Hamfest finds - a real boatanchor!

[Radioguy41]

Picked these up at the Timonium MD Hamfest last weekend.

BC-342, with a number of Ham mods (70lbs with mount!). Supposedly it works but I yanked the rectifier
and am doing some upgrades. New electrolytics, new fuse holder, and a conversion to a 3 prong plug.

1946 National NC-2-TSG Speaker

Larry

 

[n1wbd]

True BoatAnchors Larry!! Glad to see that hopefully they'll be put back in to use. Good luck on the project.

73
Bob N1WBD

Picked these up at the Timonium MD Hamfest last weekend.

BC-342, with a number of Ham mods (70lbs with mount!). Supposedly it works but I yanked the rectifier
and am doing some upgrades. New electrolytics, new fuse holder, and a conversion to a 3 prong plug.

1946 National NC-2-TSG Speaker

Larry

 

[radio]

Funny you should mention "hamfests"......

I've always been a garage sale, yard sale, "deal finding" guy...but went to my first "small" hamfest today. My friend that encouraged me to get my license invited me to go. Found it amazing how much farther my money goes there, than at standard "regular" private sales. Met some very nice people, too...one private vendor who gave a pair of radios to a young man who was OVERJOYED to get them! I saw the boy's smile and conversation from across the aisle and asked the vendor. He figured that young man would remember "Hamfest" put on by the young people's amateur radio group in Lowell, MI today for a long time, and leave happy having attended, feeling good about "hams" in general. I think the guy's on the right track. Encourage young people. Period. Was nice to see and a good gathering. If I'd had a camera, that moment would have been the classic cover to a radio/ham magazine of years gone by. You had to see it to believe it. My finds were only an AM FM tuner I needed for my business, an AM radio for my collection at the radio station, and a "studio timer"...but.....it was much fun.

 

[n1wbd]

Radio if you like the small hamfest you have to go to a larger one you'll be amazed at what you'll find.

Funny you should mention "hamfests"......

I've always been a garage sale, yard sale, "deal finding" guy...but went to my first "small" hamfest today. My friend that encouraged me to get my license invited me to go. Found it amazing how much farther my money goes there, than at standard "regular" private sales. Met some very nice people, too...one private vendor who gave a pair of radios to a young man who was OVERJOYED to get them! I saw the boy's smile and conversation from across the aisle and asked the vendor. He figured that young man would remember "Hamfest" put on by the young people's amateur radio group in Lowell, MI today for a long time, and leave happy having attended, feeling good about "hams" in general. I think the guy's on the right track. Encourage young people. Period. Was nice to see and a good gathering. If I'd had a camera, that moment would have been the classic cover to a radio/ham magazine of years gone by. You had to see it to believe it. My finds were only an AM FM tuner I needed for my business, an AM radio for my collection at the radio station, and a "studio timer"...but.....it was much fun.

 

[Radioguy41]

Funny you should mention "hamfests"......

I've always been a garage sale, yard sale, "deal finding" guy...but went to my first "small" hamfest today. My friend that encouraged me to get my license invited me to go. Found it amazing how much farther my money goes there, than at standard "regular" private sales. Met some very nice people, too...one private vendor who gave a pair of radios to a young man who was OVERJOYED to get them! I saw the boy's smile and conversation from across the aisle and asked the vendor. He figured that young man would remember "Hamfest" put on by the young people's amateur radio group in Lowell, MI today for a long time, and leave happy having attended, feeling good about "hams" in general. I think the guy's on the right track. Encourage young people. Period. Was nice to see and a good gathering. If I'd had a camera, that moment would have been the classic cover to a radio/ham magazine of years gone by. You had to see it to believe it. My finds were only an AM FM tuner I needed for my business, an AM radio for my collection at the radio station, and a "studio timer"...but.....it was much fun.

If you're in central Michigan, you're in reasonable driving distance to the Dayton Hamvention. Itsa bigun.

