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Post by No Streak on Jul 12, 2016 11:56:40 GMT -5
OH Man! Where was everybody for last weeks Classic Radio Roundup? All I heard was Spitfire and Sparky. It's been a long time since I've seen it that dead on CRR. The skip was bad that night, it was ruff in Delaware County! It good to see even though a power outage you can keep Sparky down! I would imagine that many of the usual participants were vacationing over the week following the holiday (as I was), and were not around. Hopefully this week will be a bit better. I should be there, unless something strange happens. The CRR in Delaware County gets like that too! Even when it isn't a holiday. But the SSB night is a BIG hit with the local group. Most of the guy never used there SSB that much or didn't understand the use of it. Lucky for me I found a treasure trove of goodies in my closet! I thought that I sold all my good Tram and Browning mobiles to my surprise I still had them in a box. Browning LTD's and Brownies and Tram XL's! It was Christmas in the summer! So this Wednesday I will run one of my Browning LTD with the factory stock mic on my FatBoy 2 pill 2879 YEAH POWER!!!!!
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 13, 2016 6:20:31 GMT -5
Well, tonight is time for another CRR (7/13). After listening to the gate for last week, I can only hope that our turnout is better this week than last. Since the holiday is over, I would expect a few more people will be back in there. I certainly hope to be there this time, although I might be a few minutes late......
I know I should probably start thinking about themes again, but this time of the year is just not the best time for those as we never really know who will show up and what the conditions will end up like (Never a good idea to run stock mic night or low power night when the skip is hot). I'll probably run something solid state again, due to the heat build-up in the shack. Not sure which rig I'll pull out. It'll be a surprise for sure.....
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Post by "Doc"Hammer on Jul 13, 2016 19:08:35 GMT -5
Tonights radios Midland 13-855 into the trusty Console II feeding the computer audio feed up to Pete...
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 20, 2016 6:33:58 GMT -5
Well, another week has come and gone and it's time once again for CRR. Last week was bedlam with crazy high E-skip. We've heard and returned many calls for CRR from other states, and that was a bit hit. The downside, of course, is that local, or semi-local check-ins were largely covered up or competed heavily with the skip noise. So will this week be more of the same, or will it be quiet? Tune in tonight 8:00 PM EDT to find out. The theme will be determined based on conditions. If there a lot of skip, it'll be radios that talk loudly . If quiet, it'll probably be something more mellow.
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Post by BBB on Jul 20, 2016 19:48:17 GMT -5
Looks like I'll miss it. Spew radio is down.
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 20, 2016 21:31:10 GMT -5
Looks like I'll miss it. Spew radio is down. Yea, the server is down again. Looks like the HD is going belly up. I'll try to recover what I can and transfer it to another drive. So where are you that you missed the roundup?
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Post by No Streak on Jul 20, 2016 21:50:03 GMT -5
Looks like I'll miss it. Spew radio is down. Yea, the server is down again. Looks like the HD is going belly up. I'll try to recover what I can and transfer it to another drive. So where are you that you missed the roundup? Well I see that too that it was down. I was dang it! I was trying to hear up that way. But the locals were talking. And the skip was crazy tonight.
