In article ,
"Lynn Coffelt" wrote:

"Bruce in Alaska" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Edward Weigel wrote:


snipped for brevity


it has been years, since I had thought of Old U.G. Allen..... but I
remeber you, Ed. Can't picture you in my minds eye, but the name sure
does resonate in the dusty memories. Yes, Billy Pulse is still around
in Bellingham, WA and I talk to the Don's Sr & Jr at G & L Marine from
time to time, especially when I get stumped on a Radar problem. Just had
one of those last month. Had a Furuno 1941 start losing range over a
month or so. Went from solid 36 Mile targets, down to barely 4 mile
targets. Still had the OEM Magnitron and something like 6000 Operating
Hours logged. So I figured, "tired Maggie" right? Replaced it, and no
change. After looking at the Manual Receiver Tuning, and finding that I
could run the Tuning Voltage from 5Vdc to 35Vdc with absolutly no change
on the received targets, I got really suspicious of the MMIC Front-end.
Pulled the T/R Pan and looked at the Tuning Voltage @ the inside of the
feedthru Cap inside of the MMIC casting to make sure I just didn't have
a broken wire somewhere. Since I didn't have a new MMIC, and also had no
way to test the T/R Pan offline, I sent it down to Don Sr. and he did the
replacement, and tested it on his testbed Radar Bench. Reinstalled,
and have 36 mile targets again. That was the first time I have ever
heard of a MMIC having that particular failure. (Tuning Line Voltage not
actually tuning the LO in the MMIC) Live and Learn...

Bruce in alaska

UG Allen!!!! Holy Smokes, I don't think I've heard that name for 20 years!
He helped me (via telephone) work my way through a Raytheon that I'd never
seen before...... forget the model number, but you guys probably are
familiar with the beast. 115vac motor generator wasn't it that turned a big
fat open scanner with a tube transmitter and receiver inside the scanner?
Big orange filtered CRT...... all the letters and numbers worn completely
off the indicator controls, substituted by big black pencil marks where the
skipper had the best luck. Easily picked seagulls out at 1/4 mile on flat
water. Quarter size burned spot in center of CRT..... standard for those
Raytheons according to UG.... Local fishermen told me that he was the
smartest man they had ever met, and that he was black. I never met him face
to face, but he taught me (telephone again) the fine points of tuning a 1600
and the hot new 2600. Those were the days!!!!
Old Chief Lynn



Yea, UG was a hell of a Radarman back in the day... Lynn, your thinking
of the Raytheon 1700 Radar, that had a DC Motor/AC Generator that turned
the antenna as well as provided the 115Vac that ran the electronics, from
the DC voltage input. They came in 12, 24, 32, and 110Vdc versions. My
first 12Vdc/115AC PowerConverter in my 1958 Dodge PowerWagon PanelTruck
was one of those from a scrapped out 1700 that I got from UG. RadioMen
loved those old Raytheon Radars, as they had a MTBF of about 100
Operating Hours. Crystals were a instant $50 fix, for their pocketbook,
and 2J42's were forever getting cooked by to high of heater voltage.
The thing I hated about 1700's was cleaning all those sliprings on the
antenna unit that feed the display. The 1700 also had a headphone jack,
on the receiver end of the antenna, so you could hear the Baseband while
tuning the 2K25 Klystron LO.

Bruce in alaska remembering those Goodtimes, of bygone days.....
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