Monday, Feb. 1, 2016 — According to my USPS tracking info, I learned this morning that my Bunnell Martin Flash key arrived! I couldn’t wait to beat a path to the mailbox, which I did on my way to town.
The package — externally — looked pretty good, though one corner was crunched pretty hard. There was an ominous “clunk” in the package when you moved it around, and that concerned me.
Once I was home, I carefully tore open the package and didn’t exactly like what I saw as packing — crumpled newspaper as packing. However, the key was safely in a carrying case … but what was clunking?
Another ominous sign as I dug into the box — the carrying case was wrapped in a couple of wraps of the small-bubble bubble wrap. Hmmm. Well, the key is in the carrying case, right? But what about that clunking noise??
The key was indeed in its case, but a look at the photos will show you why it was clunking — it was IN the case, but not placed in the case as intended. But still, it protected the key.
The weights tumbled out of the case when I opened it (another worrisome sign). Had they beat the bejeezus out of my new-to-me key??
The good news first: The key was unscathed (phew!), and in beautiful condition! The chrome looks as sharp as it probably did when new. The bad news: The jostling the case took sprung the carrying case’s latch, not sure I can fix it or not. There’s a name on the bottom of the key of the original purchaser (presumably). This thing did not see a lot of use, and I don’t think it every sit out of its case for long periods of time.
Anyway, despite all my worst fears, the key arrived in good condition and is safely in my shack.
SHACK TIME! This evening the XYL was out, so I had some quality time in the shack — and that quality was enhanced by repairs I made this afternoon to the office chair at the main operating position.
As mentioned previously, the hydraulic cylinder was screwing up, and lowering without warning — no matter if my lard butt was in it or not. It only took a visit to YouTube and 4-1/2 inches of PVC pipe to fix it, and it has improved my quality of (shack) life immensely. No more do I worry when the %@#*(@( chair was going to drop, and if I would misfire my CW sending because of it. It was a solution near and dear to my heart — it was cheap.
To celebrate, rather than browse eBay for a new rig, I fired up an oldie but goodie — my Heathkit HW-16 and VFO. I’ve owned it for more than 15 years, bought it from a retired engineer who built it “back in the day” and my mistake was not buying all the Heathkit stuff he had for sale — he had a long list of it too.
The HW-16 has the then-popular mod that allows the user to switch out the CW audio filter so the rig can be used to monitor SSB. I haven’t used it in four or five years, but I have always enjoyed working CW with it, and it was my classic go-to rig for Straight Key Night. I didn’t make a contact tonight, but I did refresh my memory (and my eardrums to that damnable shrill neon bulb sidetone. Holy eardrums, Bug Man!).
One of the problems now with operating it is that I have since mounted my LCD monitor for the FT-2000 display on a movable arm that basically blocks the front of the rig. I have to move the monitor around to reach the rig controls and VFO. But I expect that to change soon enough.
BITING THE BULLET. After giving more thought to upgrading the bandscope function on my FT-2000 (and how much I would like to add rig control to a bandscope), I decided to do it — late last night I bought the RTL spectrum scope kit and also the needed rig control cable. With those items in place, I can completely remove the monitor I use for the DMU display, and everything will appear on my PC monitor (which isn’t in the way of anything)..
This doesn’t mean I’m not interested in using my Flex, just that I wanted to go ahead an improve my operating experience of my FT-2000. I can also remove the DMU from the shack.
MEMORIES …. While cleaning around the HW-16 tonight, underneath it I found the original eBay invoice for my Icom IC-746PRO. The owner had purchased the rig, and then immediately purchased a 756PROII because he didn’t like the monochrome display. The rig was his backup that was never needed. I paid $970 for it in 2005, and interestingly, you’ll be lucky to find a PRO at this price point on eBay now. The only problem I had was the backlight failing. At the time it was repaired, I had them also put on a new faceplate because the owner had touched a hot soldering iron to the left upper corner of the faceplate, dinging it.
NOTE: To those who may be wondering if I’m ready to part with any of my rigs, the answer for now is …. not at this time. When I do, they’ll probably go on eBay (and it won’t include HF gear newer than my FT-757GX, lol!)