Category: Hallicrafters

N2CQR Novice Rig Roundup Station

I actually used that Drake 2-B as a novice back in 1973-1974. The HT-37 came a bit later.

For the Novice Rig Roundup I used the beautiful key that Peter VK2EMU sent me. Thanks again Peter.

Novice Rig Roundup is a lot of fun. I was on 40 CW in the old Novice band today. Worked Greg AA8V who was using a homebrew superhet receiver — that doesn’t happen every day. Another station asked a question that we don’t hear much these days: “What are you running?”

I will make some more contacts during the rest of the NRR period (scroll down to a recent blog post for more details). I have my NRR serial number. Thanks to the organizers for putting together this fun event.


Novice Rig Round-Up — March 7- March 15, 2020

I may go with my Drake 2B and HT-37. But If I get ambitious (and masochistic) I might try to involve the Hallicrafters S-38E that has been torturing me lately. And I do have a DX-40 on the shelf…

Here is the announcement:

http://www.novicerigroundup.org/

VE7SL has a really nice description of the event with great pictures:

http://ve7sl.blogspot.com/2020/02/here-comes-novice-rig-roundup-nrr-2020.html

SolderSmoke Podcast #218: S-38E Woes; CW filter for uBITX; A Teensy Explosion; Mint, Cheese and Peaberries; Mailbag; A SPECIAL PLEA FOR FEEDBACK


SolderSmoke Podcast #218 is available



SolderSmoke 218 is Sponsored by AF4K Crystals:
Bry Carling can get you the crystals you need.



Flying drones with Billy. Amazing tech out there. In the 50 buck range with video cameras and facial recognition and tracking. Check out Air Pix.

Bill’s Bench:

Active CW filter in uBITX.
Hi-Per-Mite from 4 State QRP. Easy to do. Works well.
uBITX to 5 W level.

S-38E adventure.
Replaced antenna input coil BUT — it came from an earlier S-38 and doesn’t resonate.
So I bought a junker on e-bay and will take the E model coil out of that one.
Had to re-string the dial! And add rosin to it from Maria’s old violin.
BFO was not working. Bad buzz sound.
So: Re-cap, Re-tube, Re-string, Re-align, Re-build power supply.
Shortwave sounds good. Nice to hear music coming from our machines.
SHAMELESS COMMERCE DIVISION: Please use the Amazon Search Box in the upper right hand portion of the blog.

Pete’s Bench

A teensy-weensie explosion and fire
Mint! Kl7FLR
60 Meters
Cheese Microscopes
Peaberry
Radig
California hams using online SDR receivers for local nets.

News You Can Use!
J-310s in LTSpice


MAILBAG

K5HCT August via Regen and YouTube

Doug WB5TKI and his wife read “Us and Them.”

Rich K7SZ finally following SolderSmoke Podcast. Welcome aboard Rich.

Rick KD4KRA His son was one of the kids in the MIR-Classroom contact that I monitored around 1993…

David AD8Y Read SolderSmoke Book. Similar Knack story. Shared 1978 story: Homework net on 75 meters.

Paul KL7FLR Tapping and other tribal knowledge.

Dave K8WPE Says I’m fortunate to have a supportive wife. So true.

SPECIAL REQUEST: IT IS VERY DIFFICULT FOR US TO KNOW HOW MANY PEOPLE ARE LISTENING TO THIS. SO PLEASE, SEND AN E-MAIL TO SOLDERSMOKE@YAHOO.COM JUST SAY THAT YOU LISTENED TO PODCAST #218 AND TELL US HOW YOU LISTENED TO IT (ITUNES, DOWNLAD FROM BLOG, STITCHER, PODBEAN, WHATEVER… THANKS


http://www.af4k.com/crystals.htm



TRGHS: Hallicrafters S-38E will NOT be Discarded (video)

My Hallicrafters S-38E was on very thin ice. I had grown tired of the little beast. Its dangerous no-transformer power supply had caused me to risk death and to fry one of the RF input coils (that happens if you short the antenna input to an inadvertently hot chassis). It is rickety and old and I just got tired of working on it. I had down in the basement, awaiting disposal of some kind. (I’d been afraid to give it away, fearing that the recipient might electrocute himself.) But recently I’ve been doing some shortwave listening and this caused me to reconsider the S-38E.

