[Milsurplus] Chinese 6M- packset, the 884

[Mike Morrow]

Meir wrote:

>The R-10*M series was replaced by the mid-60's in the Soviet Union/Warsaw
>pact by the R-107,

Hi Meir,

I will always defer to your well-established knowledge of this equipment, and in fact I have no opinion contrary to yours.  I would only remark that I have three R-105M and one R-109M units, and two of those four units have markings inside which indicate 1969 as year of manufacture.  They were well obsolete by 1969, but were still being made in large numbers, apparently.  One of my R-105M units was a US soldier's bring-back from Iraq in 1991.

>In the early 70's the R-107 was replaced by the R-107T, all solid state and
>with digital frequency display, same power and frequency coverage as the
>R-107.

I've always admired the R-107 series, but they seem to have had far less distribution than the older R-10xM sets even long after the R-107 appeared.  The only all-solid-state Soviet gear that I have is the R-148, R-126, and R-855, but maybe one day I'll come across an R-107 of some flavor.

>To sum it up, in the 70's which these Chinese sets are from, The R105 series
>sets were obsolete for a long time and the R-107T was in use in the
>Eastern-Block countries.

Still, the R-105M seems had a long (but hard to explain) service life even though more modern stuff had been fielded many years earlier.

>IMHO the R-107T is far superior to the CHICOM 884...

Not even a bit of doubt about that.  BTW, I just checked out a Type 884 unit against an AN/PRC-77, and found that the highest frequency that the Type 884 could be set to and still communicate with the AN/PRC-77 is about 50.35 MHz.  The Type 884 has no squelch and no volume control.  IMHO, the very cheap headset and microphone assemblies would not have survived long in combat use.  And why were the Eastern and Chinese block so fond of the complex, yet awkward, Kulikov-type copies of German WWII antennas?  The U.S. "measuring-tape" style of portable radio antennas were far simpler, cheaper, and easier to make and, most importantly, use in the field.  I carried an AN/PRC-25 in U.S. service in 1972 and I'm glad I didn't have to deal with a Kulikov.

>BTW I had so much Russian HF stuff to carry home from the big
>Friedrichshafen hamfest in Germany in 2000, that I didn't buy a nice R-107T
>set complete with all the accessories, for $100...

Now you're bragging!  :-)  (envy!)

Mike / KK5F