Category: McCoy — Lew

Mates for Mighty Midgets


 Hi Bill,


Gosh, we haven’t exchanged e-mails for—literally–-years now…! You may recall me from those heady days of yore when we both worked on / built / modified / boast of our respective MFTMM receivers…

A good friend of mine—Bill, VE3CSK—is in the process of collecting parts for an HB receiver, & I’ve been trying to sell him on the idea of an MFTMM: I keep telling him it’s an excellent “foundation” receiver, & that it’ll prove to be much more than a toy, or pleasant diversion, if he leaves enough room on the chassis & the front panel for future mods. I think I may be finally winning him over: he’s asked me for the references to the rig, & has placed an order for a National-brand slide rule dial with a fellow Stateside!

Do you still have your receiver, Bill…? If so, do you have any nuggets of info that might be worth sharing re. it, that I could pass onto Bill…?

I’ve since built yet another superhet here—in keeping with my interest in 1929-ish radios, I built this thing, & have been having a ball ever since: http://www.superhets.info/page9.html

This rascal can REALLY play—but it’s a LOT larger than my MFTMM rig!

~73!~ de Eddy VE3CUI – VE3XZ

————————————-
Hello Eddy! Great to hear from you. I like you FB page on the Super Hets. Beautiful.


Yes, I still have my MMRX. Haven’t used it for a while, but I am thinking of putting it back in operation — I am now getting active on 75 and 40 AM, and it would be fun to use this RX.

Here is an idea: The 455 kc filter crystals are now un-obtanium. But I’m thinking that we could substitute some 455 kc ceramic filters, which are readily available.

I like the receiver. A lot. So far it is my only real tube HB project. Encourage your friend to give it a go!

Keep me posted! 73 Bill

Our book: “SolderSmoke — Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics” http://soldersmoke.com/book.htm Our coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmoke Our Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20

Getting Ready to Listen for Sputniks

October 4 is approaching and I DO NOT have a homebrew Sputnik transmitter in the works. I hang my head in shame. AA1TJ sent me the parts, but they went to one of my many APO or FPO addresses, so I suspect they are orbiting around the Azores, or London, or Lisbon, or Rome. I’m sure they will reach me eventually.

But I have come up with a way to participate in this historic event even without a homebrew replica transmitter: I will be listening for the Sputnik transmitters, and I will be doing so with a receiver of that era, a receiver that could have been used by some earnest teenager eagerly tuning for the beeps of the overhead RED MENACE. Like the intrepid young man in the picture. What a great shot! Wow, that’s Roy Welch W0SL, then W5SLL! When I got into satellites in the Dominican Republic in 1994, the first tracking program that we used was Orbits II… by Roy Welch. We loved that software. From the AMSAT page: “Roy and his two-year-old daughter would put the radio speaker in a window and then go outside and listen to the strong signals while they watched the third stage booster tumbling end over end like a bright pulsating star as it passed over in the evening sky.“

I will be using a Hammarlund. Moore’s “Communication Receivers” says my HQ-100 was made between 1956 and 1960. PERFECT! (Mine was probably in the Dominican Republic on October 4, 1957.)

By the way, I got into the old Electric Radio magazines again, reading some more of Lew McCoy’s wonderful reminiscences. He reports that during the Sputnik period he — and apparently others — were asked by their Uncle Sam to use their skills to monitor Soviet space activities.

Let the beeping begin! (Sputnik signals recorded by Roy Welch:
http://www.amsat.org/amsat/features/sounds/Sputnk1b-144.ra)

Our book: “SolderSmoke — Global Adventures in Wireless Electronics”http://soldersmoke.com/book.htmOur coffee mugs, T-Shirts, bumper stickers: http://www.cafepress.com/SolderSmokeOur Book Store: http://astore.amazon.com/contracross-20