How about the excitement of drawing an arc off the plate caps of the PA tubes with a pencil (keep your fingers on the wood). That used to be part of the excitement of ham radio. Lots of these exciting things have been lost due to the advent of solid state devices and operating convenience.
Nostalgia is wonderful - I have to just look at the array of boat anchors featured in the tailgate section at hamfests. There is a lot of gear that I drooled over when I was a youngster who could not afford an HRO50 or an SX-100 or an NC-300. I see these receivers and think back to that time when I wanted one, but I resist the temptation, the new solid state gear has much better specs and reviews, and I know that I would not want to indulge in a restoration project for that boat-anchor gear no matter how strong the nostalgia may be - so I just enjoy the looking and resist the drooling. You are allowed to differ, but I am sufficiently occupied with repairs of Elecraft gear and other personal projects, and do not have spare time to restore antique gear - others may have different perspectives. 73, Don W3FPR On 9/5/2011 7:14 PM, Guy Olinger K2AV wrote: > On Mon, Sep 5, 2011 at 5:45 PM, Bruce Beford > <[email protected]>wrote: > >>> If the amplifier gets too hot, it will let you know in a safe, >>> non-spectacular way. >> How boring. 8-) >> > Indeed boring. MUCH more interesting: > > Exploding electrolytic capacitors. > > 3-1000Z meltdown and implosion. > > 3-500Z melting solder off the pins. > > Wirewound resistors burning up and leaving a burning carbon track. > > Plate transformer so hot it sets paint on fire. > > Bandswitch with a half a dozen totally burned contacts > > Plate choke with about half the wire evaporated. > > > Now that's entertainment. > > > 73, Guy > ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:[email protected] This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
