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ICOM radios. Welcome to Amtoply Calling Let's
Stop, Neil's your guy Amtoply, here we go Hey,
good evening, everyone. It's time for HamTalk
Live episode number 235, the new Drake radio
exhibit at the Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting
recorded live on Thursday, November 5th, 2020.
I'm your host, Neil Rapp, WB9's VPG. Thanks for
tuning in to this episode of HamTalk Live. Tonight,
we're joined by Jay Adric, KCJY. And Lee Hite,
K8 CLI, and we will take your calls a little
later in the show. Last week, Rob Sherwood in
C zero B was here to talk about the performance
of some of the latest radios on the market. If
you missed the show, you can listen anytime at
ham talk live .com or your favorite podcast app
or YouTube, or you can catch the rebroadcast
of ham talk live on W T W W that's 50 85. a .m.
and that's on Saturday afternoons at about 330
p .m. Eastern Time. So get your questions ready
to go about some Drake stuff and the VOA Museum.
If you're listening to us live on Thursday night
you can give us a call a little later on in the
show. I'll go ahead and give you the number now
though so you can have it ready to go and ready
to punch in. It's 859 9 8 2 73 73 again that
phone number to call later on in the show 8 5
9 9 8 2 7373. You can also send a question via
Twitter. The Twitter handle is at HamTalk Live
and I'll be checking that throughout the evening
as well. And I'll be back with Jay and Lee right
after this word from ICOM America right here
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to HamTalk Live with Neil Rapp. Welcome back
to ham talk live. Thanks to icon for sponsoring
the show Make sure you check out all their equipment
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icon America comm slash amateur Tonight, my guests
are Jay Adrick and Lee Hite. Jay Adrick, KHCJY
has been active in amateur radio since 1961.
He's a 56 plus year veteran of the broadcast
industry. In 2013, Jay retired from Harris Corporation
as their vice president of broadcast technology,
but continues as an industry consultant specializing
in digital television systems. television spectrum
issues and the television spectrum repack. He
has been awarded the television engineering achievement
award by the national association of broadcasters,
a fellow in the society of motion picture and
television engineers, the IEEE broadcast television
society and the society of broadcast engineers.
Jay serves as a board member of the Voice of
America Museum of Broadcasting. Lee Hite, K8
CLI, is one of the lead docents and a board member
at the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting.
Lee is a retired electronics engineer with a
passion for investigating technical issues, occasionally
surrounded with mystery and often bridging several
fields of technology. Lee was first licensed
in 1954 and is active with the Mason, Ohio and
Warren County cert teams and he also engineers
wind chimes and biomass briquette so Lee is the
jack -of -all -trades and If you get a chance
to visit the museum Lee is the guy you want to
talk to because he has the history of everything.
So Jay and Lee, welcome back to the show. Thank
you, Neil. Good to be here tonight. Yeah. Thank
you, Neil. Appreciate the invitation to come
back and we're looking forward to the program.
Well, I think if I remember right you've both
been on the show but not at the same time so
So we've got you both at the same time here.
Well We're gonna start off talking a little bit
about some of the history of Drake and then we're
gonna get into The new exhibit that's been revamped
here. So we're gonna start off with Jay And Jay,
just give us a brief history of the whole Drake
thing that was in southwest Ohio and how that
all got started. Okay, very good. Well, Bob Drake
was a native of Cincinnati and attended the University
of Cincinnati, studied electrical engineering,
graduated during the Depression in the latter
part of the 1930s. He went to work right away
for Dayton Radio, a company that built radio
products and was there a short time and then
moved on to work with Bill Lear in Lear's aviation
department. And he was at Lear until 1943. Of
course, the war was going on and he took a leap
of faith and started his own company, R .L. Drake,
based in Dayton, Ohio, a very small operation.
But he was able to secure a number of military
contracts to build filters and some power supplies
and some test equipment and even a VHF receiver.
So the company flourished. under Bob during the
war years. And then of course, the war is over
and the military is not buying products. So he
had to kind of dig in and figure out how to keep
the company going. And it was a pretty tough
time for the better part of almost 10 years.
