[Hammarlund] [BoatAnchors] Hammarlund HQ-88 and HQ-66

[David Thompson]

Sorry I have been out of town so slow to comment on this.  The HQ-88 shown 
in the picture appears to be the same recever shown in the 1966 WRL Catalog, 
It was designed to be very stable unlike some of the other Hammarlund 
designs.

Reading thru my notes from my meetings with Frank Lester, W4AMJ ex W2AMJ it 
appears the Hammarlund did make a prototype or two of the HQ-88.  The one 
shown in the WRL catalog is dark faced not two tome white/black.  The S 
meter is surrounded by the Hammarlund name on one side and HQ-88 on the 
other.  I assume since this receiver did not go into production and Frank 
already had his Engineers at Mars Hill working on the later HQ-215 that the 
HQ-215 survived through a modest production run.  The notes say the HQ-215 
was competition for the Collins 75S3 receiver in that you read 1 kcs 
directly rather than 10 kcs on the main dial and 1 kcs on the logging dial a 
la Drake R4A/B style.  Hammarlund used a long band reading directly in 
kilocycles.

Frank was even more familiar with the hQ-66.  The Chief Engineer at Mars 
Hill (maybe Bob W2HEL/4) wanted to upgrade the older HQ-100 then move on to 
the HQ-110.  There were two prototypes of the HQ-66 completed.

Hammarlund moved through several owners from 1965 to 1972 and never did get 
a transceiver to market.  Lloyd Hammarlund would not allow Frank and the 
Engineers to go the mechanical filter route so they tried the low frequency 
IF's that required very difficult alignment to get selectivity to work in 
say the HQ-170 or 180.

Finally in the HQ-215 Hammarlund had the stability but merely ran out of 
funds.  Stu Meyer
moved to Outercom and Frank Lester retired in 1970 as the last NYC 
Hammarlund Employee.

Prototypes, yes but not really vaporware.  Frank said there was an attempt 
to make a matching transmitter for the HQ-215.  He never even saw anything 
beyond the basic specs.  He hoped for a receiver/transmitter combo like the 
Collins S Line or Drake 4 Line.

73 Dave K4JRB