[AMRadio] 10 meters

[Charles Ring]

On 5/30/2014 1442, Donald Chester wrote:
> Back in 1980-84 I  ran the service department of a two-way  commercial 'Land
> Mobile' radio business in Kentucky. They also sold a line of amateur
> equipment and were an official Yaesu dealer, so in addition to the
> commercial VHF FM rigs used by farmers and small town police and fire
> departments, I worked on my share of ham transceivers of about every
> description. One of the more  popular transceivers at the time were the
> FT-101E series. I'd say that well over 95% of the FT-101s I encountered had
> 11m crystals installed. In those days the FT-101E was the CBer's and
> freebander's dream radio, and my boss  couldn't keep enough of them in
> stock. As I recall Yaesu had discontinued the FT-101E line by then, so he
> mostly dealt with used ones. I had plenty of work to do, replacing toasted
> finals and repairing the work of golden screwdrivers.
>
> The CB boom fizzled about the same time that the FCC deregulated the Land
> Mobile and other radio services. A 1st or 2nd class  (later downgraded to a
> combined 'General' ) radiotelephone licence was no longer required to
> install and service commercial two-way.  Users could legally buy their own
> radios directly by mail order with their frequencies pre-programmed in.
> Failed radios were simply swapped out with good ones and the defective unit
> sent back to the vendor for replacement - most were dirt-cheap and not worth
> the cost and trouble of fixing. Our business went bankrupt within a few
> months, and that's when I got completely out of radio and started the
> 22-year teaching gig - a smart move that gave me work that was more
> rewarding, and a state pension after I retired.
>
>
> Don k4kyv
>
>

Yaesu factory boxes were marked "SSB Equipment", leaving open who might 
use it. I considered them about as legit a maker as Siltronix.

Were Siltronix designs just stolen from Swan or was there more of a 
connection?

-- 
*Charles Ring W3NU*