There’s a hamfest happening in Cleveland this weekend. I went to this one for the first time last year, and came away impressed with the size and number of vendors. It’s certainly worth your time if you’re in the area, so check it out!
The Cleveland Hamfest and Computer Show
Cuyahoga County Fairgrounds, Eastland Entrance
160 Eastland Rd
Berea, OH 44107
September 28
8A - 12P
https://www.hac.org/
This was the first year for this show, and had maybe a dozen vendors on the fairgrounds. Turnout was pretty good, there were a number of people coming in during the time we were there.
Some of the vendors were ones you’ve seen from other shows, including some from the recent Findlay show. Because of that, I didn’t take very many pictures.
This nice dual range Weston voltmeter was at the club’s table. I usually pick these up when they’re cheap enough because they’re useful just about anywhere.
I wasn’t sure what this one radio (with the two dials and the center meter) was, but it looked really interesting. I didn’t need a shelf queen. however.
One vendor had a number of tubes for sale for $1 each. I took 20 of them. He also had this box of what we thought were Toyota manufactured tubes, but turned out to be pulls in Toyota spark plug boxes. Fooled us!
There was a handful more of vendors with the usual hamfest things. Overall, it was a nice little local and worth the time for us to go. If they hold it again next year, we’ll probably head over.
Next show is Cleveland at the end of the month. If this one is like last year’s show, it’s a good size show that offered a lot of stuff to see. See you there!
This probably should have been inserted before the Findlay show, as it happened over Labor Day weekend. But I’m a lazy piggy and didn’t get it posted in time, so here it is!
Swappers Day is a general flea market that happens over the Labor Day weekend. By general, I mean it’s all kinds of merchandise - but it started out as a sportsman’s club show, and you still get a lot of firearms and bows being sold. Kind of a strange mix of things.
A lot of general antiques also show up, and that includes electrical gear. However, this is an opportunity to take photos of all kinds of interesting things, and here’s what I saw that caught my eye:
This stuff is getting kind of rare, but cool to see.
As is this stuff…no prices of course. Price it!
I think Coyote was just a masochist, and the roadrunner was his enabler.
A cute mini motobike.
It's like a bike. But for water.
A relative that messed around with the wrong crowd.
Interesting, but relatively poor shape.
I took the Stewart unit home.
We had no idea what this was, just…trippy.
But they were everywhere this year.
Yeah we all had one of these.
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Not much else to say about this one, but more shows on the way!
The Findlay Radio Club Hamfest is usually a pretty decent show. It’s been shrinking somewhat over the years, which is unfortunate, but there seems to be a lot of ‘fests in Ohio these days. Perhaps that, and the general aging of the population / equipment getting older and not having more made is starting to affect who and what shows up. No idea, but this years show was probably about 2/3 of the size of the first one I attended years ago. I may put this one on every other year or so…
That’s not to say there wasn’t good stuff to see, I usually bring home way too many things from this show and this year was no exception. There was plenty of good stuff to see, and it was still well worth the trip.
I did notice that prices seem to have come back down again, after the exuberance of the first half of the year. They’ve come down a lot, to the point where I noticed a certain piece of equipment that would make a good economic indicator. More on that later!
Regardless, it was a lovely day for the show and I took a number of pictures of interesting things:
A (Sears) Silvertone Battery Checker.
Chinese bootleg Blu-Ray discs from years past.
The big rigs still show up in great numbers.
I almost took the AG-9 home, but it was damaged.
A big 'ol boat anchor Majestic.
A relatively rare clock model.
The hotdesk scanner! Hot!
Just off the boat from Japan.
This was only a buck. These were built like tanks.
It's so cute.
A couple of interesting radios.
Multiply your Qs here.
It's too bad this meter was smashed.
An early personal radio.
A bunch of interesting broadcast receivers.
The S-38s are cheap again.
I took this wattmeter home.
It's a mini phone!
A collection of old phones.
Tube testers.
If you say that wrong you get in trouble.
A 150VAC Weston meter. I took it home.
That's a cool Zenith radio.
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There are a couple more shows this year before the season wraps up, including a new one in Pennsylvania that I’m going to check out. Stay tuned, and I’ll see you there!
