I want my money back

[nu2b]

Up in the mountains of Southwest Virginia,
the anticipation was unbearable.
That is, watching the toilet paper roll slim down,
until you could finally swipe it, varnish it, wind all
those turns and hook it up to the Burstein-Appleby
galena dingy.
Big eyes when KDKA, Pittsburgh and Radio Moscow
both came in at equal sig levels.
Chubbie even until this day!
Regards,
BobbyT

[WA1GFZ]

Morton Salt was another great coil form if you had a year or so to wait.

[The Slab Bacon]

Morton Salt was another great coil form if you had a year or so to wait.

Quacker oatmeal was also a great coil form. But my mom always used to get pissed off when I stole the cardboard center from the rolls of toilet paper

[W2JBL]

i had one of those Revell radios, but it was the low end- just a crystal set. guess i was about 8 or 9 at the time. one day i announced to my father that i was going to make it "short wave" like his (forbidden to touch) BC-348, so...me and my little redheaded girfriend (cute as a button!) set upon the hapless Revell with a soldering gun. she knew how to solder and taught me, with burns, ouch! well after about a half hour or so we had loaded that thing with as many Black Beauty caps and assorted chokes and resistors as i could find. the goal was WWV on 5MHZ...all we got for our efforts was the only two stations it ever heard to begin with:WCBS 880 and WNBC 660. oh well- Art Linkletter's "Kids Say the Darndest Things" afternoon radio show was still OK. real radio and the spark transmitter would have to wait a few more years. my father was somewhat less than pleased.

[w3jn]

THe Visible V-8 etc were made by Renwall, not Revell.  I had the Visible Auto Chassis as well.  God was that thing cool - had a 3 speed transmission that shifted, working clutch, working hydraulic brakes (you filled 'em with water), working differential, etc.  The visible auto chassis accepted the Visible V-8 which bolted right up to the bell housing.  The one little electric motor turned everything!  I learned more about cars and mechanics buildign that thing, and the visibile V-8, when I was 10 or so than I could have from a stack of books.

I see one is available unassembled for only $1150:  http://www.oldmodelkits.com/index.php?manu=Renwal

[KF8XO]

Funny...I still like to build those "little plastic kits"...some of you here may have even rode in, or on one of these!

[k4kyv]

About 15 years ago I paid $150 for this G-E 1930 vintage Monitor Top refrigerator.  I put it in the shack and used it for years as a beer cooler, but the compressor blew a seal about 5 years ago and it no  longer cools.  I won't try to dig into the unit, since it uses sulphur dioxide - nasty stuff - so for right now it has turned into a very heavy parts storage cabinet.  Maybe someday someone who knows what they are doing will be able to fix it.

Should I ask for my money back?

[WA1GFZ]

Don,
Why don't you put a different compressor in it?
BTW, the clock healed itself and is working fine again. Something may have been floating around inside. My son Removed the  snooze button about 11 years ago. He may have eaten it. Maybe something broke loose inside.

[k4kyv]

Where would I ever find a replacement for that unique compressor?  The fridge itself is really an old fashioned ice-box, with a hole cut in the top.  The compressor unit sits on top and the freezing unit extends down inside the box.  It is all one assembly, and can be lifted out right out.  It is not screwed in place or otherwise attached other than by gravity.  I  suspect some of the first ones were designed to be  retrofitted on top of actual ice boxes.  I recall old timers calling an electric refrigerator the "ice box".

http://www.antiqueappliances.com/monitor_top_refrigerators.htm

[N3DRB The Derb]

beg the group's forgiveness with my Jean Shepherd-like post above. Got me all nostalgic. I really loved that radio. Still do, piece of crap that it was

my first shortwave radio was a Realistic Astronaut 4 portable. My first QSL, from the VOA. I remember jumpng up and down in front of the mailbox. Second was a Realistic DX 160. I had over 150 countries qsl'ed. I was in 5th grade I think.

[k4kyv]

I had an earlier version, a DX-150.  Bought it brand new in 1967.  It was one of the first all-transistor "communications receivers" on the market, using all discrete components and an analogue dial.  IIRC, it cost over $100 (1967 dollars).  It worked fairly well, except that it was loaded with images all over the place.  Shortwave signals bled through when I was surfing the AM broadcast band, and a strong signal would  come through at several seemingly random spots on the dial.    Small and light weight for its day,  I took it with me to Africa in '67 (and  let my ex-girlfriend keep it when I departed). While I was there I acquired an SX-28, which was a much better SWL receiver.  But I felt that despite its weight even the SX-28 was a flimsy, unstable POS compared to my pre-WW2 HRO.

