Reminiscing

Last night, I installed the last of the capacitors onto the QCX 40 printed circuit board. I got those new magnifying glasses the other day and they really helped make things easier. I was able to read the capacitor nomenclature without resorting to the "microscope". The added light form the magnifying lamp helps tremendously.

A word to the wise (for what it's worth). I saw the magnifying headset in an ad on Facebook. Almost everything I view on Facebook is somehow Amateur Radio related outside of posts from friends, so the ads that pop up are mainly related to electronics. I liked them as soon as I saw the ad, but was not enamored with the price, so I did a search for the same type of headset on eBay. Got one for less than half of what the company on Facebook was charging. Moral of the story - always look around.

As I finished soldering in the last cap, i was hit with a wave of nostalgia. I got to thinking of my Heathkit "Glory Days" back in the 80s and early 90s. I built so many Heathkits, I was able to join their Master Builder Club which came into being very close to their demise. In no particular order, these are the Heathkits that I can remember building. There may have been a few more:

My very first Heathkit was one of their VTVMs.

Then came a flurry of Amateur Radio Kits:

The HR-1680 was my Novice receiver.

Who didn't have a Heathkit Cantenna Dummy Load (filled with toxic PCBs)?

The HW-8, my first QRP rig.

The Heathkit HD-1410 Keyer - VERY popular

My Amateur Radio coup de grace build. The SB-104A with macthing speaker/power supply and auxiliary VFO.

And there were also some non-Amateur Radio builds of neat stuff:

Had this alarm clock for many, many years.

The GR-70 scanner which had all the local repeaters programmed in.

And then, in my audiophile years - rack mounted stereo equipment:

Graphic equalizer

125 Watt per Channel Power Amplifier

Stereo Pre-amplifier

I spent a lot of money in those years - hey, I was working, single with no commitments at the time. I melted a lot of solder, got a lot of solder burns (along with the scars to prove it). But most of all, I had a blast building each and every kit.

There's a lot of great kits to be had today.  Some are questionable, some are downright excellent and come with instructions that actually outshine the Heathkit manuals - but there will never be an equal to what we knew as Heathkit.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!

HW-8

It was fun hooking up the HW-8 (courtesy of Dave KD2FSI) to the 4 States QRP Group antenna tuner and playing around on 40 Meters last night.  I only made a couple of contacts; but they were solid and easy.

I was surprised by two things:

1) How little I have forgotten since I had the HW-8 I had originally purchased and built.  Knowing where the controls, the settings, the peculiarities were like second nature (not that it's a complex piece of equipment. It's not) - like riding a bike, you never forget.

2) The bandspread and selectivity. Yikes!  Compare to the KX3 and other, more modern rigs the bandspread on the HW-8 is very tight. Meaning a little twitch of the VFO knob goes a long way. Maybe 40 Meters was very crowded last night with the NAQCC Sprint going on, but it sounded so crowded,  kind of like my old Novice days on the bands.  I guess with the KX3 you get more "twiddle room" between signals - and I've gotten used to that.

In all, it was a joy to use again; and I am going to be using it more and more as time goes on.  This will definitely be my SKN rig from here on out; and maybe, just maybe, I'll take "The KB9BVN Challenge" and will see if I can get WAS with this 'lil pup.

Thanks again, to good friend Dave Hackett KD2FSI for graciously re-uniting me with a relic from my Amateur Radio halcyon days. With apologies to Thomas Wolfe, "Sometimes you CAN go home again."

72 de Larry W2LJ
QRP - When you care to send the very least!