Blown Away Bob

[k4kyv]

There was a huge gang on 3885 Sunday from about 3:30PM until after 8PM. Quite the ruckas at times. Classic 75M AM break-in and carrying on.

The static started to get unbearable after 8PM, so we shut down. They didn't have to shut down, I mean they could have stayed, but they shut down. They didn't have to shut down though. They just shut down.

T

Please repeat this for me, I don't understand

Man, I miss blown-away Bob.

Yep, Bingo.  I was hoping someone would recognize those lines.

Back in the 80's? Blown-Away Bob was in QSO with Irb on 75M.  Someone started using profanity, IIRC, and Bob signed out abruptly. The next day Bob went on for a few minutes about why he shut down.  "I shut down. I didn't HAVE to shut down - I just shut down.  I couldn't listen to it anymore so I shut down. I could have stayed around, but I shut down............"  

Anywho have a clip of that?  It's around, somewhere.

T

Yep, Bingo.  I was hoping someone would recognize those lines.

Got me, I didn't know your were paraphrasing old Blow Away Bob!

I went to visit him a long time ago. Too bad he's gone! We all will be remembered by someone but some stand out more than others.

I never visited Blown Away Bob at his place in Rutland, but over the years he visited me once each in Cambridge, Houston and here. He was OK but like Irb, you had to accept certain eccentricities and be aware of which buttons not to push. I always got a kick out of that quiver in his voice over the air right after he had just finished hitting the industrial grade toluene. I always considered him a friend but a tragic figure.

I have ofter wondered what became of his radio stuff after he went SK.  He had some nice audio and power supply iron in that homebrew 833A rig that he "carved out of solid steel with his bare hands".

[Steve - K4HX]

I didn't have to shut down.....

[K1JJ]

Heheheh - a classic!  

I can imagine a five minute recording  of AMer highlights with the soothing theme  from  "A Summer Place"  playing faintly in the background.

One hit after another.. "Irb, if ya don't shut up...  I didn't have to shut down, I just shut down...  Are you on narcotics?...  That's quite a message... I wok at China King making flied lice... You guys are gonna miss me when I'm gone...  Seeking you RZ.... $20 and a handful of FETS... My signal is so pissweak I can't even blow a fuse...  The Kia Rio...  You have value... Who the hell is Don Pardo?...  Well, FU too, OM -I'll even give ya money to take a taxi over here, how's that?"

I could add another fifty.

T

[KL7OF]

Hitting the industrial grade Toulene?   These guys really knew how to live.....We are pretty boring out West...Not too many colorful types,  Pretty boring actually...Does Home Depot sell Toulene??

[K1JJ]

There's been 50+ years for accumulated and concentrated AM NE culture here, Steve.  (At least my own listening time)  I guess we, as the living, can keep it alive a little longer.


Some more famous AMers  (With theme from "A Summer Place" playing in background)

"My 813 rig is so compact I can carry it under one arm...  Those darn blondes in their red cars.....  Not a slopbucket in North America can.....  Give us a call, even if it's only for a signal report or QSL request....  Name here is Jacques, better known as Rico Suave, but you can call me Fabio for short....  Phase A, phase A, now phase B, PhaseB, which do you prefer?....    Shaded dipole, wire array.....   This year's colloquim subject will be about how Einstein's Theory of Relativity was wrong...       Is anyone around? W1----T----J------  X-------, Putnam, CT...      I was lead vocalist for the Wayne King Orchestra"


More???

T

[N3WWL]

Heheheh - a classic! 

The Kia Rio...

Who's that?

[WA1GFZ]

"Is anyone around" W1TJX

[WA1GFZ]

The all time classic W2OY... no kids, no lids....

[KB2WIG]

Insurance Mafia

[KA8WTK]

Doing an "INR"

[W1AEX]

Things that Blown Away Bob said to me (and many others) frequently on 75 meters:

"I gotta shut down cuz I need to get to the church to fix their PA system. It's all tubes, mostly 6L6's, and I'm the only one who seems to be able to fix it..."

"Things here at my parents house have never been the same since they installed that damn traffic light. You have no idea..."

"Well, the modulator is in the basement, and the tubes are lying on some 2 x 4's down there. The HV comes up here to the 813 RF deck through holes I drilled in the floor. I worry about the cat wandering down in the basement sometimes while I'm operating up here..."

"OK, this is my final, final, final, final. I have to get out of here and get over to the church because that damn PA system is messed up again..."

"You know, when all of us were let go from NASA, a lot of the blueprints and documentation for the Apollo hardware went with us. They'd have to re-invent everything from scratch, and I'll bet they couldn't do it very easily, if they wanted to get back to the moon that is..."

Bob was quite a character. He took a trip around the northeast on his rather beat up looking motorcycle one summer, stopping off to visit with people he spoke with on the air. He stopped by here and spent the night as our guest. I took him for a tour of ALL the sights in East Granby, CT (Newgate Prison... that's it...) and he was very excited and enthusiastic about it. Bob was as interesting in real life as he was on the air.

[KB2WIG]

Didn't he also have something to do with the bells???  Usually, I was in my monitor/nap mode when he was on. And curently suffering from CRS.

klc



also, Black robed gangsters. 

[W3GMS]

Someone needs to figure out how to capture Ralph - W3GL "PTT Trigger Finger"!  