Around this time, while looking at e-bay, I saw some guy selling just the RF input coil that I had fried. So I bought it. Then I pulled the S38-E out of the basement and fired it up. I realized that I had already done a lot of work on it. I had put in an isolation transformer, so the receiver was no longer quite so dangerous. I’d already replaced most of the capacitors. It sounded pretty good on the AM broadcast band. Then, in my first scan of the shortwave bands, I heard the William Tell Overture pouring from the speaker (see video). Could it be? Perhaps a replay of the Jean Shepherd show? No, but I soon heard the familiar voice of Tim WA1HLR — he was doing his show on (I think) WBCQ shortwave, just above our 40 meter band.

THE RADIO GODS HAVE SPOKEN. THE S-38E STAYS!

HT-37/2B QSO with K6ZA (three short videos)

On January 23, 2019 on 20 meters I talked to Barry K6ZA. He is near San Francisco. I was running my Hallicrafters HT-37 with my Drake 2B. I was really pleased to discover that the guy I was talking to loves these two pieces of gear as much as I do.

Barry said he wished I could record his voice coming out of the HT-37. My iPhone came to the rescue.

SolderSmoke Podcast #209 SKN, Old Rigs, Movie Review, Safety Tips, Mail Bag

SolderSmoke Podcast #209 is Available:

13 January 2019

 http://soldersmoke.com/soldersmoke209.mp3

An HT-37 “With Presence!” Even on CW! A Straight Key Night Story
Saving a much-loved HT-37
Drake 2-B Alignment
Tweaking the Mate for the Mighty Midget
Fixing a Deaf DC Receiver
A Wobbly National HRO-ish Gear Box
Minimum Discernible Signal Tests
Pete’s Festive Holiday Transceiver in a Bottle

 Movie Review: “First Man” Neil Armstrong goes to the moon.

Safety Tips for 2019: Fuses, Hard Drives, Flu Shots.

MAILBAG:
Dave G6AJW builds Pete’s Sudden Transceiver
Rogier KJ6ETL builds a new shack
Steve N8NM Helps save the HT-37
Jim AL7RV W8NSA builds Parasets
Dave AA7EE puts a beacon on the air — Please Listen!
Jan OM2ATC builds and documents an Si5351 VFO
Bruce KC1FSZ Homebrew’s a BITX
KB1GMX’s Tip on IRF-510 Oscillation Prevention
Ryan W7RLF Homebrews a DC Receiver

 Listening to August K5HCT from the East and West Coasts on 40
Tim WA1HLR rebuilding his 1968 transmitter.


Old Station On-The-Air — A Transmitter Half as Old as Radio Itself

I’m biased, but I think it is “a thing of beauty.” With some unexpected free time available, today I followed up on my HT-37 work by cleaning and aligning the Drake 2B. I was assisted in this by one of the many great YouTube videos by Alan Wolke W2AEW.

The Drake 2B’s 50 kc and 405 kc oscillators were right were they were supposed to be — no adjustment required. And I don’t think they have been peaked since 1973. The 455 kc IF can was also very close to perfectly tuned.

Since most stations from the mid-1960s had some QSL cards on the wall behind the rig, I pulled out some old ones and put them up. Many of these contacts were made by the rigs in the picture.

If we say that 1897 marked the first use of radio, and if we assume that this HT-37 was manufactured in 1959, that means that my old transmitter has been in operation for almost HALF of the history of radio.

