REVIEW

The Stoner Pro-40 is a particular favorite of mine....well, my all-time favorite SSB rig, and if you ever own one, I'm sure you'll like it too. I won't spend a lot of time on the historical data, as you can find that under my Manufacturer "Bio" section (including the original CB Magazine Review, circa late 1970's).

The Stoner Pro-40 is a singe-sideband ONLY transceiver, designed from top to bottom, with SSB communications in mind. The display, reminiscent of the Heathkit 104 Ham-band transceiver, is easy to read with it's large red LED's. Both channel number and frquency readout are visible at all times, and the digital display is a full six digits. The letter at the right of the display indicates Upper or Lower sideband modes.

Each Stoner Pro-40 was issued it's own Stoner "Number" which is lit up and visible on the left side of the red display bezel. I don't know the exact number of units made, but I've never seen one over 600 yet.

The large tuning knob, centered in the front of the rig is not the channel selector - it's a large clarifier control, easy to control. Channel selection is done via the push button's on the right front panel [slow -DWN, fast -DWN, slow- UP, fast - UP]. Other controls include the usual volume, rf gain, on-off button, and the not-as-common receive tone control. There is a button marked AM, and let me explain this feature:

While most sidebanders tend to hang around on sideband, some still have buddies on the "Ancient Mariners" side (AM), so Stoner incorporated an AM switch on the front panel, which would switch over to a separate, external, AM transceiver (this could be any mobile rig attached to the Stoner expansion base, or even your old AM Base station for that matter!

I don't thinkt there is anyplace you can find a new-in-the-box Stoner Pro-40 so lets talk about what you can expect with a used rig:

I've been buying Stoner gear for about six years now and have 4 of the Main units, and have noticed:

1. They all tend to drift a little for the first 30 minutes (usally about .5 khz)

2. They seem to have a "popping" noise, much like a discharging capacitor which occurs fairly frequently. I've yet to replace one (cap), but every box I've bought has done the same thing.

3. The IF tuning feature, designed to kill AM interference is not a cure-all for am "birdies", but sometimes helps.

4. These aren't "Power house" rigs with many watts, in fact, I usually only get 6-10 watts on sideband (pep), but it's enough to do the trick. There's no way to "mod" this to boost the power enough to make a difference, so leave it in spec.

5. Transmit modulation has always been very good. I either use an un-amplified D-104 with 10DA head, or my Icom SM-10.

6. The Adj. Channel rejection, for me, is one of the most important parts of a radio. I live near a freeway and get a lot bleedover from the "big trucks", and this rig has great, better-than-the-usual-bear, adjacent channel rejection.

7. If you're lucky enough, you can find the other external components which comprise the complete Stoner Pro-40 station. These are:

1. Monitor / O-scope (pictured)

2. External Speaker. Speaking of which, some used rigs will NOT have a speaker in them, and require an external speaker for use.

3. Station console/Clock

4. Am transceiver "base"

5. SWR-Watt meter

6. Ham-band expander (allows reception of some ham bands).

 

So, is the Stoner Pro-40 for you? Well if you're a collector - YES. If you're a dedicated sidebander who likes to run legal gear on 11 meters - YES. If you use AM as much (or more) as SSB, maybe not, unless you have another rig to use for AM.