TJ says:

Hams can build their gear from anything they want. It’s a technical hobby. There are many hams who have modified 11m gear to work on 10m. The catch is that you need to certify that it is clean, i.e. that it puts out a clean signal no wider than what is authorized. Most CB gear will easily do that. It has to pass spectral purity, that is, from the band edges of your 2.4kz SSB channel, that the signal attenuates to not cause interference on adjacent channels. Odds are that most 11m gear will do that.

You can get lots of great assistance for free from local hams who will help you measure and test your modified radio so don’t sweat all the requirements. There are many articles showing how to mod these 11m rigs.

If it’s a crystal controlled rig then it has a high probability of just working… the problem with not having a vfo though is going to be in finding someone to tune up to you. With the sun spot cycle so low right now DX on 10m is rare and unless you have crystals to get to the 10m calling frequencies your chances of getting a lot of use out of that rig are low. Make sure that your crystal puts you in the right 10m sub-band. Unless you are general class or above you’ll need to keep it below 28.5 MHz. Last I checked the calling frequency was 28.350MHz.

To check it out you will want to find some close by hams who will work you and give you signal reports.

You would do good to give some serious consideration to costs.. if it’s going to cost you more than 200 dollars or so to set this crystal controlled rig up you can probably find a used rig with a vfo which would work far better and give you a lot more flexibility. Any money you save you can use to improve your antenna so that when conditions do improve you can work the many operators who enjoy the fine dx that 10m offers.

Hope you get your ticket soon.. I’ve been a ham for 22 years now and will always be a ham.