HNY (Happy New Year), SKN (Straight Key Night) 2019, and an HT-37 with “presence” — even on CW

I got the HT-37 working just a few days before the New Year’s Eve/New Year’s Day Straight Key Night event. Looking at my older blog posts, I now see that the problems first surfaced in LAST YEAR’s SKN. Wow, it took me a long time to get to that problem. But I’m glad I fixed it in time for SKN.

For SKN I used the VU3XVR straight key from India that Farhan gave to me. See the picture above.


I started out on 80 meters on New Year’s eve. I rarely operate on that band — I thought it would be a good change of pace. Here is who I contacted on 80 CW:

In the warm-up period before the official start of SKN I worked John KU4AF. John was running a homebrew tube transmitter and a REGEN receiver. Respect, my friends. RESPECT!

N9EP Ed near Chicago was on a K3.

VE9XX Don was on a KX3.

NJ8D Tom in Ohio.

K4IA, Buck, down the road in Fredricksburg Va. Buck was running a Drake TR4C with a Begali key. FB Buck. He mentioned that he had had a Drake 2B — he said he regrets selling it. Indeed.

VE9WW Bill in Moncton NB. On a straight key.

AA8MI Gene (gosh, that name really sings in CW — try it!) in Ohio. Gene was running 5 watts from a K3. This added a needed QRP element to the festivities. Thanks Gene.

AI4SV Jack in Rockville Md. OH MY GOD! NOW I REALIZE WHO THIS WAS! Jack! Jack of Antanarivo Madagsascar! And now I understand what he said to me. He said in CW that my HT-37 has “Lots of presence.” Huh? What? I couldn’t figure out what he was talking about, but now I realize that he was joking about all our discussions mocking the poor audiophiles. Well, thanks Jack. I’m glad the rig has presence, EVEN ON CW! THIS QSO GETS MY VOTE FOR BEST SKN QSO.

I also listened for a while to W3GMS. His signal had a lot of character and personality. He was telling the other fellow that he suspected this was the result of a soft voltage regulator tube in his DX-60. I think he was also using a Drake 2-B. I didn’t get a chance to talk to Howard, but I’m sure it would have been fun.

On New Year’s morning I switched bands. First to 40 where I worked Greg NM2L near Atlanta. He said he fingers and wrist were out of condition, but I told him his fist was FB.

Then I went to 20 CW where I worked a bit of DX. First David F8CRS then Bert F6HKA. The contact with Bert reminded me of the charms of DX contacts using CW. “VY GM DR OM.” It was nice.

N7AQQ Mike in Montana.

So it was a good SKN for me. Working the French stations reminded me of the allure of listening to CW coming in from far away, and from a foreign culture. And it was great to hear from AI4SV that my HT-37 has “presence” even on CW.

73 and HNY to all.

HT-37 Choke Failure — Why did this happen? What is your diagnosis?

Look, it has been 60 years, so I’m not looking for my money back or anything, but having just repaired the LV power supply choke on my very venerable Hallicrafters HT-37, I started thinking about how and why it failed.

Clues:

— I found it with four of the windings broken, with the eight broken leads kind of sticking out of the winding wrap.

— The four broken leads were on the outside of the winding (thank God!) an were at the part of the winding closest to the chassis and the back of the cabinet. (See picture below.)

— There was evidence of burning on at least two of the leads.

— The choke is located in the extreme back corner of the chassis, near the back of the cabinet.

— The paper and cellophane wrapping around the windings was a bit deteriorated.

So, what is your diagnosis? What happened to cause the choke to go open?

HT-37 FIXED — Thanks for all the support

Don’t worry– I covered it with tape

This week I found myself with some unexpected free-time, courtesy of the government shutdown. And of course, my thoughts turned to the HT-37. I started thinking about the open choke in the power supply. Four wires were sticking out of one side, four sticking out of the other. Figuring out which went to which would have driven me nuts. But it occurred to me that I could just wrap the four one on both sides together, and then just connect them with a piece of wire (see above). I’d end up sacrificing three windings, but that shouldn’t matter.