I’d never been to this show, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Turned out to be a good local, a long row of vendors with some more in a building. We ended up wandering around for a couple hours, looking at everything twice. A few odds ‘n ends went home, including some freebies, so it turned out to be a good trip.
Prices at this show were variable - some were selling things for more than new, others had what I could consider to be accurate prices. Unfortunately, the down in the dirt prices of a few years ago seem to be gone. Hope you got what you wanted then!
This is what I saw at the show:
A clear cased counter. Quite cool.
Obligatory Heathkit equipment, getting rarer.
Multimeters, multimeters everywhere.
Some military piece.
A really good condition late model 260.
This guy had a couple of good looking radios.
Do you need your performance checked?
Benny looks a bit high.
The radio on the top was given to me with a “Do something with it.”
The pencil tube in a radiosonde.
A couple of antique radiosondes.
These were decent enough speakers.
The name of the former owner is engraved deeply.
What we go to shows for.
cin25-tekscopes-wereboar.jpp.jpg
A very nice tube tester and some radios.
This guy was selling Weston lab meters cheap.
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This will probably be a show I go to if there’s time, seeing as it’s about 2 hours away. Next show is the Findlay hamfest, which is always a good show (assuming no rain!)
I’ve never been to this show, so I can’t really say what it’s like - but it’s not that far so I’ll take a trip and see. If there’s anything good, I’ll have a lot of pictures for you. It’s at the Clermont County Fairgrounds in Owensville, which is a suburb somewhat to the east of Cincy proper.
Cincinatti Hamfest
Clermont County Fairgrounds
1000 Locust Street
Owensville, OH 45160
August 9
8A - 2P
Admission: $10 (you can pre-order tickets)
https://cincinnatihamfest.org/
See you there!
8/11 Update - I did make it to the show, it was a little one but I still saw some good stuff. Pictures coming ASAP.
The show in Columbus, Ohio is always a surprisingly good one. Other than the few years that it threatened rain, it’s always presented a very good selection of things to see, and a lot of vendors. This year was no different. Prices at this show were what I would consider more reasonable, so it was easy to spend a few bucks.
I limited myself to a few small items and some books, but there was plenty for everyone. Here’s what I saw at the show:
Some big boatanchor.
This guy was selling a lot of good books cheap.
The random things we go to shows for.
A Hallicrafters “Super Defiant” w/speaker.
I think it launches the missiles.
A random Hallicrafters and some stuff.
Something homemade, covered with screen.
A portable explosion inna box.
A RCA multi-tap isolation transformer.
Probably deaf as a post when it was new.
Lots of meters. I didn't buy a voltmeter.
Another one of those monitor scopes.
A Sencore Mighty Mite tube tester.
columbus25-moresupply-wereboar.jpg
The Weston meter was lovely.
Just don't take the guy's table.
I took the Olson transistor supply home.
One of GenRad's many specialty devices.
A Pan American “Tropical” receiver.
An interesting Heathkit supply.
Another deaf as a post radio.
The Hamfest Special table.
A few better grade radios.
And some better better radios.
columbus25-randoms-wereboar.jpg
A big, ancient lighting rheostat.
And a couple of these.
You need to see at least one of these.
Some small scopes.
A couple of small speakers from the 'shack.
Just a bunch of stuff.
A station-station telephone setup.
One of Heath's “Lunchbox” testers.
A tiny Tek scope.
A power supply for tube devices.
A meter in a rotor housing.
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The next show (this coming weekend) is Cincinnati. I’ve never been to that one, so it will be interesting to see what it’s like.
The Shriner’s Hamfest in Columbus, Ohio is happening August 2nd. This is a small, local show, but it’s always been good for something decent - be it a project device or simply something unique. Since it’s my local show, I always make a point to attend. As always, I’ll have pictures shortly after the show.
Columbus (OH) Hamfest
Aladdin Shrine Center
1801 Gateway Cir
Grove City, OH 43123
August 2
8A - 1PMish https://aladdinshrine.org/hamfest/
For the most part, I’ve only brought home parts (or parts units) this year - prices on equipment has really gone up and it’s moving things into the “I’d like that, but not at that price” territory, with some of the stuff being so far out of budget that there’s no way you could negotiate it down.
