On Thu, 06 Nov 2008 23:44:31 -0500, Wayne.B
wrote:

On Thu, 06 Nov 2008 21:00:35 GMT, Tom Francis - SWSports
wrote:

http://tinyurl.com/5hkot4

Hmmmm....used to have one of those.

Bit of nostalgia...

I had one of these as a kid:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnWFPmG0ypo

http://www.antiqueradio.org/halli07.htm

Man they built some monsters back then didn't they? I remember "da
bomb" as the kids today say was the Hammerlund SP-210-LX even twenty
years after it's introduction.

http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~postr/bapix/SP210bk.htm

You had one of those beasts, you were on top of the bragging rights
pile even twenty years after they were made. SWLs would literally
fight each other to get hold of one if they ever found one available.

One of our neighbors had one - big time SWL listener, had a wire
antenna array the envy of the US Navy. He used to let me listen
around from time-to-time - nice guy - a little light in the loafers if
you get my drift but he and his "friend" were great neighbors. He
knew his electronics and taught physics at MIT for a number of years -
taught a bunch of us guys about antenna theory when the high school
had a radio club.

My Dad bought it right after WWII in 1947 and it was built like a
battleship. It had continuous tuning from the bottom of the
broadcast band at .55 MHz all the way to the top of the FM band at 108
MHz.

When I was 12 years old I built of of these:

http://www.eham.net/reviews/detail/4093

Ah yes - the days of being crystal bound until you could get, beg,
borrow or build a VFO. :)

Probably my all time favorite story/radio was the Heath "Tener"
lunchbox. I had just got my General and it was a present from my Dad
for getting my "full" ticket. I spent two days straight building and
aligning it - then had to put it down. At the time, I was working
part-time at a local TV store as a super go-fer - meaning that I would
go out in the VW van and pick up and return TV sets and/or simple tube
replacement jobs.

So after school, I had a run up to my neighborhood, I stopped at my
house to get the Lunchbox to show the boss who was also a ham my new
toy. I got the idea to load up the CB whip on the way back to the
store and wonder of wonders I heard a DL6 calling CQ. I called back
and bingo - very first voice contact ever, on ten, from a Lunchbox
radio loaded into a CB antenna from a VW bus on West Shore Drive in
Marblehead. :)

WHOO HOO!!!

Now - eh - I can call Germany on my cell phone - big whoop. :)

Not to wander off on a philosophical rant here, but you know, I think
that the advance of technology has dumbed down a lot of things - we've
become isolated from the wonders that the universe provides - the
sense of adventure has left the building if you will if only because
the truly extraordinary has become the ordinary - even mundane. You
used to have to have a general coverage receiver in your car or at
home to catch the BBC World News, now you can get it on your Sirius
just by pushing a button. Everything has become interlinked to hell
and gone and there are no corners or mystery left.

And now I'm depressed.

And its your fault. :)