It worked. My AADE L/C meter won’t measure up into the full Henry range, but the choke was no longer open and the resistance looked right (about 230 ohms).

I put it into the HT-37. It works. I had a long rag chew with AE2EE — a guy who really knows his boatanchors. He said it sounded great. This contact was like icing on the cake. TRGHS.

Thanks to everyone who wrote in with offers of parts or suggestions on how to acquire a suitable replacement.

Special thanks to Steve Murphy, N8NM who removed the LV choke from a junker HT-37and mailed it to me JUST AS I WAS LEARNING THAT THIS REPAIR WOULD WORK. I feel bad about putting Steve to the trouble. I blame the shut-down. Idle hands are the devil’s workshop. And that broken HT-37 was bothering me.

This was a very satisfying repair. It was great fun to put the old rig back on the air. And I did it without injuring myself. Straight Key Night is right around the corner.

Terminal strip for newer caps. Repaired choke went to the two ends of the strip.


All I want for Christmas is… an HT-37 L25 Choke– 9 Henries at 135 ma


 Following my own advice to prepare for Straight Key Night, I tried to fire up my venerable Hallicrafters HT-37 transmitter. It didn’t work. I quickly determined that none of the oscillators were working, so my troubleshooting focused on the power supply. Sure enough, the choke in the low voltage power supply is open. That’s bad.

I briefly considered giving up on this old rig. I don’t really like working with tubes anymore. And this thing is very heavy — a real beast. DX-100-like in its heaviness. It can be hazardous to your health just moving this thing around. Opening up the case is not easy. And there are nasty voltages in there….

But I have had this transmitter since 1973 or 1974. I have fixed it many times, in several countries. I got it from a member of the Crystal Radio Club when I was a kid. There are parts given to me by Pericles, HI8P in the Dominican Republic. I used it to transmit through Russian satellites. That transmitter is like an old friend. I just can’t give up on it.

So I need to replace or repair the choke. Is there anyone out there who has a junker out in the garage or some other source of L25? Or does anyone know of a business that could rewind the choke. Please let me know. I have decided to leave the rig on the bench until I get this thing fixed (it is too heavy to move multiple times!)

It it Hallicrafters Part Number 056-300259. L25 — 9 Henries at 135 ma. Help!

Where it belongs: S38E in a Zoo

Hey fellas,
Hope this finds you well. Spent the day with my family at a zoo. They have a neat African exhibit that includes many small huts for shade and to give the feel of the African bush. Each was outfitted with items kne would expect to find in a distant bush camp… Gear, etc. Many had semi modern radio receivers.
But one… One had a well worn and rusting Hallicrafters S38E. The rig y’all love to hate… Lol. It is secured to the shelf and as far as I know stays their year round; partially open to all the wonder weather Michigan can throw at it.
I got a kick out of it, thought you may as well.
Hope all is well.
John in Michigan
KE5ETX
——————–
John: Finally, a good place for these things. Museums. Or Zoos. We should organize a collection campaign, perhaps with free pick-up and tax deductions.

Here is a no-kidding story. We had a family reunion last month. I met a cousin I hadn’t seen in 40 years. I had given him an old S38E so he could listen to SW BC. I asked him if he remembered that radio. “Yea, I sure do — It almost electrocuted me!”
73 Bill
——————



Haunted by Hallicrafters At Winterfest

I was on the verge of not going to the Vienna Wireless Society’s Winterfest Hamfest this year. We had just returned from a long trip. I was tired. Armand WA1UQO bailed due to a family obligation. But, since this is about the only hamfest that regularly attend, and because it is only about 5 miles down the road, I went.

