[Milsurplus] Coil Forms...

[Hue Miller]

Michael, I think I posted this to the list before, but it

was before you signed on, I think....

around 35 years ago I was reading a magazine in a waiting

room. It was a short story, something to do with WW2 in

the Philippines. The one scene I remember is in some US

military radio installation, a man is copying CW from some

Filipine guerilla operated radio. The story describes the tones

as drifting or warbling or something such, and due to the

guerilla forces built radio having coils wound on bamboo.

The man copying the CW message finally stands up, takes

off his headphones and throws them down, he can't take 

anymore of the caterwhaul.

Some things of course, wrong with that scenario. Probably

would have used a standard issue US military radio smuggled

in, and not a homebrew rig. Bamboo coil forms would have 

nothing to do with chirp or yoop; that would be voltage

regulation in the oscillator. And if the serviceman copying

the message was able to recover any characters at all,

he wouldn't dare just throw down the headphones. Well,

it was fiction after all, and most of that is unrealistic as 

can be.
The Ghost of Guam, I think I recall reading that he wanted

to build a transmitter, but couldn't, finally. His Hallicrafter

radio eventually either rusted out or he had to abandon

it, as the Japanese were continually searching Guam for 

him. It had been some Navy man's personal radio so I 

suppose it was just something simple like a Sky Buddy.

-Hue Miller