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 21, 2016 6:16:11 GMT -5
Yea, the server is down again. Looks like the HD is going belly up. I'll try to recover what I can and transfer it to another drive. So where are you that you missed the roundup? Well I see that too that it was down. I was dang it! I was trying to hear up that way. But the locals were talking. And the skip was crazy tonight. Yea, that's an understatement. The skip was in and out in a rapid transition. Night Ranger came in there giving me close to S9, but on his second transmission, slowly faded out and never cam back. Meanwhile we'd get hits from the midwest and the south, here one minute, gone the next. Turnout from the local end was rather light. Sparky was noticeably absent, along with 1/4 wave Dave and Skeeter. Night Train made it in there from the mobile toward the end of things. My rigs of choice for the night were Cobra 2000 for the first 1.5 hours and then a 1/2 hour run with the HiFi Galaxy
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Post by Night Ranger on Jul 21, 2016 20:28:08 GMT -5
Well I see that too that it was down. I was dang it! I was trying to hear up that way. But the locals were talking. And the skip was crazy tonight. Yea, that's an understatement. The skip was in and out in a rapid transition. Night Ranger came in there giving me close to S9, but on his second transmission, slowly faded out and never cam back. Meanwhile we'd get hits from the midwest and the south, here one minute, gone the next. Turnout from the local end was rather light. Sparky was noticeably absent, along with 1/4 wave Dave and Skeeter. Night Train made it in there from the mobile toward the end of things. My rigs of choice for the night were Cobra 2000 for the first 1.5 hours and then a 1/2 hour run with the HiFi Galaxy View Attachment View AttachmentClassic Radio Roundup July 20, 2016 - five minute skip window from South Carolina videogate. I'm using my rare "black meter" Royce 1-620 23 channel base. Most Royce 1-620's have a white background meter. The "black meter" Royce 1-620 must have been a limited edition version. Night Ranger
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 22, 2016 6:18:30 GMT -5
Yea, that's an understatement. The skip was in and out in a rapid transition. Night Ranger came in there giving me close to S9, but on his second transmission, slowly faded out and never cam back. Meanwhile we'd get hits from the midwest and the south, here one minute, gone the next. Turnout from the local end was rather light. Sparky was noticeably absent, along with 1/4 wave Dave and Skeeter. Night Train made it in there from the mobile toward the end of things. My rigs of choice for the night were Cobra 2000 for the first 1.5 hours and then a 1/2 hour run with the HiFi Galaxy View Attachment View AttachmentClassic Radio Roundup July 20, 2016 - five minute skip window from South Carolina videogate. I'm using my rare "black meter" Royce 1-620 23 channel base. Most Royce 1-620's have a white background meter. The "black meter" Royce 1-620 must have been a limited edition version. Night Ranger That was certainly a weird E-skip. Pete and I are 10 miles apart, and at the beginning, he and I were in there about equally. Then about a minute later, I was a little stronger but he was completely gone (sounded like I was ghost talking). Then the conditions dropped out completely. We had the same thing on our end. When you broke in there, I had nearly an S9 on you, but Pete couldn't hear you. Then as the conditions started to fade, I lost you, but he could hear you briefly before the door shut completely. Have you checked out the receive on that Royce? Seemed to be a little weak, or at least the S meter seemed tight for the audio level. On most of my radios, the white noise level is stronger than S1, and no one is majority quieting at an S3 level. Judging from the clarity of the audio, I would think the signals should have been over S7. Also there seemed to be nothing else going on in the background. Was it really that dead quiet in your neck of the woods, with just that (however brief) path to Pa., and nothing else? We had all sorts of hit and miss skip from several different parts of the country. Not enough to carry on lengthy conversations, but enough to keep the noise level above S5.
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Post by Night Ranger on Jul 22, 2016 16:48:10 GMT -5
Classic Radio Roundup July 20, 2016 - five minute skip window from South Carolina videogate. I'm using my rare "black meter" Royce 1-620 23 channel base. Most Royce 1-620's have a white background meter. The "black meter" Royce 1-620 must have been a limited edition version. Night Ranger That was certainly a weird E-skip. Pete and I are 10 miles apart, and at the beginning, he and I were in there about equally. Then about a minute later, I was a little stronger but he was completely gone (sounded like I was ghost talking). Then the conditions dropped out completely. We had the same thing on our end. When you broke in there, I had nearly an S9 on you, but Pete couldn't hear you. Then as the conditions started to fade, I lost you, but he could hear you briefly before the door shut completely. Have you checked out the receive on that Royce? Seemed to be a little weak, or at least the S meter seemed tight for the audio level. On most of my radios, the white noise level