[Heathkit] Heathkit SB Essay.

[Robert Nickels]

john wrote:
>
> Good engineering *is* creating the best product within time and 
> financial constraints.  In that light, Heath gear was very well 
> engineered indeed.  The fact that there's also thousands on the air 40 
> years later is testament to their quality.
>
Exactly right John.   In the SB series, Heath obviously set out to mimic 
the Collins S line in appearance, and while I've been frustrated when a 
dial slips, I try to remember Collins spent 3 times as much and many say 
never made a profit selling to hams even then.  And replacements for the 
infamous rubber drive belts can be found in most local hardware stores 
in the faucet o-ring department ;-)    It's also important to remember 
that Heath didn't have the luxury of highly skilled and experienced 
assemblers either.

Looking beyond the SB series, Heath exemplified simplicity and 
functional design in most of their ham gear, which is why so much of it 
has been easily restored and is on the air today.    Even the more 
complex mechanicals of the Apache or Mohawk don't often fail, and items 
like dial drum scales have been more readily reproduced than say, screen 
printed glass dial scales that self-destruct in the presence of nearly 
any solvent!

I'd argue that the older Heath ham gear would be a good benchmark even 
today, for affordable, robust and reproducible designs.

73, Bob W9RAN