It shouldn’t be said that there aren’t bargains around, because there are. I did pick up some interesting things because I they were unusual or cheap.
First is this device. You’ve seen it before, since I had a post on it earlier. It’s a “tube tester” - aka “filament checker” for tubes. It’s some little device a company packed up with a RCA tube manual - in this case, the manual doesn’t look like it’s ever been cracked open. That’s the primary reason I purchased this, but the gadget was cool as well. It looks to have been used maybe one or two times - probably right up until the original owner realized you could just check the filaments with a meter instead!
Next up is a signal tracer! Yay! Well, not really. There’s nothing special about a signal tracer save this one is one of Precision’s devices (aka PACO) and is somewhat unusual. You see more of PACO’s signal generators and other devices - I believe this ST-22 is the first tracer from that manufacturer I’ve seen. It’s in very dirty shape and missing a knob, but it works. I did some cleanup on it and borrowed a knob from a PACO G-30, and it will probably be able to get put into service with a filter change. Stay tuned for a post on that in the future.
An Eico 902 Harmonic Distortion Analyzer is next up - this is a fairly late item for Eico, and as such, has very little wax paper capacitors to go bad. That’s good, because this is a fairly complex device under the hood. Providing some of the same measurements as the AA-1 and IM-48, this device could do both AC VTVM measurements as well as provide harmonic distortion measurements for audio amplifiers. While I don’t do a whole lot of audio work, this device was so cheap I really couldn’t pass it up. Next year, this will probably be back to 3 figures, so I picked it up now. There will be some posts on this one later as well.
Last, are some rather banal parts. These CSC (Continental Specialties Corporation) proto-boards match standard breadboard layout. You’ll probably recognize these - everyone from Radio Shack to no-name Chinese vendors sold a board with this exact same layout. Since I use these at times, and you can’t get them from the rats at the shack anymore, I picked these up for a few bucks. The 1970s packaging is just a bonus.
That takes care of finds from the first part of the year. Next show(s) are Columbus and Cincinnati in August, with a few more in September and November. Stay tuned for pictures of the goodies that show up!
Unlike last year, this year was promising rain - we could see it coming on the RADAR feed, but thought it would hold off for a few hours.
…but it didn’t hold off for long. We got about an hour before it started raining. Not hard, just a summer shower, but it wasn’t going to let up. We headed out.
The threat of rain kept a lot of vendors away, as the outdoor part of the market was less than half of last year’s crowd. That’s just the way this works - sometimes it rains. Still, there was a decent amount of things to see and the indoor portion of the show was full. Prices on some of the things was kind of high, with a few of the things I saw being just crazy - they were stopgap hobby things when new, and they aren’t aging well. Still, if someone is willing to pay it then more power to the people selling.
I did pick up a nice metered GenRad variac for $10, and some old Rat Shack style protoboards for a couple bucks each. I was offered some other things really cheap, but the “I don’t need more of this stuff” mentality kicked in.
Here’s what I saw at the show:
A lot of progessional audio gear
Some old protoboard like rat shack sold. I took these home.
An old, complex, impedance bridge.
Some cool old clock radios.
A couple of Conar (NRI) radios.
A signal generator in a truck bed.
I don't understand the prices on some of this stuff.
Was Hello Kitty on everything?
An old HP1200A scope.
This guy had a collection of meters for sale.
My friend loved this but said he couldn't afford it just to play Mario Bros.
A cool old Panasonic table radio.
Some radios, at a radio show…
Lots of random things.
This show has a lot of tables of things.
And even more random items.
What was this from?
An official Ma Bell teleprinter repair manual.
A tube tester and stuff.
Random radio gear.
It was a dollar because there were no tubes.
Tube testers are expensive.
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This finishes shows for the first half of the year, as there aren’t any I’m going to attend in July. Next is the Aladdin Shrine Audio Unit show in Columbus, Ohio, followed by the Cincinnati Hamfest in (obviously?) Cincinnati, Ohio.