is stronger than S1, and no one is majority quieting at an S3 level. Judging from the clarity of the audio, I would think the signals should have been over S7. Also there seemed to be nothing else going on in the background. Was it really that dead quiet in your neck of the woods, with just that (however brief) path to Pa., and nothing else? We had all sorts of hit and miss skip from several different parts of the country. Not enough to carry on lengthy conversations, but enough to keep the noise level above S5. The Lazy H is a very very quiet antenna. Atmospheric signals coming from directly above are 180 degrees out of phase, and of course it is using horizontal polarization. When there is no skip I often have to turn off the ANL or check the SWR on transmit to make sure the antenna is plugged up. Having the S meter sit on zero even when there is weak to moderate E layer skip and no current transmission is also normal for the Lazy H antenna. F layer skip does develop more of a skip roar than sporadic E on the Lazy H. Wide open sporadic E does raise the noise floor. Also the ANL on that radio is very very good. Better than most as a matter of fact. The only repair I have ever done to that radio is one of the crystals was not oscillating when I first got it. I re-soldered the crystal, and it came back. All crystals are still on frequency. I'll get the schematic out and run through a receiver alignment just to be sure. Night Ranger
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Post by Night Ranger on Jul 22, 2016 18:04:10 GMT -5
That was certainly a weird E-skip. Pete and I are 10 miles apart, and at the beginning, he and I were in there about equally. Then about a minute later, I was a little stronger but he was completely gone (sounded like I was ghost talking). Then the conditions dropped out completely. We had the same thing on our end. When you broke in there, I had nearly an S9 on you, but Pete couldn't hear you. Then as the conditions started to fade, I lost you, but he could hear you briefly before the door shut completely. Have you checked out the receive on that Royce? Seemed to be a little weak, or at least the S meter seemed tight for the audio level. On most of my radios, the white noise level is stronger than S1, and no one is majority quieting at an S3 level. Judging from the clarity of the audio, I would think the signals should have been over S7. Also there seemed to be nothing else going on in the background. Was it really that dead quiet in your neck of the woods, with just that (however brief) path to Pa., and nothing else? We had all sorts of hit and miss skip from several different parts of the country. Not enough to carry on lengthy conversations, but enough to keep the noise level above S5. I just realigned the Royce 1-620 per the Sams photofact. I just did the receive chain, and I did not touch the S meter adjustment. I gained about 3 S units of signal strength from my injected 27 MHz signal, so it did need it. I'm listening to S9 and S10+ hispanic skip on channel 9 now via the Lazy H. The S meter is still sitting on zero on the other channels and it is quiet with no signals, but the banana pickers on channel 9 are s9, s10, and higher. Royce 1-620 receive test after realignment. Night Ranger
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Post by Sandbagger on Jul 22, 2016 20:13:21 GMT -5
That was certainly a weird E-skip. Pete and I are 10 miles apart, and at the beginning, he and I were in there about equally. Then about a minute later, I was a little stronger but he was completely gone (sounded like I was ghost talking). Then the conditions dropped out completely. We had the same thing on our end. When you broke in there, I had nearly an S9 on you, but Pete couldn't hear you. Then as the conditions started to fade, I lost you, but he could hear you briefly before the door shut completely. Have you checked out the receive on that Royce? Seemed to be a little weak, or at least the S meter seemed tight for the audio level. On most of my radios, the white noise level is stronger than S1, and no one is majority quieting at an S3 level. Judging from the clarity of the audio, I would think the signals should have been over S7. Also there seemed to be nothing else going on in the background. Was it really that dead quiet in your neck of the woods, with just that (however brief) path to Pa., and nothing else? We had all sorts of hit and miss skip from several different parts of the country. Not enough to carry on lengthy conversations, but enough to keep the noise level above S5. I just realigned the Royce 1-620 per the Sams photofact. I just did the receive chain, and I did not touch the S meter adjustment. I gained about 3 S units of signal strength from my injected 27 MHz signal, so it did need it. I'm listening to S9 and S10+ hispanic skip on channel 9 now via the Lazy H. The S meter is still sitting on zero on the other channels and it is quiet with no signals, but the banana pickers on channel 9 are s9, s10, and higher. Royce 1-620 receive test after realignment. Night Ranger I had a feeling it needed a bit of a boost in the receiver. Hopefully, we'll get a better chance to try it out next week. I'm surprised that the E-skip season has hung on as long as it has. That big and hot high pressure system hanging over most of the eastern-most part of the country might have something to do with it.....
