Fixing a broken latch on the Yaesu YSK-100 Separation Kit

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I’ve maintained the Yaesu FT100 FAQ for about 10 years. For those of you not familiar with ham radio, the FT100 is a popular mobile transceiver. I’ve talked to people from all over the world on it. As time went on, the FAQ stabilized and I rarely have to do much updating to it now other than to fix broken links. This FAQ still sees a fair amount of traffic.

My FT100 is mounted in my Durango using a YSK100 separation kit. The separation kit makes this radio easier to mount in a vehicle by separating the user controls, called the ‘head’, from larger body of the radio. The head then can be installed on a faceplate that is connected to the radio’s body with long cables. The body of the radio can be installed wherever you find room in the vehicle. Mine is hidden in the center console.

About a year ago, the latch that holds the head on to the face plate of the YSK-100 separation kit broke while I was removing the head.

I’ve never been happy with the YSK100 faceplate design since the latch requires an excessive amount of force to deflect when installing or removing the head. Without the latch, the radio could still be used, but it would fall off easily whenever I brushed against the head. Since the radio has been out of production for a few years, spare parts hare hard to find. So I decided to fix it myself.

YSK-100 faceplate with broken latch

The plastic latch had cracked off of my faceplate.

There had been several reports of this problem on the FT100 Yahoo Group, but no one had ever reported figuring out a fix for it. You can’t just glue it back in place, because the part is highly stressed and a glue joint would not hold up to those extreme forces.

YSK with cracked latch

As you can see in the above image, a small portion of the latch is still on the wall of the faceplate. I sanded this off with a small belt sander. Next I took some measurements and started bending some .032″ thick aluminum sheet metal to make my own latch. I have a small metal brake/shear, but in this case, I just ended up using a vice to bend the sheet metal since the brake has a limit on how small the bends can be. I drilled some small holes and with attached it with M3 screws and nuts.

Sheet metal replacement latch for the YSK100

Here is a top view of the latch.

It works pretty much like the old latch in that it’s very stiff and holds with a lot of force. I suppose a thinner material, perhaps a lighter gauge steel, might have worked better, but this one can be bent to get the desired feel. If it ever breaks again, I know how to make a new one.

Here is a side view of the latch.

YSK-100 with metal latch

New metal latch with head installed.


Now that the radio is fixed, I plan to spend more time using it. When it was in that state of falling off the faceplate whenever I touched it, I frequently removed it all together and stowed it so it wouldn’t get damaged. But now I’m looking forward to having a properly functioning radio again. I tend to avoid using something that doesn’t work the way I want it to and then when I get around to fixing it, I wonder why I didn’t do it sooner.

I hope that others are able to take advantage of my description and pictures to help them to fabricate their own latch in the event that they break the plastic one that comes on the faceplate.

9 thoughts on “Fixing a broken latch on the Yaesu YSK-100 Separation Kit

  1. do you still have the ysk-100 kit?
    A ham in australia would like to buy it if it is still available.
    his call is VK8GM in Alice Springs
    his irlp node is 6000

    my addr is 306 cripple creek ct
    virginia Beach, Va. 23452

    thanks

    • Hi Bruce, I only have one separation kit for my FT100 and I need it, so it’s not for sale. If you post on the FT100 Yahoo group, you may be find someone willing to sell a kit, or a whole radio with a kit….

  2. My FT-100 has started throwing a 10-100 watt
    carrier on 10 meters while in ssb mode. Have you run into this issue ? Have any ideas on how to resolve.

    FT-100 SER.# 9J101334

    Thanks for this site!

    Respectfully,
    Ron Smith WB7UZZ

    • Hi Ron, If you’re getting a carrier on SSB, it sounds like the radio might be transmitting in AM mode. I don’t know of what might cause that, but you may want to post the question to the Yahoo group since there are many people on there who may have heard of what causes this and what could be done to fix it.

      Best regards, Lee

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