Antenna Materials

 I always find myself tossing damaged or scrap antennas in the woods behind the barn until needed. I never throw anything away, if there's a possible use for them later. I finally got tired of this and decided to clean it up. I pulled those old bits out, disassembled and cleaned them, and put them in the barn. Using some scrap lattice, I made racks for this stuff, including my gin pole. Here's a few pics...

Workbench update...

 

My work bench space has been getting increasingly smaller, with test gear encroaching into the "work zone". Finally, I could take no more. I found plenty of scrap wood in the barn to fix this. I set the table saw up, ripped some 2x12 scrap into 2x4 size, cut some scrap 1/2" ply for the top, and built an extension. Wow, this is much more comfortable!

Attenuator Damage...

 Duh... I did it again. I accidentally left the bench coaxial switch looking into the sig gen/attenuator, and keyed about 100w from a Kenwood TS-530 in CW mode into it (instead of switching to the dummy load. ZAP! The attenuator let the magic smoke out. Its repaired now, but check out the damage to the 1st 20dB pad :-) ...

Samsung Syncmaster 2253BW Repairs

 Debbie walked through the shack and noticed that one of the computers was offline. After a bit of testing, I found it was the monitor that had failed. I sub'd it with a smaller spare, and hauled it out to the workshop and onto the workbench. What I found was surprising...

After disassembly, I noticed several of the electrolytic caps' tops were bulging. Some had leaked electrolyte onto the pcb. No fuses were blown, the power supply had simply shut down. I began removing and testing caps. All but 1 of the 820uF caps tested less than 17uF, the 1000uF caps were 10uF or less! I continued removing and replacing caps, and all were either way below spec or open! I don't know how this thing had operated as long as it did... 

I replaced all of the electrolytic caps, and reassembled the monitor. It's back in the shack and running like new on Debbie's computer. Here's a few pics...

After repairs, she's as good as new!

Syncmaster 2253BW...

Once the base was unplugged, the back was carefully pryed away from the front trim ring... no screws.

I unplugged these 3 cables... a wire broke on the smaller plug (near my thumb). I had to trim some of the plastic and solder it to the tiny connector inside...

This 820uF cap tested open... The next only measured 17.7uF!

Here's the main board, completely recapped...

There was only 10 caps on the main board, as opposed to over 100 in some ham radios I recap...

Bulging and leaking tops...

Leaking bottoms...

...and more bulging and leaking tops.

It booted right up and began looking for a signal!

Ready to leave the workbench and go back to studio A!

Shure 708A Crystal Microphone Restoration

 This is a 1940 Shure 708A microphone I picked up in a box of junk probably 20+ years ago. It didn't have a stand, had a bad mic element, and looked pretty bad. These were also often purchased and used as a harp mic, as they were very popular with harmonica players. Around 2014 it was nearly sacrificed and repurposed as a tail light for a bobber motorcycle project....but wasn't. 

I disassembled everything, and glass beaded to parts to remove the old paint. These were available only painted in brown, gray, or black. I refinished this in hammered black enamel. The head was refitted with a NOS crystal element and a new internal pop guard. I found a base and stand from a similarly aged mic, buffed the base, and refinished the wooden stand in gloss black. 

Its back alive and will ultimately be connected to one of my boat anchors. Here's a few pics and a video...