Pro-405 desktop backlight mod

[nanZor]

Performed some minor surgery to a RS Pro405 to toggle the backlight on and off. Looks good in daylight, although the pic has some glare. To the left of the display, I drilled a hole in the middle of the NOAA label, and inserted a mini SPST toggle switch.

 

[nanZor]

Inside, there is a black and green wire going to the display board. I just cut the green wire and inserted the spst toggle switch in series with my own little green jumper. Also seen is an audio lowpass mod on the speaker, detailed elsewhere.

Since I was lazy, and didn't want to remove the whole board, I just made sure that I had a good grip on the wire with needle nose pliers before stripping the ends. If you don't have a good grip, prepare to remove the board when you yank the wires out accidentally.

I used a mini toggle from RS, but that barely gave me enough screw thread to work with once installed, so while a sub-mini toggle might be to your liking, you may not have enough thread to go through the plastic front panel. So be generous and get a toggle big enough to pass through the faceplate so you can do it right with the lockwashers.

This is the RS405, but I'll bet the GRE PSR200 / 200U are similar.

 

[nanZor]

Running portable!

Ok, a bit over the top. But the 405 has very good loud audio for outdoor use. You'll see an open-ended quarter-wave stub attached to a bnc-tee connector to kill a 153mhz pager when I do airband monitoring.

 

[DeadMike]

Man I can't believe nobody commented on this thread! I just got a 20-405 and wanted do exactly this. Once setup the backlight is only annoying as I am planning on using it for a stream.

Great work!

I noticed you mentioned the lowpass filter yet I can't find it via search. Would you mind pointing me in the right direction? Thanks so much!!

 

[DeadMike]

Yup good stuff thanks again!