5351 PLL phase (through tiny frequency changes over 800kbit/s I2C) and controlling the PA Power (through PWM on the key-shaping circuit). In this way a highly power-efficient class-E driven SSB-signal can be realized; a PWM driven class-E design keeps the SSB transceiver simple, tiny, cool, power-efficient and low-cost (ie. no need for power-inefficient and complex linear amplifier with bulky heat-sink as often is seen in SSB transceivers).
An Open Source Arduino sketch is used as the basis for the firmware, the hardware modification bypasses the QCX CW filter and adds a microphone input in-place of the DVM-circuit; the mod is easy to apply and consist of four wire and four component changes and after applying the transceiver remains compatible with the original QCX (CW) firmware.
This experiment is created to try out what can be done with minimal hardware; a simple ATMEGA processor, a QCX and a software-based SSB processing approach. It would be nice to add more features to the sketch, and try out if the QCX design can be further simplified e.g. by implementing parts of the receiver stage in software. Feel free to experiment with this sketch, let me know your thoughts or contribute here: https://github.com/threeme3/QCX-SSB There is a forum discussion on the topic here: QRPLabs Forum
73, Guido [email protected]
Wow! What a brilliant modification, Pete! Thank you for sharing.
Very interesting indeed thanks 73 de SV1GRN
Vox option is a plus…Hams answering don’t believe i’m running 5 watts…it’a a jewel…
About 14 min into the podcast talks about the SSB mod.
http://soldersmoke.com/soldersmoke226.mp3
Pete, said he did the mod and the SSB mod was very disappointing and he put it in a box. They said at least one other ham had the same problem. I saw a video on YouTub demonstrating the SSB and it sounded VERY rough to me. They said it might be the too much to ask the processor on the QCX mini to do. Sounds like it is still a work in progress.