Indeed! Saw the pics, that's quite some Flashbox. At least we know where Derb will be at night, not out roaming the streets getting into trouble with spray paint and fast wimmins.
Spent a bit of time with the 300G last night trying to discover why it wouldn't power up. Checked all the connections, including the connections inside the SOLA iron, checked for continuity in the breaker, etc etc. Nothing came to light, so to speak.
Plugged it in, tried a number of different approaches, still nothing. While standing there frustrated, with the front door open, I switched the knobs to and fro between the crystal oscillators as I pondered. Nothing. Flipped the knob for the heaters to the 'on' position. Little red jewels lit up! There's power inside the beasty!
At this point it became clear that, with the circuit breaker working and power elsewhere, the latching relay was the issue. Not seeing anything obvious, I took the a very
amateur approach: using a large cork lid from a pantry jar of perfect thickness (and with the transmitter unplugged), I shoved the cork between the bottom of the relay and top of the breaker to hold the relay closed. Plugged it back in and...
WHOOSH! The blower spooled up as the filaments lit and the 300G came back to life for the first time since 2003! Opening the front door back up, I was greeted with a shower of debris: tiny bits of paper towel, plant leaves, dust bunnies, basically everything I'd missed or added while cleaning it up over the last 4.5 years.
After the amazement wore off a bit, phone calls were made to share the success. To MrMike/W1RC and my dad, both of whom were present for the tipping party when the crew stood up the transmitter (Mike took the photos, dad actually went to CO to help get it), and to Big G, because I knew he could relate to such things as the savior of a 21E. Each time holding the phone in the lower back compartment and quizzing them as to what they heard. Hey, it's Tuesday night in Verminmont - whatcha gonna do for excitement?
Jen (a.k.a. XYL, 'the wife', etc) was at class, lucky for her. She didn't escape though, I left the transmitter running for a couple hours until she called.
"Sounds like static" she sez. No, it sounds like success! Okay, mild success, a step in the right direction, but HUGE to me.
Needless to say, the relay issue still needs to be figured out. Running a BC transmitter with a piece of cork shoved in to hold a relay closed is probably not good engineering practice and all that. Tom W2ILA and Paul WA3VJB, both 300G gurus, have been extremely helpful along the way in answering questions, providing tips, and offering ideas of where to start looking for the gremlins. Yesterday was no different, via email they gave suggestions and support. Tom even went so far as to declare "It will light tonight". I wasn't so sure, but he was right!
So, there's a lot of fluff about a rather minor event in the world of radio. An event that has me grinning ear-to-ear still, and anxious to get home tonight for more of the same. This stuff is still FUN, it never gets old!
