[MRCA] BC-659 Just 4 fun

[Tim]

Hi Breck - Nice video - as usual!  You might motivate me to revive my
BC-659.  HiHi
Just for fun I tested the meter needle for radioactivity.  Mine reads 0.22
mR/hr with the detector touching the panel.  That's about 20 times my local
background.  It falls off via 1/r^2 as expected.   The GQ GMC-800 Geiger
counter cannot detect the alpha's from the radium (the meter glass stops
those anyway) but it does detect the associated gamma's.
I had tested my BC-683 "artillery band" VHF FM receiver as well.  It's
quite "Spicy" at over 25 times the level of the BC-659.  Some details on
that here: https://www.n6cc.com/bc-683-vhf-fm-artillery-receiver/

No great concern, we all know the precautions...
Thanks for posting your work!
73, Tim
N6CC

On Mon, Jul 13, 2026 at 4:03 PM B. Smith via MRCA <mrca at mailman.qth.net>
wrote:

> While working on a possible web page for the BC-659 I found these videos.
> Z
>
>
>
> http://k4che.com/Tempvideo/BC-659%20Receiver%20Demo/BC-659%20Bench%20k4che.mp4
>
>
> http://k4che.com/Tempvideo/BC-659%20Mystery%20Signals/Mystery%20ch%20272%20273.mp4
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