K5LAD - 50 Years of Ham Radio Memories

Basket of memories

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Memories from K5LAD
Version 02/27/07:3 – previous versions - 01/15/07:2 - 11/28/05:4 - 9/15/05:3
Memories of a ham


1958 - Working Cuban CW contact on 20 loading up Mother's clothesline
The Birthday Hole
1961 - Got a hole for birthday present
How many people do you know why have received a hole in the ground for their birthday? I did. I never did have access to any towers, poles, or other nice antenna support structures. After I went away to college, my mother talked to the local electrical utility company about obtaining an old power pole they were discarding. They told her that they would give her the old pole and would even bring by the equipment to set the pole in the ground but she would have to have the hole dug.
She contracted with someone to dig the hole and the power company brought by a 35-40 foot pole and set it.
When I came home from college on the week-end following my birthday I found a beautiful wooden antenna support in the back yard………. complete with a ribbon and bow around it. The only cost had been the digging so I actually received a hole in the ground for my birthday. I thought it was a pretty super gift.
The Secret Hamshack Telephone
1961 - Telephone in basement - neon bulb for indicator - push-button switch for dial
Hams sure do some crazy things to ‘made do.’ These days, people have phones all over their house, in every room and sometimes even in the bathroom. Back in the "Good Ole Days," a phone was mighty handy in a hamshack but that wasn’t part of our family’s budget. During the early 60s, my hamshack was in my family’s basement. The phone wire for the one phone in our house came right through the basement and was nailed to the floor braces for the room above. That wire was easily accessible and I accessed it. My phone was built inside a Prince Edward cigar box. I had no dial for my phone but I discovered that I could use a SPST normally closed push-button switch and pulse the line. I was actually breaking the circuit to the handset. It was a reverse procedure, i.e., I pressed the button to close the circuit for each digit of a number. Timeing was important and I would just count each "unpress" to make each number. I sound complicated but it worked fine.
Also, I needed a way to tell when it was ringing. The word was that the phone company had an automated process to sweep all the phone lines and check the resistance across the line. Since a phone’s ringer was across the line as it sat, waiting for an incoming call, they could check that resistance. The resistance would tell them how many ringers were on the line and they could find un-authorized phones. I placed a NE-2 neon bulb across the line for my visual ringer. Since the neon bulb had no physical connection, it showed no resistance to the auto checking device. It worked great.
1956 - Memories of Popular Electronics -- Loved Carl and Jerry -- name in list of Looking for Help.
1957 - Electronics in High School - wanted to build 2 meter AM transceiver kit - fixed intercom speakers in study hall for stage presentations.
12. 1956 - Going to Ike's house on weekends until Mother would drive by and honk.
13. First Ham Test
QSL Cards - (1957 - present day)
1958 - Printed my QSL cards Many different QSL cards, Walter Ashe, WRL, S.Spgs. picture cards, cards from the International Oil Exposition 1964?, cards printed at Bell, cards printed by Reedy Booker including Bicentennial cards for AD5LAD.
I’ve had quite a few different QSL cards during my years as a ham. Like all hams who were first licensed in the mid 50s, the first batch of cards you got were either from WRL (World Radio Labs in Council Bluffs, IA) or from Walter Ashe. The WRL cards showed a map of the USA with all the states outlined and an arrow with the words "My QTH" displayed at the appropriate place. The Walter Ashe cards were all text and had your call in big bold orange letters. The prices were evidently low enough to entice a new ham to choose either one or both of them and the delivery was quick. I had both of these cards both with my call, KN5LAD. I still had a few left when I upgraded my license so I just blocked out the novice designator, "N" As I recall it looked rather scroungy with a letter blocked out but it was all I had available at the time.
My next cards were printed at the local newspaper office where I worked part time. The card stock I used had a pearly look and I thought they were really nice. I’m not quite as impressed when I see them now but I was young and foolish. I’m no longer young.
I also printed some special cards that I bought at the local drug store. These cards were the kind they sold as souvenirs and showed a photograph of the city of Sand Springs (OK). I think I paid 5 cents each for those cards and then printer my call, name and address over the photograph. I reserved these cards for special contacts, those I thought were real DX…….. like Canada and Mexico.
I also used some preprinted cards from the Electron Benders Amateur Radio Club that celebrated the Petroleum Exposition of 1964. Those cards had a place to write in my call, name, and address.
