"the 54mhz trap hasn't been disabled"
just out of curiosity, how would one diasble such a trap?
I believe that all FCC accepted radios have a circuit to block the 2nd harmonic of 27mhz; which would be 54mhz (2 X 27 = 54). 54mhz is the 6m Ham band. So these FCC accepted radios use chokes and capacitors to make a kind of a filter to keep those harmonics down to an acceptable level.
If you have opened up a radio and seen some copper coils near the final output and seen then flattened down; then that 54mhz trap has been disabled. Some guys have the idea that because they see more power output of the radio on a meter once they spread or flatten these coils down - that the radio is actually putting more power out. Actually, they are NOT. Power meters are dumb and don't recognize the fact that it is seeing 54mhz power coming through; not just 27mhz power. So, the golden screwdriver that does this can tell his customer 'Your radio can now do 25 watts instead of 18 watts'. Because the meter is reading the 27mhz AND 54mhz at the same time. Doesn't mean that you are hearing those watts on 27mhz; but the meter will say so.
"Bad tech; no soup for you . . ."
The other harmonic distortion is made by having more than 100% modulation. One cannot have more than 100% of anything. So, that level that goes above 100% modulation ends up as adjacent channel 'splatter' or channel 'bleedover'. Removing or altering the AM limiter will give up to 140% modulation; but guess where the rest of that extra 40% modulation is going? You guessed it -bleedover!
Now what happens when you are running a radio that has all of those 'mods' in to an amp? You've guessed right if you said that the amp is now amplifying all of that crap out to the antenna. Overdriving a linear will not only eventually cause the amp to fail; but it will also sound like crap while it is also giving off amplified 54mhz noise.
Ever wonder why Hams are so ticked off at CBers?
Well; that will do for a start.
At least, that is the way I understand it and that does make sense.
I hope I wrote it all down correctly...