Dayton Hamvention 2011 - Global Friendship

Larry

 

[radio]

I hope to work it into the schedule. And, to take some "fun money" for it. Maybe not for just ham gear, but....for those "rare, fun finds." We all have our favorites
when it comes to electronics!

 

[w6pea]

Boat Anchor for sure.

 

[Radioguy41]

Received parts today and finished putting the rectifier unit back together. Ran some tests and all was well. Brought it up slowly on the variac and when I reached 110v a resistor in the tube platform section started to smoke so back to the drawing board. I'm hoping it's just an out of spec resistor but time will tell.

 

[Radioguy41]

Here's the oldest BA I have, a 1940 Hallicrafters S-20R I refurbed last summer. I have since located all the correct knobs but am still searching for an original speaker.

 

[Radioguy41]

Hot diggety I found an original speaker for the S-20R! As soon as my surgeon (gall bladder removed this past Tuesday) clears me to start lifting more than 8-10lbs I'm going to tear into that one. The speaker is the last piece of the puzzle.

 

[n1wbd]

Sorry to hear you were in the hospital. But hopefully you'll recover soon and finish that project. Looking forward to hear your results.
Bob

Hot diggety I found an original speaker for the S-20R! As soon as my surgeon (gall bladder removed this past Tuesday) clears me to start lifting more than 8-10lbs I'm going to tear into that one. The speaker is the last piece of the puzzle.

 

[Radioguy41]

It took a while but the BC-342-N is finally up and running. I left all the post-war ham mods as they were and restored it as an early post-war hamified surplus receiver.

Since it could be a long time before an LS-3 speaker falls into my lap, I decided to build my own. The speaker is out of a Hallicrafters S-72 (5K ohm tranny). The case is a Radio Shack project box. I drilled the holes for the speaker bolts and cut the circle for the grille. The grille cloth is just an extra piece I had left over. I removed the headphone jack from the speaker connections. I added an RCA female phono connector to the case and wired the tranny to it. I bought an RCA phono-to-mic cable to connect the speaker to the radio. It works like a champ; plenty of volume and no noticable distortion. Total cost - $10.

Larry

 

[Radioguy41]

For some reason the links to the pics are broken so I'll repost one of the homebrew speaker.

As an update, the following pieces have moved on to new homes:

The National speaker shown in the original post
The Hallicrafters SX-42
The Hallicrafters S-40A
The Heathkit HW-32A
The Hammarlund HQ-140-X

But then this followed me home from the Kutztown Radio Meet last weekend:

BC-314-D

Larry

 

[turbosat]

What is that thing Larry? Can't make the picture any bigger, but it wouldn't help me anyway, haha.

 

[Radioguy41]

Both are WWII military receivers but for different frequencies. The BC-342 is an A/C powered shortwave receiver while the BC-314 was originally powered by a dynamotor and receives the broadcast band and medium wave frequencies. It has been converted to A/C power. I've restored the BC-342 and it works great. The BC-314 works but has some problems. The audio is garbled at volume and it draws too much current. I only bought it to get the fine tuning knob, which has been replaced, so I will sell it as-is. I have a Hallicrafters SX-28A that I'm going to re-cap this Winter so I don't need another boatanchor project. The SX-28A has more than 40 caps and electrolytics to be replaced.

 

[boister340]

Oh boy - this reminds me of the boat anchors, towers, rotators, and other gear I'm supposed to help a friend clean out. So, this looks like a selling forum as well? Sweeet.

 

[jayn_j]

Oh boy - this reminds me of the boat anchors, towers, rotators, and other gear I'm supposed to help a friend clean out. So, this looks like a selling forum as well? Sweeet.

No, it isn't. Selling is restricted to the for sale forum, and posting of items is restricted to pub members. Any post by a non-pub-member or outside the proper forum will be deleted.

That probably sounds a bit harsh, but Scott set that policy a couple of years ago when we were overrun with people joining in order to post their get rich quick garbage.