[R-390] RE: What Came After The R-390

Barry Hauser barry at hausernet.com
Sun May 15 11:45:23 EDT 2005 

Bob (& list) ..

What about the SRR-XX series of modular (submini tube) receivers?  They're 
Navy only and first came out a bit after the '390s, ahead of the 1051's.

Substantial overlap in usage of all three even though the first R-390 came 
out in '51 and first 1051's in late 60's.  SRR's came out somewhere in there 
in the early/mid 50's.  Can anybody clarify?

Barry



Bob wrote:

> Hi
>
> We just went through a fairly detailed thread on this about three  weeks 
> ago. It should be fairly easy to find in the archives.
>
> The R390 radios are fairly unique. They were "front line" radios for  a 
> long time. Unlike a lot of military gear they were used by all of  the 
> services and many agencies. There are *very* few pieces of gear  of any 
> type that have been as widely accepted. The .45 Colt pistol is  about the 
> only item that comes to my mind.
>
> The R390 is fundamentally  a fixed location radio rather than a  portable 
> or strap it on a jeep mobile radio. The 390's were made in  enormous 
> numbers considering the type of radio they are. No other  radio of this 
> type has ever hit nearly the same production numbers.  No other radio of 
> this type has been made by as many people for as  many years. Again it's a 
> unique radio.
>
> Up to the point that the 390's came out each of the services came up  with 
> their own radios. After the R390 to a great extent they went  back to the 
> same pattern. There is a series of radios used by the  Marine Corps that 
> is different than those used by the Navy. Navy  radios came from different 
> suppliers and were designed differently  than Army radios. The Army and 
> Air Force shared some gear but  generally issued different sets for the 
> same basic missions.
>
> The agencies radio usage is even more obscure and complex than usage  by 
> the services. The services could afford to design radios from  scratch. 
> The agencies for the most part simply did not have a big  enough budget to 
> do that sort of thing. Radios were designed targeted  at agency type 
> requirements, but from the ground up for a given agency.
>
> The 390's were used in various missions from the early 1950's through  the 
> early 1990's. For all we know they are still deployed somewhere  in the 
> world by the US. Certainly the bulk of the usage was in the  late 1950's 
> and 1960's. The 390A radios began to show up as common  items on the 
> surplus market by the early 1970's. In the late 1980s  the government was 
> worried enough about them to buy a ton of spare  tubes to keep them going.
>
> One technically correct answer to your question is the Harris RF-590.  It 
> was designed from the ground up as a replacement for the R390. The 
> similarity of the numbers between the two radios is deliberate. They  were 
> sold into a number of systems where they directly replaced the  R390's 
> both in service and agency service.
>
> Another fundamentally correct answer to the question is the R1051.  This 
> is a Navy only radio rather than a multi service / multi agency  radio. It 
> is essentially a return to the previous pattern of radios  designed for 
> the specific needs of a single service. The 1051's  definitely dropped 
> into racks that R390's came out of and did so  starting in the 1960's 
> while the bulk of the R390's were being built.  The R1051 was designed 
> specifically  to overcome limitations of the  R390 in Navy usage. They are 
> also still in service in the Navy.
>
> In another respect just about any HF radio that was made in quantity  by 
> Collins, Racal, Watkins Johnson or Harris did replace the R390 in  some 
> application with either the services or agencies. Certainly the  Racal 
> 6790GM and the Harris RF550 are in this category.
>
> The final way to look at it is that there really was no replacement  for 
> the R390. Communications requirements have changed over the  years. The 
> biggest role of the R390 was in backbone communications  for the DOD. The 
> full deployment of satellite based communications in  the 1970's took HF 
> out of the backbone role. We can debate the  intelligence of this move, 
> but it is what was done. In this sense the  replacement for the R390 is a 
> radio that doesn't even cover HF at all.
>
> Fortunately this is a hobby and not a court of law. We each get to  decide 
> what to do with our own collections. Just about any set of  radios can be 
> described as forming a reasonable "evolution" of radio  systems. As you 
> may have guessed by now I have a few of radios that  came after the R390 
> in my collection. I make no claim that I have an  exhaustive set, or even 
> a representative set.
>
> No matter which way you go there is some cost involved. None of these 
> radios are 100% reliable. Parts for all of them are hard to come by. 
> Simply buying one of each is not a reasonable way to have a working  set 
> of radios. Either you will spend a lot of time and money shipping  radios 
> out for repair or you will maintain a stock of parts yourself.  As the 
> radios get newer they get more expensive. A rack full of  RF590A's will 
> set you back just a little.
>
> Best advice would be to pick *one* of the successor radios and focus  on 
> it. Get a reasonable setup including spares and manuals. Once you  are 
> comfortable with the stability of that part of the collection  move on to 
> the next radio. Most of us are limited in the cash we can  spend on this 
> hobby. If you have a *lot* of money to put into this  then we need to talk 
> .... Assuming you have a rational budget the   best guess is that you are 
> talking at least a couple of years per  radio type.
>
>     Take Care!
>
>         Bob Camp
>         KB8TQ
>
>
>
> On May 15, 2005, at 1:29 AM, Orrin Bentz wrote:
>
>> Good evening gentlemen.
>>
>> Can anyone tell me what kind of receivers were in use by the
>> military & civilian agencies after the R390's were phased out.
>>
>> In other words which radios are we going to collect and refurbish
>> next?
>>
>> This question may be answered  in the archives but I couldn't find
>> it.
>>
>> Regards
>>
>> Orrin Bentz
>>
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