[Elecraft] A Real SOS

[Ron D'Eau Claire]

I was one of the techs who demonstrated that gear to Phil's FCC engineers
for their annual SOLAS inspection on the San Francisco Bay. It was a simple
test to ensure the desiccant cartridges were still blue (dry), see that it
made RF and could hear signals on both 600 meters and HF and that the auto
keyer wheel that automatically pumped out the SOS and ship's call sign
worked. (So anyone could send the distress signal by turning the crank -
they didn't need to know Morse. Once in the lifeboat they just kept cranking
so rescue ships could use their radio direction finders.)

One of Phil's inspectors passed on a funny story to me about testing them to
ensure they were water-tight. The technique was to tie a line onto it and
toss it over the side, then pull it in and look for any signs of water. So
they tied a line on it, tossed over the side and then noticed that no one
had tied off the line to the railing. I understand it's still somewhere on
the bottom of the San Francisco bay. I was never asked to do that :-)

Many, perhaps most, Sparks were anything but "ancient" - many in their 20's
or 30's. A number of O.T.s got drug out of retirement during the first Gulf
War because the USA has only a tiny merchant marine and we were very short
on crews for the ships pulled out of the mothball fleets to haul military
supplies. But that was not normal. 

73, Ron AC7AC


-----Original Message-----

Hah, hah... I imagine it was a real judgement call for the FCC inspector as
to just how thoroughly the lifeboat radio must be tested while some ancient
"sparks" was grinding away wheezing and sputtering at the crank...

73,
Drew
AF2Z