[Collins] Question about Collins and Eldico Clones

[Dr.Gerald Johnson]

Grease gets lumpy in Collins PTOs too. Only took about 20 years for my 
75S3B that I bought in 1964.

Heatkits used a worm gear driven variable capacitor with a spiral face 
cam to move the 100 KHz pointer. The VFO in my 6 meter SB-110A gets 
very noisy when tuned out of the bottom 200 KHz of the band where its 
had almost no use.

The inventor of the Jeep was the Bantam Motor Company. I have a 
book about Jeeps and it says the government gave the contracts to 
American Motors and Ford because they didn't think Bantam was big 
enough to supply the military's needs. Bantam built all the Jeep trailers for 
WW2 and then built a modified version for civilian sales after the war. The 
military version had no opening tailgate, it was water tight so it could 
float. The civilian version has a tailgate like a pickup. I have one out in 
the garage that my dad (K0CPN) had for many years but there's no 
nameplate on it. So Bantam survived the war, but by how much I don't 
know.

The truth probably is that Bantam really wasn't big enough but with 
typical federal payments might have grown fast enough to meet the 
needs or might have been able to contract with AM or GM or Ford or 
Chrysler or some other maker, but still only have been able to meet part 
of the demand and not as fast as Ford and AM who already had large 
car assembly plants with no materials to build cars.

Going to AM and Ford probably got more Jeeps a year faster than 
Bantam in their wildest dreams could have delivered. As for patents, the 
Dodge Power Wagon four wheel drive was already around, the only 
thing unique about the Jeep was its compact size which was large for a 
Bantam Motor Car design. The only patent might have been a design 
patent which is mostly style. The Ford and AM engines were long stroke 
characteristic of Bantam engines.

73, Jerry, K0CQ, Technical Advisor to the CRA

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Entire content copyright Dr. Gerald N. Johnson, electrical engineer.
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