He resorted to spring contacts for General Electric
for apparently for relays and that type of electrical
component. Did some chokes and coils and other
components for Delco. Delco of course being based
in Dayton, Ohio at that time. And even resorted
to building lamps for S .S. Kresge. I know Lee
would love to find one of those lamps to add
to the collection, but he hasn't been able to
turn one up yet. So in the early 50s, Bob, being
a ham, came up with a couple of amateur radio
products. The first products were filters because
this new thing called television had a problem
with interference from from some ham transmitters
and he was very good at designing filters so
he designed both high pass filters for the television
receivers and low pass filters to put on the
output of the ham transmitters and I I definitely
recall having a Drake filter on the output of
my rig back in the 1960s. The other products
they came up with, a phone patch and Q multiplier
to improve receiver performance. Along about
1956, Bob was really struggling to keep the company
going and it resulted in some health issues and
while he was out, confined to home, he designed
a receiver for single sideband. And that receiver,
known as the 1A, he built a prototype, tried
to sell the design under a license to manufacture
to a number of companies, the old standards of
the time, National and Hammerland and Hallacrafters.
and even took it to RCA. None of them were really
interested. So then he took it to Gibby up at
Universal Service in Columbus, Ohio. And Gibby
said, well, I'll tell you what, he said, I will
give you an order for the first 100 pieces. And
he also went over to Shrupco Electronics, which
was based in Dayton. And the fellow that ran
Shrepco, Hyde Ruble, made a similar commitment.
So the first 200 units were spoken for. And he
was able to deliver first product in the latter
part of 1957. It was quite an advancement. First
of all, all the receivers in the time, you know,
starting with the big HRO receivers and of course
the Collins 75A4. Most of them were not designed
for single sideband. 75A4 of course was, but
very, very pricey and very large. Not so with
the 1A. The 1A was the size of a typical rural
mailbox, kind of shaped like that. It was narrow,
tall, and About the same depth as a mailbox It
was lightweight under under 20 pounds 12 tube
radio and designed specifically for single sideband
because Bob had Picked up on the benefits of
single sideband and really thought it was a great
great approach So the receiver was an instant
success particularly out here in the Midwest
it took off and was the start of Bob's a real
venture into amateur radio products. They followed
that up in 1959 with the Drake 2A and shortly
thereafter in 1961 the Drake 2B. All very familiar
products for those of us who were around at that
time in amateur radio. The 2B of course was probably
one of the best sellers of the those three products.
And I personally had a 2B for a period of time
in my early ham radio days. So the company moved
from Dayton down to Miamisburg, Ohio. Miamisburg
being a smaller town located southwest of downtown
Dayton, Ohio. Started out in the bomb opera house.
building adjacent to the Opera House where they
did their manufacturing of the 1A and the 2A
and so forth. And that lasted for a while, but
they needed a bigger facility as the orders came
in. And at the same time, they set about designing
a transceiver, a transmitter -receiver package.
Of course, Collins was out with the KWM -1 and
KWM -2, but they were again very pricey and Bob
was looking for something that was affordable,
kind of like the Henry Ford of automobiles, something
that would be affordable by the common man. He
had an engineer by the name of Sullivan that
was working for him and they set about developing
what became the TR -3. And as that matured into
a product, it was very obvious that the space
they had at the Baum Opera House was not big
enough. So they found new digs over at 540 Richard
Street, not too far from the Opera House, and
a very famous address in in Miamisburg where
the majority of the amateur radio products were
built. So that's kind of the start of things.
The TR -3 came out in 1963. So the three line,
strictly the TR -3, then morphed into the four
line and started with the R -4 receiver. And
then the T -4, which was a companion transmitting
device, that slaved to the R4 receiver, and then
of course the T4X, which was a standalone transmitter.
So those products went through several iterations.
The R4 became the R4A, eventually the R4B, and
the R4C, the T4, T4A, T4B, T4C, and so forth.
As the company matured and developed with those
products, there were a lot of add -ons that were
developed, such as the transverters, the TC6
and the TC2 that did VHF transverting from 14
megahertz. converter called the CC1, actually
converter cabinet with plug -in modules for six
and two meters and a calibrator and power supply.
And then, of course, things like wattmeters,
antenna tuners, and a very unique product that
they came out with in the mid -60s was the C4,
which was a station control The C4 was a highly
integrated device that had a phone patch, had
the rotor controller for a high gain or a ham
-ham type rotator. It had switching, power switching,
so you could turn everything on and off from
one common point. It had audio switching, a number
of of features all integrated into a single box.
That was very, very unique. Also a wattmeter
was part of it. So that was a unique item for
ham radio at the time. So you could build a complete
station with all of the products from Drake and
have a very functional 160 all the way through
two meter. operation if you had all of the right
boxes. Also, they developed two more transceivers,
the TR4, and it came out in a number of different
flavors over the period of time, TR4, TR4C, TR4CW,
which was a version that incorporated a lot of
CW functions. And then, of course, for six meters,
the TR6. So those are all very popular products
that came out throughout the era of the 60s.
And the four line actually continued into the
early 70s, 1974 I think was pretty much the end
of the four line. And at that point in time,
it was seeing quite a bit of competition from
the Japanese products, which were solid -state.
