- 2024
- May
- 17
Hamvention 2024 - Friday’s Stuff I Didn’t Need (but it jumped in my car I swear!)
This year’s show started out rainy, and it rained until I was done browsing the flea market about 4 hours after open. Of course!
Really, the only thing I wanted out of the show this year was to find a Hallicrafters S38C. I had one of these years ago, and gave it to a family member. They swear they gave it back, but I don’t have it and I don’t remember giving it away. Not a big deal, it was a pretty poor example of the type but it did have a manual with it. I ended up coming home with a frequency counter - I need one to fix my other one that suddenly stopped counting, and got a good deal on a boat anchor of a signal generator. I also found what I came to the show for - an S38C.
The Frequency counter is nothing special, just a counter. It works. I saw it working at the show, so no problems.
The gods smiled on me because this S38C was sitting at a booth with a couple of other similar radios that an older gentleman was selling because he just didn’t have the time or interest anymore. It’s in great shape for the age. It’s missing the back, of course, and a knob was kind of busted. Not a big deal, the case and innards are in excellent condition.
Everything inside is completely untouched. Bask in the glory of leaky wax paper capacitors and bumblebombs.
The filters are bad, of course. That’s expected, and the 150V capacitors won’t be too hard to acquire. If I can find some at the show tomorrow that aren’t super goodly chinesium, I’ll get them - otherwise, a Mouser order is in my future.
The last item is the signal generator. It’s in ok shape for the age. What caught my eye is the beautiful flywheel tuning dial. Just a pleasure to spin and turn. It works, but has some issues - the signal kind of fades in and out. No tsure what’s going on here, I’ll open it later and take a look. However, when it does work the signal is quite nice.
That’s it. There’s one piece I told myself if it’s there I’ll get it tomorrow, so we’ll see.
Links to all the things I drug home this year:
Friday https://wereboar.com … d-in-my-car-i-swear/
Saturday https://wereboar.com … it-followed-me-home/
Sunday https://wereboar.com … t-because-its-cheap/