As soon as I got there I started wondering if I should have stayed home. Here’s why: Hallicrafter S-38s. Just about everywhere I turned, there were S-38s. I had never seen so many of these EVIL AC/DC trandformerless widow-makers. I watched in horror as innocent hams reached into their wallets and bought these little monsters. “Does it work?” asked one victim. “Well,” said the seller, “it hums like crazy when you turn it on.” Yea, I’ll bet it does. (The guy bought it.)

It was kind of a Hallicrafters day. I even saw an Hallicrafters TV! See above.

Nothing big followed me home. I got a couple of nice variable caps (one with a reduction drive). A Radio Shack speaker. Some coax. A project box of BITX40 size. A Weller soldering gun slightly less beat up than the one I’ve had since age 13.

I got to meet Richard Choy of Midway Electronics. He has a business out in the Shenandoah Valley and is selling a neat little 2 watt CW transceiver kit. Go to midwayelecrronics.us/qrp for more info.


Oh yea, I got a kick out of this ENORMOUS BFO. I almost bought it for Pete (who is so fond of tiny little oscillators). This is a real Boatanchor BFO. I wonder how many Si5351s you could put in that box?

Thanks to VWS for putting on the ‘fest. In spite of the S-38s, I had fun.

Straight Key Night at N2CQR

I did my part for the retro-Luddite-CW-Straight Key cause. My HT-37 was kind of wheezing. I may have to go in there to striaghten it out. At times I had it cranked back to less than 5W (to maintain some semblence of QRP street cred).

A highlight was the QSO with Jim W1PID. Jim is a well-known QRPer and a friend of QRP Hero Mike Rainey. Jim and I talked last year — same date, same event, same rig. Jim has a really nice web site: http://www.w1pid.com/

My nephew Jeffrey joined me for the last two contacts. He got a real kick out of it, both the CW and the SSB.

31 December 2017
17S P49MR Martin – Back in the islands! Like an annual QSO.
40CW Pre SKN W1PID on 40 with my HT-37. An annual event! Jim running 75 watts
40CW SKN KF5RBR Dan in AR.
1 January 2018
40CW SKN W8HOG SKCC 87750 Perry in Ohio
40CW SKN N1CGP Dave in Maine using J37 key
40CW SKN WB4JJJ Al in Fairfax
40CW SKN K8SRB Stan in Ohio (with nephew Jeffrey with me)

17SSB WJ2N Andy in Florida (with Jeffrey in the QSO)

Amazing Homebrew/Boatanchors QSOs on 40 –Six solder melters in a row!

Al W8VR
After a day of happy tinkering with the Direct Conversion receiver I’ve been working on, I turned off the soldering iron and got on 40 meter SSB with my BITX Digi-Tia.

First — Steve W4IJ came back to my CQ. Steve is a boatanchor enthusiast and has written for Electric Radio magazine. FB.

W4IJ Boatanchors

When Steve signed off, I got into a contact with Pete W8NBO. We had spoken before and he had told me of a homebrew transmitter he’d built as a kid. This time I asked for details: It was a 6AG7 oscillator to a 6L6 amplifier. He ran it with an S38 (brave man!). He described what must have been a very painful effort to hack (literally) the needed holes in the transmitter chassis using just a spike, a hammer and a file. I told him this brought back my memories of similarly painful chassis work (mine was for a power supply for a Heath HW-32A).

At this point we were joined by Arnie, W2HDI. Arnie’s rig is in Stowe Vermont, but he was running it remote from the South of France where he and his wife were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. Arnie shared with us memories of similar chassis pain — his were related to an external modulator that he built for a DX-40. I think he said that all he had was a hole punch and a file. Oh, the humanity!

