The case is sheet metal, the circuit is a very straight forward design with a separate VFO, NE602 mixers and a narrow crystal filter. All components are through hole, no surprises here. The PCB came a bit stained with some brown-ish residue at some parts which I thought might have been a leftover from the PCB factory or could come from a chemical interaction with other parts of the kit (why is the PCB not in a bag??)

Anyway. After a couple of hours of soldering and coil making (don't we all love toroids?) the thing is ready to go on the air. It outputs a nice steady 4 Watt when driven by a straight key. The receive sound is crystal clear and beautiful to listen to.

What I like:

- Sturdiness. This is solid stuff.

- RX sound. Clear as a crystal stream on a spring morning.

- Simplicity. The circuit is very straightforward and can be serviced easily.

What I did not like so much:

- The manual sucks. No published bug free PDF version, just a bunch of stapled copies with a load of errata.

- Can we at least have an option to plug in a keyer chip in one corner? Then again, this is a purist rig. Maybe it should be driven with a straight key.

- The white marking on the dial knob. C'mon guys. You really want me to paint the dial knob myself with white paint? What is this?

The kit quality itself was OK, with one exception all parts were there (no problem, I had it as a spare). The connectors for the headset and the antenna are of good quality, the built in speaker does a great job.