Topband: Spring Stew Perry in a few more days

[Bill Cromwell]

Hi,

Somebody mentioned the Stew is coming 'round again so I finally 
remembered to look it up. It will be here a week from Saturday. I have 
been 'on a roll' at my workbench getting the old radios operational 
again. I am going to flog myself attempting to have the station ready to 
get on the air with a patched up antenna (frost is still in the ground). 
My Atlas 180 is coming along pretty well. I stopped using it about 
twenty years ago (where did the time go!) and it has deteriorated just 
sitting on the shelf. Magic? It is receiving pretty well now. Most of 
the transmitter is trying to work now. It wouldn't even think about it 
last week. No RX. No TX. Nada. I printed a copy of the voltage charts 
and I'll use that to isolate the trouble. I can see that somebody in the 
past made some "improvements" or at least some repairs. I suspect a 
broken wire or a solder joint. Maybe one of those pesky electrolytic 
caps. At high volume the RX audio is "raspy" and I have been ignoring 
that - keep the volume down to just my garage.

And the DX-100 is wanting to work. It would be great to have both 
available. The Kenwood R-599 has 160 on it and works as well as it ever 
did. Just needs a TX to go with. The matching T-599 does NOT have Top 
Band. What's up with that? I do have a real life aside from ham radio 
(like most of us) so I will have to *focus* to be on 160 in time for the 
Stew. I hope to see you on the air - *soon*.

73,

Bill  KU8H