Then Al W8VR joined the conversation. Al said that he’s been in the game so long that his early rigs were built using cigar boxes as chassis. I pointed to a connection: I noted that my BITX rigs are enclosed in what could be considered cigar boxes. Al’s QRZ page picture has a magnificent AM rack rig that he said was actually built twice. There is also an HRO-60 in the picture. FB. Check it all out at Al’s web site. Click on the mic for the write ups, the key for the pictures. http://www.w8vr.org/

Then Dennis K0EOO called in. Holy Cow! Dennis and I spoke not long ago. You may recall my enthusiastic write up of his beautiful 1974 SSB rig:
http://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2017/08/k0eoo-homebrew-ssb-in-1974.html
and
http://soldersmoke.blogspot.com/2017/08/more-on-k0eoos-amazing-homebrew-ssb-rig.html

This was almost too much. Rarely will you spontaneously come across so many hams who have melted so much solder. FB.

Icing on the cake: When I returned to the bench, I fired up the DC receiver and heard Mike KN4EAR talking about his BITX40. I switched to the Digi-Tia and gave Mike a call. He reports making many contacts with his rig. FB.

TRGHS.

Hallicrafters and the Romantic Life of Private Hogarth

The world of the SolderSmoke podcast and blog are — and will remain — G rated. But occassionally our discussion of ham radio technology causes us to bump up against some racy topics. This happens VERY rarely, and that rarity probably says something about ham radio. We have noted the alleged attractive power of Pete Juliano’s French beret. There was that April 1 story about the new SolderSmoke cologne (“chicks dig it!”). Jean Shepherd was a man of the world — our discussions of him sometimes bring us a bit closer to the prurient boundary line. We occassionally mention the lifestyle of the Dos Equis man. But mostly, we stick to the circuitry.

This morning I came across a character that I hadn’t been aware of: Private (later Corporal) Hogarth. He was the theme of a series of ads run by the Hallicrafters Company during World War II. They were trying to sell their EC-1 broadcast receiver (essentially an All American Five). Their advertising theme was, essentially, “chicks dig it.”

More of this here: http://www.geojohn.org/Radios/MyRadios/EC1/EC1.html


 Don’t blame me. I blame Hallicrafters.

N8NM’s SR-16 Hallicrafters Tribute RIg

Bill, Pete:
The rig is loosely based on the Hallicrafters SR-160 transceiver, since I’m using a RD16HHF1 in the final RF, I’m calling it the SR-16. It’s a tri-band rig covering 80, 40 and 20m. Architectually, it’s similar to Pete’s JBOM, which is partially coincidental (thanks for sharing the article, Pete!) The heart of the rig is the W7ZOI hybrid-cascode IF, a really slick circuit that really makes the rig a joy to use.
Frequency generation is handled by the ubiquitous Arduino/Si5351 combo and a sketch based on Tom, AK2B’s “Multi Function VFO”, to which I added functions for selecting the appropriate bandpass and IF filters, generating CW, RIT, and dual VFOs (with split functionality), the state of which is saved in EEPROM when the rig is powered-down.
The rig’s just about finished – I’ve got the remaining parts ordered and hope to have it on-the-air soon.
73! – Steve N8NM

Boatanchors! HT-37 to HT-37 contact with W1ZB

Jerry W1ZB and I met up on 40 a week or so ago. He was running a Hallicrafters HT-37. This spurred me to clear up the T/R problem that had knocked me out of the competition on Straight Key Night (I’m sure I would have won!). One spray of DeOxit D5 on the HT37 relay contacts was all it took. Jerry and I set up a schedule for this morning on 40 minutes. Above you can see a short video of the first part of our HT-37 to HT-37 contact.

Jerry has an amazing collection of beautiful old tube radios. Check out his QRZ.com page:
https://www.qrz.com/lookup/w1zb

BTW: Speaking of old rigs talking to identical old rigs: Last night on 40 I worked TI2NF in San Jose, Costa Rica. He was running a Collins KWM-2 to a Collins 30-L1. It was real nice to talk to somebody who was using an unusual rig. Right after we finished, VE3OCZ called TI2NF. VE3OCZ was ALSO running a KWM-2 to a 30-L1. TRGHS.