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Post by BBB on Jul 23, 2016 14:39:49 GMT -5
Looks like I'll miss it. Spew radio is down. Yea, the server is down again. Looks like the HD is going belly up. I'll try to recover what I can and transfer it to another drive. So where are you that you missed the roundup? We were "down the shore" in Avalon, NJ. Cooler by a Mile is their slogan and it was just simply beautiful all week long. Bicycling to Stone Harbor in the mornings and swimming in the ocean during the heat of the day. I could get used to that $cene
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Post by Sandbagger on Aug 25, 2016 6:42:26 GMT -5
It's been a while since I've posted a CRR recap. I guess the summer sort of derails the usual agenda of themes and knocks down the number of participants. Things will pick up again once the fall hits with full force and the clocks get set back. On that note, last night's (8/24) roundup was typically summer-lean. Pete ended up being a no-show, which means no video gate, which is a bummer for those who like to play it and hear what went on the night before. Turnout on our end was light, with 1/4 wave Dave saying hello in the very beginning, and then disappearing until the very end. Sparky, Skeeter, Slammin' Sam, Chuck, and Ron were in there for most of the night. The Delco crew was also in there doing their thing. As the night progressed the conditions seemed to enhance. There was some low-level E-skip to the midwest that rose and fell, and the local conditions seemed to get better as well, as I was hearing the Delco guys a bit stronger by the end of the night. The cherry on top of that sundae, was having a brief exchange with Crazy Bob down in Milville NJ., at a distance of 70 miles from me. I guess the tree limbs haven't completely blocked my antenna yet.. I decided to run my SBE Trinidad for the night. I had to do some quick contact cleaning on my Silver Eagle D104, as it started off being very scratchy. But all seems well again......
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Post by cbrown on Aug 25, 2016 12:51:26 GMT -5
Nice SBE, I'd be tempted to refinish the cabinet. Wood scratches bother me, must be OCD.
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Post by Sandbagger on Aug 25, 2016 14:02:59 GMT -5
Nice SBE, I'd be tempted to refinish the cabinet. Wood scratches bother me, must be OCD. It's far easier to refinish a real wood cabinet, than it is to try on a veneer over particle board case. I'm not a big fan of scratches either, but I'm also not Norm Abrams either......
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Post by BBB on Aug 27, 2016 9:24:09 GMT -5
The SBE Trinidad sounded good Sandbagger.
It wasn't too warm in the shack, so I ran a Mark III 'til the halfway point of the show; then had to duck out. It was good saying hello to Captain Barry in Cecil County MD as well (+/- 50 miles)
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Post by cbrown on Aug 29, 2016 15:10:32 GMT -5
It's far easier to refinish a real wood cabinet, than it is to try on a veneer over particle board case. I'm not a big fan of scratches either, but I'm also not Norm Abrams either...... My dad did a lot of woodworking, so I learned from him. I'll never be as good as him, but I know which end of a chisel to hold. Didn't realize it was a veneer over particle board. Some of the CB radios still had real wood cabinets. I miss those.
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Post by Sandbagger on Aug 29, 2016 18:36:16 GMT -5
It's far easier to refinish a real wood cabinet, than it is to try on a veneer over particle board case. I'm not a big fan of scratches either, but I'm also not Norm Abrams either...... My dad did a lot of woodworking, so I learned from him. I'll never be as good as him, but I know which end of a chisel to hold. Didn't realize it was a veneer over particle board. Some of the CB radios still had real wood cabinets. I miss those. Not too many were real wood. Even the end pieces of my D201's are veneer. Same goes for the Trinidad, Royce 640, the Midland 13-898, and my Cobra 135, and 2000. I can't recall if the Titan IIa is real wood, but I think not, but I'll have to double check.
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Post by cbrown on Aug 31, 2016 11:49:17 GMT -5
I had a Hygain IV that I think had real wood sides, but now I'm questioning it. Another memory shot down.
