[Milsurplus] Repaneled Receivers

[Todd Bigelow - PS]

It makes sense that this was done, but I always thought any sets converted for
use during that time were converted to provide coverage or use for a specific
part of the spectrum where: a.) nothing else was available at hand, so something
needed to me modified to work or b.) someone in particular was familiar with or
liked using a certain piece of gear made for aircraft or the likes and wanted one
available for ground use as well, when an AC model didn't necessarily exist or
wasn't readily available.

 Maybe it was as simple as having an extra unit kicking around and wanting some
redundancy or increased capabilities. We tend to think of the military as always
having all the gear it needed at wanted all the time, everywhere. My thought here
is that things could be used or adapted - not unlike the 'standard' SCR-274N or
ARC-5 aircraft set up that was anything but standard, but modified and changed to
suit different circumstances.

Again, this is all speculation on my part since I wasn't around then. I do know
that many units were modified after being surplussed out and this is probably the
more likely scenario in many cases. The fact that it looks professional or uses
military parts for the modifications is no guarantee that it was done by the
military. Not all hams were 'ham-handed' as can be seen by the homebrew gear in
old handbooks and magazines of the time. I have a few HB rigs made by a former
Raytheon engineer that could easily pass for commercial quality.

Todd/'Boomer'  KA1KAQ

Kargokult@aol.com wrote:

> In a message dated 2/4/02 8:37:29 AM Pacific Standard Time, k4kwm@hotmail.com
> writes:
>
> << >
>  >I suspect these were efforts to gain a few more years of useful life out of
>  >these old workhorses when equipment routinely moved to rack mounting.
>  >Anyone else seen rigs like this?
>  > >>
>
> I suspect it was more like a diversion to keep  highly skilled workmen
> who  were already on the  payroll, but hardly  overworked,
> occupied and interested.  With the amount of better  gear surplussed
> from the late 40s thru the 60s, it's hard for me to imagine a reason to
> choose a  BC-348 or a really marginal receiver like the RBM-hf, unless
> the mission really wasn't that important - in which case, why spend all
> that money for  rebuilding? You have to admit, in terms of  time, if you
> had to commission the job and pay for it, it would be very expensive.
> Why not use a Super Pro or some such? Already rack mountable and
> certainly vastly ahead of a BC-348 or RBM-hf.
> Hue Miller