So, I'm cheap. Here's an example... I have a 4' light over my workbench, but wanted some additional lighting that was adjustable. I picked up 2 gooseneck desk lamps at Dollar Tree for a buck each (before they went to "everything's a $1.25"), reappropriated an outer cover from an old Motorola Micor, and had some old double-sided tape. I put that together, slipped it under my audio analyzer on the shelf, and this is the result :-)
This followed me home, yesterday. Hickok 536 mutual conductance tube tester. Another cool vintage piece for the workshop. I'm gonna recover the cabinet, but otherwise, it looks pretty solid.
This is a Galaxy FC-250 Frequency Counter I repaired for a friend. These counters were originally targeting the CB radio community, as they matched the Galaxy brand of radios. After repairs, a quick test proved it to work well from 160 through 2 meters. I didn't test it higher, but I suspect the model number suggests 250 mHz. Anyway, I replaced a bad FET in the rf amplifier stage, and installed a new DC pigtail & fuse holder. The RF feed through ports are good for a 100w rig, and the RCA port can be connected to a source or use a small whip antenna. This is a solid little counter, and typically a great hamfest find.
This is a Mini-60 hf antenna analyzer I repaired for a friend. It was providing erratic and undependable results that were traced to a number of bad / cold solder joints. The worst were where the antenna port interfaces with the PCB. Here's a few pics...
I have a step attenuator on my bench, between one of the signal generators and a rotary switch. The switch selects a dummy load, sig gen, and outside antenna, and presents that to the radio thats on the workbench. I had a brain fart, left it in sig gen mode, and laid 100w on it :-) . Magic smoke escaped! Oh well, a little work, and it's back in service...
This is an old GRC 615-B SWR bridge / low power hf wattmeter by General Radiotelephone Company that I restored and calibrated for a friend. If you dig around on eBay, you'll find some cool stuff by them. I have a noise bridge from GRC, they even made a multiband HF rig. Anyway, here's a few pics of this sweet piece...
I built up this little variac tool with isolation for the work bench from some stuff that was laying around. I got a 500w 115v variac with gear drive from a friend, and added a 115vac isolation transformer for working on some of those old AA5 tube radios that have a hot chassis. Power out pigtails are for isolated or non-isolated power. This is mostly helpful when bringing up some of the old vintage stuff that's been parked a long time. I could put it in an enclosure for safety, but where's the fun in that? :-) Here's some pics and a video...
This is a HP141T mainframe, with a 8554B spectrum analyzer and 8552 I.F. plug-ins. These were about $7000 in 1972 dollars, waayyyy beyond any toy I could have afforded in those days!! It's amazing, 50+ years later, thee things still perform pretty well.
I got this from a friend in the Rockingham area. I did the typical recapping, changing some out of spec resistors and such, cleaning, lubricating various controls, etc. After bringing it up on a variac, the fuses in the 8552 I.F. module kept blowing. Digging into the schematics, I found a crowbar was tripping, due to over voltage from the 141T display unit.
In the 141T, there's a neon Z82R7 lamp with a drop of Krypton 85 that sets the firing voltage at 82 vdc. Yep, radioactive parts... It has a 10 year half-life, and was now firing upwards of 100v, causing the crowbar to crow and blow fuses :-) . I strung a few zeners in series to give me about 82v, and replaced the Krypton thing with more modern tech. All is now well, and this 50+ year old spectrum analyzer is working like new.
