Sunday, Feb. 27, 2011 — I had to file this under the “What’d He Say?” heading in my high-tech filing system:
An eBay seller listed a Kenwood TS-430S for sale this weekend. It’s one of Kenwood’s many workhorse 100W HF rigs; I have owned several, and still have one. The write-up on this one caught my eye.
It mentions in the headline that this TS-430S is a “high power” version (Huh? I’ve heard of a QRP version of some Kenwood rigs, but never a high power one). The listing states that the seller got lots of compliments on his audio when using the rig. It’s a nice one, he states, since it has “high power 250 watts.” (WTF??) But there’s a problem — the radio stopped transmitting and “might be the finals.” (You THINK??!)
I can only imagine this guy’s shack when he was running this radio at 250 watts … they say that tube radios glow in the dark; something tells me that the solid state TS-430S did too … briefly!
With a Buy It Now of $235, I hope someone who knows what they’re doing buys it … and can actually fix it. It’s a lot of cash for a fixer-upper that’s been ridden hard and put up wet!
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