alanr@tekigm.UUCP (Alan Rovner) (08/02/85)
To the ham who was looking for comments on 2m mobile xcvrs: I recently sold a 7950 after having it in the car for a couple years and overall was very happy with it as far as the features, etc. But one word of warning...on high power it dissipates about 90 watts of heat in the heat sink. Translate this to read it gets REAL hot, especially in the summer when in a hot car. This 90 watts is derived by looking at the DC current draw on high power (~10 A) and multiplying this times the input voltage (13.8 V). This gives approx. 138 watts DC draw from the power supply. The RF output power is 50 watts so the delta, or 88 watts or so is dissipated as heat. What all this boils down to is that you have to keep your transmissions fairly short in order to prevent overheating. All the griping aside, the 7950 is a fine radio. I think it was one of the first to incorporate the PL and transmit offset into each memory. If I did it all over again I would buy the 7930 instead which gives you the same features but no heat problem.. 73, Al Rovner, WA2TMP Tektronix, Vancouver, WA