Later, the junior high school where I was teaching had a print shop which had earlier been set up as a class but the equipment was no longer being used. Prior to my interest in radios and electronics I had been very interested in printing. I even had an old treadle-operated platen press in my basement when had been loaned to me by a family friend. I used my prior-learned printing skills to print quite a batch of cards on the school equipment. Not too pretty a card, mighty cheap paper stock, but it was what was available and didn’t cost me anything. I used those cards all through my hamming in the 60s and the early 70s.
By the early 70s I was now co-owner of a ham radio store. One of my fellow MARS (Military Affiliate Radio System) was a retired printer in another city. My store customers often asked my opinion on where they could get their QSL cards and I would give them samples from my printer friend. By the way, his name was Reedy Booker and he was a wonderful gentleman……… I just always chuckled as his name and how appropriate it was for a printer. I didn’t get any money from recommending these QSL card customers; I just did it for him. Every so often I was surprised to receive a package of cards with my call imprinted, and these were the nicest cards I ever had used. He even asked me to send a photograph of my station and he would print that on a card.
During 1976, the US bicentennial, US stations had the option the trade their call prefix to some bicentennial special calls. Calls beginning with the letter K could use the letters AD so I became AD5LAD and I was surprised to find a package of cards from Reedy with my new – temporary call.
During the late 80s and early 90s, I had a chance to create some cards using the WordPerfect word processing program. I had access to various colors of stock so my cards were home-brewed again.
My late 90s and turn of the century cards were printed by a commercial printer who I found at a local hamfest. I’ve had two different batches printed by him with the only difference being the color of my call.
A couple of years ago, a ‘Stray’ in QST was about a fellow who finally went back and finished his WAS by getting one last card. They published a picture showing his display of all 50 cards. I received an email from a ham in Texas who knew me and he pointed out the picture and said he thought he saw my call in the collection. Sure enough, there was one of my old Walter Ashe cards he had used to represent his QSO with Oklahoma. It’s been interesting to go back and look at my ham history through QSL cards.
14. 1957 - First receiver was AR-3 purchased by cashing in $25 savings bond I had won.
15. 1957 - First transmitter was Globe Chief 90. Purchased by giving up paper route to get my $50 bond.
16. 1957 - AR-3 took to Tommy W5CFF house to have it aligned......... it was so unstable because all components were still original length. Disassembled it and rebuilt it and it was great.
17. 1957 - Those were the first full lead-length components I had until I was in college.
18. 1958 - Plate modulated Globe Chief....... built on steel chassis......... couldn't afford modulation xfmr so W5PA gave me an aircraft power xfmr...... had the right turns ratio and was rated at 400 to 2600 cycles. Terrible modulation......... good signal..... not much audio.
Modulator for Globe Chief 90. Steel chassis. resistors from old TV sets with leads soldered on, couldn't afford modulation transformer. Given an aircraft power transformer by W5PA?. Had the right turns ratio and was rated at 400 to 2600 cycles (not Hertz). It worked but just didn't modulate the rig fully. Got comments like "good strong signal but not enough modulation."
20. 1959 - College receiver was Hallicrafters S-20R Sky Buddy..... bought with money earned from driving ambulance for several weeks during the summer before going to college.
21. 1959 - College xmtr was designed by W5TVU using tubes which were pulls from KRMG. Pair of 2E26s, modulated by 2E26s with a 2E26 clamper tube. Also built on steel chassis.... cheaper.
22. 1960 - Radio station at college........ ham station in small room off the gathering room on 3rd floor in men's dorm. Antenna on roof for 75meters.
23. 1960 - Broadcast radio station at college....... turntable from college-gift hi-fi (pre-stereo) Knight kit transmitter. Antenna from my room on 3rd floor to girl's room in adjacent girl's dorm. Antenna about 300 feet. Rules said, 10 foot antenna -- 50 foot transmission distance. Advertised pizzas
24. 1958 - CK722 transistors for 99 cents. 1959 - Wrote senior research paper on CK722.
25. 1958 - Took Gen test in Tulsa..... rode bus to Tulsa PO.... FCC was there 4 times a year.... gave them postcard addressed to myself that said, "You have Passed/Failed you General Class test."
26. 1958 - Passed 13 WPM code record right before getting on the bus.
27. 1958 - Worked some 11 meters while it was still a ham band before becoming a CB band in 1958.
28. 1961 - Always secretly wished when I came home from college that there was a beautiful new ham rig in place of the old stuff.
29. 1958 - Talking to K5JZV on telephone after school..... I was talking to Canal Zone station and he said, "Put me on the patch." John worked him using his call and got a QSL too.
30. 1958 - Made phone patch out of Lionel train transformer which was being sold for guys building SSB rigs ==== 75 and 20 meters
31. Burstein Applebee -- Jim Miller Warehouse Assortment (floor sweepings)

