[Milsurplus] Jefferson Travis JT-350

[John J Mccarty]

Hello Paul and All;


I have a JT-350. It was rescued from a garage and falling down outside ham shack
of an old-time ham in the next town. I have the radio, power supply and remote
control unit in their transit cases. Thanks to the generosity of members of this
and other lists I have been able to assemble most of the accessories. The rig
was “ham hacked” but I was able to back out the modifications except for the
3/16 mic jack that was installed on the front panel. I used to take it out for
the local radio club’s Armed Forces Day special event.

Inside the radio’s transit case there are legs that fit into sockets on the side
of the case and the front side folds down to make an operating desk. Think of a
BC-654 on steroids. The power supply case with the supply inside becomes a place
to sit down for the operator. I haven’t had it out for awhile because it’s so
unbelievably heavy. The radio in the case weights like 325 lbs and the power
supply even more. I haven’t been able to get it up the narrow basement stairs
since my two sons moved out. They still joke that they moved out so they would
not have to haul “the big green heavy boxes”

Operationally, it’s a pretty neat radio. It does have a product detector for cw,
and the first owner hacked it. I put it back to original, but something does not
quite seem right with it. There are two frequency selection knobs and scales on
the front, one for the transmitter and one for the receiver. These seem to be
right off a Hammerland radio. And Hammerland is listed as one of the
sub-contractors for the rig. It has a pi network output and tunes up easily.
Someone said that it’s like a TCS in a single box, and that’s a pretty good
analogy. Puts out about 40 or so watts of good sounding AM. Selectivity is about
what you would expect with a single 455kc I.F. stage. Clanking T-R relay will
make you deaf on cw.

Maybe if I can clean up enough space in my shack I’ll set it up this winter if I
can get some help moving it.

73


John n9hrt


On 8/20/2010 12:14 PM, Thekan, Paul wrote:
>   There was a recent post on this forum recently on the possible availability of the JT-350. This piqued my curiosity on this set again as I have never seen one nor know of anyone who has / had one. I've read they where used as a base field radio transmitter and receiver for forward advance airfields.
>  If anyone has ever owned or operated one of these sets I would really be interested in hearing how it operated. It's one of those radio sets that has always interested me but never had the chance to see one or hear about it's operation.
> 
> Thanks
> Paul
> N6FEG