One to rack your brain on

When my little brother pulled into the yard for the last time he gave me a DX959 and a Gen. Washington. The 959 had cold/broken solder joints on the external speaker jack. The audio would just drop to nothing. Resoldering it did the trick.

The Gen. Wash. not only had bad joints on the ext. speaker jack but several chassis to board grounds. Resoldering fixed it.

These joints were broken by years of hard handling and slipseating. When they went intermittent he would throw the bad one in the closet and buy another. He kept the Galaxy 99. I couldn't talk him out of it.

I think you've got a bad solder joint SO-239 jack on that radio. They take a lot of stress connecting and unconnecting the coax. That's why they're usually on a little 1"X1" or 2"X2" board of their own. So the stress isn't transferred to the main board and possibly damage it.

As the main board heats up, it expands before the chassis has a chance to which puts pressure on all solder joints from the chassis to the board. Any of them could be bad or intermittent. Power, grounds (all around three sides of the chassis, usually), antenna.

Try resoldering the SO-239 on that little board (if indeed it's on a little board by itself - they're trying to save money lots of ways today) and where the connectors from it go to on the main board. Then check or resolder the several grounds from the chassis to the board.

You'll need a good soldering iron. Lots of solder there that will suck the heat right out of a teensy pencil iron. Don't give in to the temptation to grab a gun, though.

Good luck. I hate intermittents. You're gonna need a lot of luck. Everybody give him some luck.

Ted