Next show: Manassas VA 6/4/17, bright sunny day and a decent crowd! Always fun at Manassas...
Pic 1-2: telegraph set TG-5-B - this is a late war telegraph key set, comes in a self-enclosed box with a bunch of electronics and a battery pack, along with the headset and key. This unit was in good shape but was missing most of the set, except for the key which was present. No price listed for it.
Pic 3: Another Hammarlund SP-600, this one is a JX-17 version, probably the most common of the SP-600 Super Pro series. This unit was used by several agencies and military branches, but this specific iteration was never given a military designation, unlike other -600 SPs. The JX-17 was the only one that had the red-colored metal knobs, other versions had black plastic. $600 obo was listed for this boat anchor, a bit high but if it worked okay I would gladly offer $450 to $475.
Pic 4: I've posted pics of R-390As before and given you the rundown, they are a great HF radio receiver. If you have $300-400 and you like quality radios, you NEED to have one in your shack. This unit was in good condition and working, seller was taking offers. I figured $250 would've brought it home.
Pic 5: A Hammarlund BC-794-B, the Signal Corps version of the SP-200SX. All Hammarlund are well-built and will give you decades of enjoyment if well cared for. This unit was mid-WWII in age, the BC-794 is perhaps the most rare of the SP-200 series. It's rack mounted, covers 1.2 to 40 MHz in receive. This one came with the rack mounted power supply for $100 - a GREAT deal and I was ready to purchase it when the owner said it worked. However, seeing a tag attached to the top of the power supply listed a half-dozen problems with the radio set, it DID work, but there were 5-6 features that didn't, all probably related to capacitor failure. While this can be remedied by a recapping job, I need another radio project like I need a hole in the head, so I opted to leave her where she was.
Pics 6-9: what I came home with!
I caught up with the seller who had the TS-497B/URR signal generator for $25 at the Howard Cty. show, he was set up there and still had the unit (!!!). I whipped out a $20 and a $5 and was glad noone else caught that unit first!
- Lot of 3 various ARC (Aircraft Radio Corp) R-34 type aircraft receivers. I don't know much about these, from what I understand they are descendants of the venerable ARC-5 radio sets I have plenty of. For $10 for the lot of 3 units, I'll take a chance.
-Test Oscillator TS-170/ARN-5. This unit was disassembled when I found it, I put it back together again. The AN/ARN-5 is an airborne glide path receiver, fixed freq. of 335 MHz. This is calibration source for that radio. It's probably useless for me, but for $2 I'll hold down more paper around here.
- Couple military coiled cables, a H-113/U headset, a WWII J-45 leg key bracket (without the key, but I have one here), and an odd flip-phone-like radio handset that is for a European military radio. Unsure of model, there are several places on it with three crowns in an inverted triangle, I assume that is supposed to hint at its country of origin, but got me. If anyone knows what model handset it is, please let me know.