Knight Star Roamer

[GEORGE/W2AMR]

I finally got around to repairing the little Knight Star Roamer receiver that I bought at a yard sale last summer for 8 bucks. After a clean up, I had to re string the dial cord, and replace 4 electrolytic filter caps.  I also replace the old selenium rectifier with a new 1N5408 diode, and cleaned all the pots and switches with Deoxit D5.  I have been doing a lot of SWLing with it lately. What a cool little receiver,  It's amazing such a simple design can work so well.

[WQ9E]

George,

It looks very good.

A Star Roamer was the very first kit I built when I was 11.  I later built an external BFO for it from a Popular Electronics article.  A few years ago I paired it up with a Knight T-60 just so I could make one contact with the Star Roamer.

The T-60 is now paired with a Knight R-195 and I acquired a Star Roamer II (solid state) which looks nice but I don't think it works as well as the original.

I thought that there was another tube type Knight kit receiver of the Star Roamer era (post R-100A) that was a bit more sophisticated but I haven't come across any information on one so it could be a case of faulty memory. 

[WA3VJB]

VGood, George.

This is the sort of receiver a kid would get for Christmas. I was just thinking about getting a Shady O'Rack DX-120 about forty years ago, and exchanging it for the DX-150A soon after, using some of my grass-cutting money from the previous summer.

There was some magic listening to the international BC stations back then.  I still have a mess of pennants, stickers and old programme schedules, after becoming a "member" from sending -x- number of verified reception reports.

Now I presume a broadcaster can just use a remote monitoring service or computer modeling to determine how they are potentially being heard anywhere they are trying to put in a signal.

[Bill, KD0HG]

A Star Roamer was the first kit I ever built when I was a kid. Yes, it was a Christmas gift. Went over to Allied Radio at 100 N. Western Avenue to pick it up with my dad. Whotta ham department they had!

I doubt that today manufacturers would sell any kit connected to the AC power lines.

Bill, WPE9GPI

[WB2EMS]

Man I'm jealous. I spent *years* drooling over that receiver in the Allied catalogs.    Never got one, but my first receiver later was a used Knight Kit R-100 which I did a lot of SWLing with and used as my first shack receiver. It wasn't as pretty, but it probably worked a bit better having a few more stages in it and a real BFO.

Fun stuff. Made radio accessible to us as kids.

[Tim WA1HnyLR]

I have had two Star Roamers in my time so far. The first one I put double tuned IF cans in it to improve the selectivity. Unfortunately it came with the expense of gain . I lost it in the fire of '92. I came across another one that was made in Japan. Probably a so called Factory assembled model. I De-Hnyellphyied the audio. and put a full wave bridge rectifier in the power supply. I put a muting circuit into it. I teamed it up with a modified T-60. It makes a great piss weaker station.
De Tim WA1HnyLR

[W3GMS]

The Star Roamer was the competitor to the Heathkit GR-64.  Both were from the same vintage and I believe they both sold for around 39 dollars.  I had the GR-64 but always thought the Star Roamer looked cooler!  Knight had some good styling folks. 
I now have both the GR-64 and the Star Roamer.  It would be interesting to see how they compare in performance. 
Joe, W3GMS   

[AL7FS]

I had not thought of the Star Roamer in some time.  Yep, I must join the "me, too" crowd.  I built one of these in about 1964 or 1965.  I don't think mine ever worked well.  I had no Elmer, no test equipment, no training and was 16 years old.  In spite of that, I fondly remember building the kit and beginning to learn how to solder.

Jim, AL7FS
http://www.AL7FS.us/
Anchorage, AK

[KE2EE]

My best friend who lived across the street got one for Christmas. We were in the 8th grade at the time. After building it, it didn't light up. He brought it over and I found two cold solders. What a thrill when that thing came to life ! Later I got a National NC-77x, similar but with no LW band. Did anyone ever copy anything
on that LW band ?

Mike 

[Bill, KD0HG]

Did anyone ever copy anything
on that LW band ?

Mike 

It was awful. Just a bunch of BCB images.

[WQ9E]

Did anyone ever copy anything
on that LW band ?

Mike 

It was awful. Just a bunch of BCB images.

I remember a couple of airport beacons.  There weren't many BCB stations on the Mississippi gulf coast to cause images and the nearest powerhouse station would have been WWL in NOLA 70 miles away.

I remember the internal BFO did not work well on mine and I found it easier to copy using  the quieting of background noise on 40 meters instead of using the BFO. 

My next kit building experience was a Science Fair Globe Patrol 3 transistor regen (detector plus 2 stages of audio).  It would out perform the Star Roamer above 7 Mhz.  I remember listening to Radio Netherlands quite a lot on the little regen.  Two years ago I found a Globe Patrol that was still new in box and Santa Claus brought that to our daughter for Christmas.  She built it with a lot of assistance (she was 6) and it works pretty well but it is sitting on a Hallicrafters SX-42 in her room and although it can out perform a Star Roamer it doesn't outperform a restored and aligned SX-42.

[GEORGE/W2AMR]

VGood, George.

This is the sort of receiver a kid would get for Christmas.

This kid got it for Christmas last August. 

[Jim W8DRZ]

I always wanted a Star Roamer.
At age 12, in 1963 I saved up enough
lawn mowing money to buy a Knight-Kit
Span Master.  I still have it.

[N4LTA]

I bought one cheap on Ebay a couple of years ago. Some knucklehead had drilled a 1/2" hole in the front panel under the s meter where the Knight emblem is. I bought it because I always wante don as a kid.

I need to find a way to cover that hole up?

[WQ9E]

I bought one cheap on Ebay a couple of years ago. Some knucklehead had drilled a 1/2" hole in the front panel under the s meter where the Knight emblem is. I bought it because I always wante don as a kid.

I need to find a way to cover that hole up?

Probably the grandson of the guy who drilled a hole through the National emblem on my NC-100X.

Perhaps it is time for a pilot lamp for you Star Roamer.

[WU2D]

Top Receivers

1. Knight Star Roamer
2. Heath HR10B
3. Collins HF2050
4. Drake MSR-2
5. TEN TEC RX340
6. Racal 6790
7. WJ-8888
8. Collins HF8054
9. Rohde & Schwarz EK-07
10. Eddystone 1830/1

[Steve - K4HX]

You forgot the S-20R, the finest receiver ever made.

[Todd, KA1KAQ]

Well suited for feeding an outside speaker, I've heard. The Sky Buddy just didn't measure up.

Look around, George. You can probably find a decent replacement panel from a donor unit. Or just stick a plug in it. Those panels weren't terribly thick as I recall, so making a permanent repair would be a challenge.

[WU2D]

That Star Roamer will be a fun rig to use on shortwave. It would benefit from a Q multiplier. The Sky Buddy that I did up for my friend Frank WA1VNR, was sounding good and it had fairly good audio but it really pepped up after I made a Q multiplier for it seen on the left in the silver box. Frank says it makes all the difference in the world with the radio. It is simply a peaking type with a single 6J5.

Mike WU2D

[John K5PRO]

That was my first kit too, around 1968. Wonder where it went.

[N4LTA]

If anyone knows of a junker with a complete front panel - Let me know.

Pat
N4LTA