My most memorable moment with the DX-150 was catching a late evening (local time) newscast on the BBC World Service, and hearing the staid announcer so typical of the Beeb of that era, read "once again the main points", with zero emotion in his voice, that "rock musician Jimi Hendrix was found dead in his hotel room in London of an apparent drug overdose".

[WA1GFZ]

Don,
How about these RV fridges based on a peltier cooler?? Strap a big heat sink on top to radiate the heat and call it the solid state beer cooler rig.

[KF8XO]

beg the group's forgiveness with my Jean Shepherd-like post above. Got me all nostalgic. I really loved that radio. Still do, piece of crap that it was

my first shortwave radio was a Realistic Astronaut 4 portable. My first QSL, from the VOA. I remember jumpng up and down in front of the mailbox. Second was a Realistic DX 160. I had over 150 countries qsl'ed. I was in 5th grade I think.

My first shotwave radio was a Realistic DX-200 bought on clearance with my paper route wages...well my first one that was mine. First SW I ever diddled was Dad's Transoceanic he had on board with him during the blockade of Cuba.

My first QSL was WWV Ft. Collins...still have it prominently displayed in the shack...

[WU2D]

Like Don, my first storebought radio was a Realistic DX-150 and I remember my parents were amazed that it cost so much - 119 Dollars by 1970! All true but a solid State wonder and worked great on batteries and it had an excellent true ring product detector.

I took it on my uncle's trip to Alaska in 1974. He grabbed me and my cousin for his "last high adventure trip to Alaska before I dies trip". As a 16 year old I logged some rare ones and caught some huge fish. The Alcan highway was 100% dirt and the pipeline was just going in so the road was full of Ice Road Truckers! Imagine driving from FL to Maine on dirt.

Before the trip he had me install an ancient RCA tube CB in the old Winnie Indian. That was a great radio and with a whip on top we really got out. I had my novice by that time but did not bring my Command set station.

Mike WU2D

[N8LGU]

    Speaking of cheap plastic radio kits, when I was 14(circa 1961), I told my father I would like to build a little kit radio. I had already made some crystal radios. He took me to a hobby shop somewhere in the DC area. The shop owner brought out 3 boxes from the back room. Two were transistor kits and one was a one tube job. One of the transistor jobs had two transistors and the other had three transistors. I asked my Dad which one would be best. He said that he thought that one tube would be better than three transistors, so he bought me the one tube kit.
    I am thinking it was made by Revell but I'm not sure. It was a 3A5 twin triode powered by a 22 1/2 v B+ battery and used two C or D cells for the filaments. Armstrong regen detector and a stage of audio following it. It was housed in a beige plastic cabinet with a gray front panel. Two gray plastic push on knobs (filament reostat and 365 mmf tuning cap). No soldering required as the components and wiring fastened to the back of the front panel with little screws. The kit even came with a "one eared" set of cans. I strung up a wire from my bedroom window out to a tree out in the backyard. The regeneration was set by manually sliding the tickler coil up or down on the antenna coil.
    Sure it was a piece of sh*t but it allowed me to DX the broadcast band all night and I got in trouble because my grades were suffering cause I wasn't getting enough sleep! I loved that radio!
    Do any of you guys remember a radio like this one? I would love to find one on E-pay but I have never been able to find it on google. 

[W9GT]

Talking about little one tube radios.....I picked -up an interesting one this past weekend at a flea market.  It is a Kitcraft model 200 one-tuber...1946 vintage.  Uses a 1T4 tube and is on a little plastic chassis with a slider coil.  It is not even a regen, just an amplified detector.  It came with a set of old Murdoch phones, which were really what the guy was selling...the radio was free.   
I also remember fondly my Remco transistor radio that I received for Christmas when I was about 10 or so (circa 1954-55)....It was really just an xtal set with a one transistor amplifier.  I had a ball with that thing....really thought it was cool.  It had a plastic case with a fake antenna on the top that looked like a radar antenna or something. Ahh....those were the days.

73,  Jack, W9GT