Bamboo boom beam (already written up)
No pictures of early station.
Always interested in 2 meters. Built 2 meter converter in 1964 but it was full of birdies..... don't recall ever hearing any stations.
Early FM base station was ARC-3 converted.... covered 100 to 156 MHz.... slope detected FM. Transmitter was ARC-3 transmitter - FMed by placing the secondary of modulation xfmr in series with screen of the oscillator tube.
40. Power supply for TX had half-power "kick switch."
Later added VF-1 VFO to TX. Had a threaded rod in side with a washer on the end that was moved to and away from the vfo coil. Listened on RX while transmitting very low power into the repeater. With the tuning rod I placed the vfo on frequency by listening for full quieting signal, then kicked the power supply switch to bring up the power. When the air conditioner came on it would change the vfo freq enough so I would drop out of the repeater. Same then when air conditioner went off.
42. 1965 - built 15 meter dipole with emt which gave me a rotatable antenna -- armstrong method.
43. Wife Gloria was also teaching. She said if I could figure out a way for her to stop working that she would get her license. She didn't stop working but she did get her Novice and Technician license in 1966. She only used the Tech license to talk back and forth to me. In 2001 or so, when the FCC changed the rules to allow anyone who had taken the 5 wpm code test to be grandfathered (grandmothered) up to General.
44. Son, Russell KD6GGI, got a Tech license in 1991 when the code-free tickets came available. He was living in Calif. and got it to surprise and please me......... which he did.
45. Son, Daniel KE6LMF, and daughter-in-law Kimberly KE6LMH, took classes after they had moved to Calif. and in 1995?? both got their Tech licenses, to surprise and please me..... which they did.
46. First yagi, rotator, and tower. Still have invoice from Radio Inc. Hornet TB-750 beam, built in Duncan, OK. CD-45 rotator. Homebrew tower.
Traded Suzuki 50 motorcycle for homemade tower. Two 30 foot sections, overlapped for 5 feet.
RTTY Experiences – Converted TD
Using a converted TD with short start and stop pulses
RTTY Experiences
RTTY is not dead, but I still remember ..
by K5LAD on November 17, 2000
I too enjoyed the clanking walk back through memory lane. I was running a MARS model 19 at home, back in the 60s, and the thing I remember, with a smile, is talking with someone on 80 meter RTTY who was also running tape and trying to keep up with cutting a tape at my keyboard while the station I was talking to was answering. You couldn't see what you were typing, while cutting the tape, so you had to guess at your errors and try to blindly correct them. It was always a blessing when the other station did not have tape and was a slow typist since I could finally stay (almost) caught up.
Even the current political discussions coming from Florida have talked about chads and hanging chads and that had brought back more memories to me. The chadless machine kept things a lot cleaner around the shack since it didn't drop its little yellow circles, but those tapes were sure harder to wind up in a neat roll. I also had to learn that bow-tie rollup operation.
Ah, the memories.............
50.   

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