[Milsurplus] Re: RT-68 and such

[Mike Morrow]

Hue wrote:

>Was this GRC gear made in not large quantities, or has most of it disappeared
>overseas? It just doesn't seem to come up for sale often.

It's very common stuff...on ebay, at hamfests, and at military vehicle collector shows.  Fair Radio carries a bunch.  The mounting racks are sometimes scarce, but even they aren't really hard to find pretty cheap.  Compare that to an FT-237 for the SCR-508/608, which harder than dammit to find.  The MT-300/GR for the AM-65 and RT-70 (AN/VRC-7) seems to go for the highest price, since it is prized by military vehicle types that want a representative radio system installed, but don't want the size and weight of one of the more complex installations.

As Robert mentioned, until a few years ago this gear was hard to give away, and even today it's still not too highly prized except by oddballs like me.  I love my AN/GRC-7 (with 75 vacuum tubes!).  This equipment was really pushing the technology limit when it first appeared almost 60 years ago.  The only thing I don't much care for is the heavy use of vibrators and ballast tubes in the power supplies, and all the 1.5 volt direct-heated miniature tubes.

>I wouldn't mind finding myself an RT-67, i think that's the one that covers
>10 meters

That's the right one for 10 meters, but the RT-68/GRC which covers 38 to 55 mcs seems to be the most popular, due to six meter coverage including the ever popular 51.0 mc FM military gear calling frequency.

The RT-66/GRC covers 20 to 28 mcs, and there's really not much of anything that one can use that set for.

Mike / KK5F