13th Annual Irving ARC, Inc. Hamfest (March 7) Report

The 2015 Irving Amatuer radio Club hamfest was lots of fun. The weather and the same-day grand opening of HRO's new store detracted only slightly from attendance. All but 8? tables were sold, and the turnout was large. Pictures will be at IrvingARC.org some time shortly.

There were three Heath Apaches ($150-200), a super nice 75A-3 ($400), many newer repeater items meaning solid state power amps, didn't see any of the old tube stuff this time. There were some 4E27's in a box (I traded 5 refurbished CB radios for them), tons of old radio book and mags. The favorite old big red Radiotron book was priced $65, Other items included a Murch 2000 tuner, Sunair GSB900DX, and lots of smaller things like old HT's for cheap, test equipment, antennas, power supplies, etc. There were few amps, tuners, and none of the big TX tubes, iron, MOSFETs, Class E stuff, or those kinds of experimenters things. The ham club table had a lot of bargains from estates.

This year I got more active in the fest. I volunteered to host the "Test Table" which is the free service to check or test things for people so they can know they work (or not) before they buy them.

Items than can be checked can include transmitters, receivers, power supplies, tuners, mikes, and parts like RF coils and power supply chokes, plate/combination transformers, RF and power capacitors, and most any other part.

I even troubleshot a power supply and determined the fault was the power switch, and I guess that made it worth the $5 price the seller wanted! It's worthwhile to provide this kind of service for free because it makes everyone happy and I had a great time.

The one doing the Test Table has to bring their own equipment and can determine what to test/bring. This year there was a spectrum monitor, scope, frequency counter, 40A 12V power supply, 6KV probe for plate iron, and LCR bridge ZM-11/U. It can all be wheeled in on a cart. The regular person who did that for several years has moved away. A member from a nearby city's club saw this and thought it was a super idea. We discussed this thing and why it's better to do it free (some fests charge about $5 or let a vendor charge for it), and he wants to have his club do it at their fests.

bought:
Three 4E27

sold:
5 CB radios
ATU for Sunair GSB900

There was a 1KW HF slug for a Bird 43. I bought it for $65 but found out it was out of round. The brass part would not enter the hole. It would not fit my 43 and calipers showed it had a major diameter of 1.0025" instead of a consistent diameter of 0.998" that the other slugs have. The seller bought it back no problem.