We don't have a forum area for discussing repairs to late(r) model gear so I'll park this thread here until such time as we create one.

JRC gear has to be used to be appreciated. I was peripherally aware of the stuff until around this time a couple of years ago, at which time I got hold of a DOA NRD-515. None of the equipment can be considered boat-anchor, hybrid, etc. as it's all solid-state. Even the earliest amateur and commercial (marine) gear used some pretty sophisticated concepts and techniques in the equipment lines, particularly at the RF end of things. The results are some of the quietest receivers and the cleanest transmitters I've ever played with. If you can sound better than an FT-102, you're doing something right - and I can A/B the JRC and Yaesu rigs at will.

My current inventory of the gear includes NRD/NSD-515s, the NDH-51x memory units, several NRD-525s, a couple of NRD-535s, a JST-135 and a Raytheon RAY-152. The latter is actually a re-badged JRC JSB-176, which is a stripped-down JST-135 with a marine-style display/front panel unit and a mission-specific firmware set.

The -525, 535, -135, -152/ -176 all share some common DNA in their various circuits - especially where the plug-in cards are concerned. Some are re-usable across models; others aren't. As I walk through various repair procedures and configuration options I'll try to present a road map of what's what.

Note that I won't be covering the NRD-545 or the JST-145/245 series of equipment. Those are the last amateur/hobby models which JRC produced before they pulled out of the amateur market altogether, and use different architectures than their predecessors.