Ham radio power supply question...

[acyddrop]

I'm just wondering if a PC power supply (the "PSU") with sufficient output can be used as a base power supply for a ham radio? I have a bunch of old PSU's laying around from building so many PCs over the past couple of years, and have been bringing them to the "toxic dump" days when the town has them. But I got to thinking.. I have a 1000 watt PSU here that has around 50A of the +12V line, the power output is around 11.88vDC and stable. I know this isn't exactly 13.8v but I believe it falls with in tolerances of modern rigs. 50A is more than enough to drive most of (if not all of) the current ham rigs being sold today.

I realize that *as is* they wouldn't work very well because they are lacking some sort of power pole setup to attach your rig to and they seem complicated to turn on. Well the second one is easy. You'd need a SPST switch to connect the green wire (there is only ONE green wire) from the PSU to *ANY* ground wire, this will give you the ability to turn the PSU off and on like any other power supply. Power poles are only slightly more tricky but can be easily added I would think.

I haven't tried hooking one up yet but I just might. I'm asking because I've looked at the cost of a lot of switching power supplies for ham radio and they're all $90 and up. You can get a decent PSU for a PC with enough current on the +12 volt rail for under 45 bucks. The intel ATX standards define a power supply that must be relatively clean and ripple free, and able to deliver extreme amounts of power. Seems to me that a computer power supply would work beautifully in ham radio as your power plants.

Has anyone tried this and what were your results?

[n9mxq]

This has been covered here before.. Keep in mind that PC PSUs only output 12 volts and modern radios require 13.8v.. Also, PC PSUs can be very noisy on RF.

I would think you'd be better served with a purpose built supply whether it is a switching supply or a good old fashioned transformer type..

[n0nhp]

Old computer power supply for radio use

Bruce

[acyddrop]

I imagine there'd be an adjustment in the PWM circuit to increase the output on the 12v rail to whatever you needed it to be.. I'm going to take this 1kw PSU apart and see what I can find. Getting rid of RFI on your power line isn't all that difficult.

Originally Posted by n9mxq

This has been covered here before.. Keep in mind that PC PSUs only output 12 volts and modern radios require 13.8v.. Also, PC PSUs can be very noisy on RF.

I would think you'd be better served with a purpose built supply whether it is a switching supply or a good old fashioned transformer type..

[acyddrop]

Thanks for that!

I was sure it'd been asked before somewhere

Originally Posted by n0nhp

Old computer power supply for radio use

Bruce