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 1, 2016 6:54:13 GMT -5
I had a Hygain IV that I think had real wood sides, but now I'm questioning it. Another memory shot down. Most of the "wood top" radios that I've owned or worked on had either a veneer finish glued to some sort of particle board, or were fashioned from some sort of thin plywood with the top layer finished. There was someone on E-bay some time back, who was selling aftermarket (I guess he made them) real cherry wood sides for the D201. I've seen aftermarket wood covers for the Browning Eagles and even the SBE Console II. It might be worth the effort for someone with great wood finishing skills (which, unfortunately, isn't me )
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 1, 2016 7:07:45 GMT -5
Well, as they say, if you don't like how something is going, wait 10 minutes. That's pretty much how I'd describe 8/31's Classic Radio Roundup. It started off really slow on our end with only Pete and myself. There was some low-level south-of-the-border skip running, and we were treated to the talents of Sweaty Maria and her roaming band of taxi-driving mariachi's. Eventually, the skip faded out and the local conditions started to go longer. The Delco crew was coming in in fine style by 9:00. The slow start on our end eventually built up some momentum, when Sparky, Skeeter, Slammin' Sam, Topgun, Security, Tickle and Night Train in the mobile, all joined in. Things got a little bit silly toward the end when Pete wanted me to do some voice promos for his broadcast radio show. It was not the best venue for me to be completely serious, and I was plagued by occasional bouts of the giggles. But it was different. I started off running my Courier Gladiator (probably the biggest modern solid state mobile rig) on the D104, but switched to the Hi-Fi Galaxy when the voice promo's started. Yes, there will be a videogate.....
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Post by BBB on Sept 6, 2016 11:56:03 GMT -5
Good times. I was trying to get you to laugh during the first couple of voice overs
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 6, 2016 19:39:36 GMT -5
Good times. I was trying to get you to laugh during the first couple of voice overs I don't need any help. I am fully capable of getting the giggles on my own.... and I do...... Speaking of voice overs, I think we may have a new sponsor for Classic Radio Roundup..... Tune in Wednesday night to find out......
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 14, 2016 7:12:52 GMT -5
I realize that summer is not yet officially (or meteorologically) over, but it's time for Classic Radio Roundup again tonight. Last week's turnout was light, and hopefully things will start picking up again soon. But the fact that summer is hanging on (which is definitely NOT a bad thing), will again influence my radio choices. I can't wait to start running tube rigs again, but with today's weather forecasting 90 degrees, I know my radio room will be on the hot side again tonight, and that means solid state yet again. So dust off those old rigs and give a shout. Our friends in the Delco area have been putting on a good showing, and hopefully we'll have a few more locals tonight.
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Post by BBB on Sept 14, 2016 10:51:30 GMT -5
I'll probably also refrain from t00bs this time around as the shack temp is already pushing 80 (at 11:30am) Got this cool "steam punk" temp gauge at the Kimberton ham fest.
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Post by BBB on Sept 15, 2016 14:27:09 GMT -5
Pretty good turn out last night for CRR. Most of the locals showed. I did end up running a transistorized Sears RoadTalker 40 SSB "slant-face" base/ mobile CB radio for the first half. The previous owner had the clarifier opened. Nice.
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 21, 2016 6:30:22 GMT -5
Be there or be square. Yep it's time again for Classic Radio Roundup. It might have cooled off enough that I may break out a tube rig tonight (Possibly my MKIII). Let's hope the post summer turnout is a good one, as tomorrow is the 1st day of fall.
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Post by Sandbagger on Sept 23, 2016 6:49:10 GMT -5
9/21's CRR was a little more active, but still not up to our "normal" standards. Looks like 1/4 Wave Dave has abandoned us in favor of the latest prime time reality TV show, as he hasn't been around the roundup for several weeks now. Night Train spent the time playing taxi to one of his employees, and was operating out of the mobile. The usual crew was in there running a variety of mostly solid state radios this time, including a Pearce-Simpson Super Lynx, Regency CR-123, and my Midland 13-898B. I had every intention of running my Browning MK-III, but we're still experiencing summer temperatures, and my radio room was too warm to sustain the additional warmth given off by tube radios, so it was the Midland instead. Instead of changing radios, I played musical microphones. I ran the following mics on the Midland to see which ones sounded best: Silver Eagle D104 for most of the night. I also tried a Kenwood MC-85, Astatic Echomax-2000, Turner +2, Turner Super Sidekick, and Turner +3. Each mic had a distinctive sound, but none of them really sounded "bad". The Midland was pretty forgiving of the variety of mics. Other radios are not so forgiving. I'd have to say, based on the videogate, that the D104 had the best "classic 70's CB sound". The Super Sidekick was probably the most natural, if not set too high. The MC-85 mic didn't do bad either with the right level setting.
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