Back in the 60's, Bill- W3DUG used a micro-switch on the end of a long cord as his PTT.  The back-side of it was gooped with RTV so you would not get zorched by it!  That thing was pretty darn fast.  It may have given Ralph a run for his money.

Then you have Jessie, when he was parachute mobile on 75!  I'm tumbling-I'm tumbling!  

Anyone remember WRFH and the promo's to send in money!  Oh, can't forget when Jessie bought Bill- DUQ station after Bill lost his license for a year!  

How about the recorded ducks at Icedale???  

Wow, that was a long time ago  

Joe, W3GMS

[Ralph W3GL]

   "Seeking You"...  Who would be so foolish to use that for a CQ call?

    Well yeah, it does fit.  It's a general call after all. Check the Spanish
    version the ola-ola gang use...

    And Joe, the PTT trick is simply Anticipation, as the song goes...

[WA3VJB]

The UAN in space.

Ron Boot vs. The Derb

Lilly & Tilly

Little Billy Heiland (or, The 50C5 Story)

[w1vtp]

<snip>

Well, the modulator is in the basement, and the tubes are lying on some 2 x 4's down there. The HV comes up here to the 813 RF deck through holes I drilled in the floor. I worry about the cat wandering down in the basement sometimes while I'm operating up here...

<snip>
Bob was quite a character. He took a trip around the northeast on his rather beat up looking motorcycle one summer, stopping off to visit with people he spoke with on the air. He stopped by here and spent the night as our guest. I took him for a tour of ALL the sights in East Granby, CT (Newgate Prison... that's it...) and he was very excited and enthusiastic about it. Bob was as interesting in real life as he was on the air.

I visited Bob one time - what a memorable visit.  I saw the HV PS in the basement - so the modulator was there too?  Makes sense.  Hey!  I've toyed with that idea when I my shack was in the bedroom.  I wish I had taken a picture of his "setup."  It was clasic Blown out Bob.

I remember him as a congeniel person, certainly enjoyable to visit. It's a shame he had a premature demise.

Al

[k4kyv]

I used to enjoy conversations with Bob regarding the church PA systems.  Apparently he took care of more than one.  Instead of ringing real bells, they played recordings of bells over the PA, and most of the amplifiers were 40s vintage, using 6L6s.  He was about the only person in town able and willing to work on them.

He would sometimes describe in graphic detail his adventures of climbing stairs crusted with several inches of bird droppings inside the church steeples.  If you had ever met Bob in person and noticed his physique, that whole scenario would conjure up images of Quasimodo swinging around on a rope.

[Jim, W5JO]

   These guys really knew how to live.....We are pretty boring out West...Not too many colorful types,  Pretty boring actually

You should really get off the mountain Steve.  Met Jerry down in Pueblo or Ole' Bob from up in Nebraska?  They are just two examples in that part of the world.  Down here we have Catepillar Ken and some.

[WA1GFZ]

Einstein's Theory of Relative titty

Lilly and Tilly is the all time classic and I heard it live

[W1AEX]

Little Billy Heiland (or, The 50C5 Story)

"Inserted where??? Pins first?"

Somehow I recall that tale being connected to a trip on the "metal dinosaur".

[kb3ouk]

the funniest thing i remember hearing was one night during the winter, i think it was 51 watt Fred, asked Timtron if they got any snow up in Maine, Timtron replied with something like "Fred, does a bear s**t in the woods?" Or the night last february with Timtron, Kerri, Tom, Steve (the one who was WB3HUZ), me and a bunch of others down on 3870 i think. All i remember is Tim had the SBE on,  them making up all kinds of strange and unusual callsigns, i think Steve was the one who was saying about once feeding an audio signal generator into the rig and Irb would be up something like 15 khz and this thing would be going whoop-whoop-whoop all over his signal, Timtron talking about having some bolt with a nut on it that when you spun it it would make a high pitched noise that would do the same thing, then me taking an huge ceramic insulator i had an when i would key up i would tap a metal screwdriver off it and have the pinging from it appear clear up around 3878. what a night that was.

[KB2WIG]

'   what a night that was.  "

Radio criminals alll........ up and down the band, they are nothing less than   Child Rapers.


klc
 
 
 

[W1RC]

I remember "Blown Away Bob" K1AJL.  His eyes never seemed to focus on you.  He used to rant about the traffic in Rutland Vermont.  One time I was driving through Rutland and drove by his place just to see where he lived.  

I also remember the week he died.   The Charlotte hamfest was on that weekend.  It was one of the last ones.  Irb was there on his bicycle (he took the ferry from New Russia NY).  I always wondered why Irb didn't go down to Rutland to attend Bob's funeral.  

Bob always made me feel sad.  I heard the story about how he became blown away.

MrMike

[k4kyv]

A story I heard a few years before he died was that he discovered a growth on his leg, which was diagnosed as cancerous. He had it removed, but it returned a short while later.  The second time, instead of going back to the doctor, he decided to treat it himself.  He  rigged up a DX-100 to feed a tuned circuit, and burnt out the growth with RF.  Apparently it never recurred before he died of unrelated causes.

Reportedly, his body was found floating in the water in a quarry where he had gone swimming. He may have been the victim of accidental drowning, or else had a seizure or heart attack while in the water.

[KL7OF]

how did he get the name "blown away Bob"