All the four -line products were primarily tube,
but as they progressed through towards the C
version, there were a number of solid -state
additions, such as the PTO and other parts of
the receiver, and for that matter, in the transmitter.
but it was not a really a solid state rig. It
was just a few additions of solid state. So the
progress from there was to go to a solid state
radio and that work was the TR -5 and eventually
the seven line, the TR -7 and that was an R -7.
that also went with it. And of course, for the
four line, they also developed an amplifier,
the L4, L4B, which I would point out that we
have virtually all of those components on display
as part of the Drake display out at the museum.
We'll talk more about that as we move through
the evening. Lee's done a fabulous job of pulling
everything together. So, unfortunately, Bob,
well, first of all, fortunately, Bob pulled in
some great engineers to work with the company.
One of the young engineers who started actually
as a high school student was Steve Kugler. And
Steve went on eventually to own part of the company
long after Bob had passed away. So Bob was quite
a boss, the kind of boss I think that you'd want
to work for. He was very personable and a fellow
that cared about his employees and really supported
their their work and their activities. And if
they had problems, he was a guy that was there
to help them. So Bob developed prostate cancer
in the latter part of the 1970s and passed away
I believe in 1978. Might have been a little bit
earlier than that. Anyway, so the company was
left to his wife. His wife, Bob and his wife
had three sons and a daughter. One of the sons,
Peter, took over the company. The daughter, Nancy,
also joined the company and they... carried on
the operation. But the amateur radio activities
kind of started winding down in the latter part
of the 70s. First of all, there were a lot of
things going on in the electronic world. The
satellite, home satellite business was beginning
to take off. and they developed some products
for that area. They had also developed some commercial
gear for shipboard radio stations, shipboard
maritime operations, where at that point in time,
every ship, ocean going vessel had to have an
HF communications link. This was obviously pre
-satellite communications days. So the company
started to outgrow the Richard Street plant and
Peter purchased some land over in Franklin, Ohio
and built a new plant to house the operation,
particularly because of the satellite work that
they were getting into. I'd point out, by the
way, that as they were developing the TR -7,
there were two guys that went on to fame in another
electronic area, both being hams, by the way.
One is Jim Jager. Jim was a very talented, and
still is, a very talented design engineer who
worked on the TR -7, and then Mike Valentine.
Mike is a very active ham today. He has his own
company, Valentine Research, which builds radar
detectors. But Mike and Jim left Drake and started
Cincinnati Microwave, which made the escort radar
detector. So there were a lot of folks that came
out of the Drake operation, as well as those
that were there for a lengthy period of time.
So the amateur radio products wound down. The
satellite products became the mainstay. And another
area that they went into was to develop cable
TV products, but not for the big MSOs, the multiple
system operators, but rather for the smaller
cable systems. Like, for example, if you lived
in an apartment building and the apartment complex
put their own satellite antennas in and their
own cable distribution and modulators for channels
as well as channel converters to bring in the
local stations. The correct name for that type
of product is SMA TV, small market antenna TV.
And they developed a whole series of those products,
both in the analog world and later as television
went digital, they developed a series of digital
cable products. And that's kind of how Drake
ended up being sold eventually to a company called
Blondertong. Blondertong is a company out of
New Jersey that made modulators and channel converters
and demodulators and a lot of other products
that are used in the cable television industry.
and they ended up acquiring RL Drake in 2012,
which is kind of the lead -in to where the Drake
collection at the VOA came about. Bob Drake was
very proud of the products. we need to we need
to take a break we're already uh... over time
for a break so we're going to come back and we're
going to take a look at uh... the exhibit itself
and where where that came from and take your
calls right after this word from tower electronics
right here on ham talk live I'm sorry to bother
you, but I'm having an antenna party and I ran
out of PL -259s. Oh, come in. Thank you. Would
silver -plated PL -259s from Tower Electronics
be too good for your guests? Those will be fine,
thank you. You saved my life the other night.
Oh, the PL -259s from Tower Electronics? Yes,
they were very successful at the antenna party.
My antenna works like a charm. Then how can you
ever thank me? I'll try to think of something.
Don't be caught without PL259's. Visit Tower
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Or if you'd rather type than talk, tweet us at
HamTalk Live. Now, here's Neil Rapp with more
HamTalk Live. You're listening to HamTalk Live,
the most popular podcast with the words ham,
talk, and live in the title. Here's your host,
Neil Rapp. Tower electronics is gonna be in Bedford,
Indiana this weekend and actually had had dinner
with Scott and Jill today. It's great to see
them from tower electronics. They're just down
the road here and Bedford, Indiana hamfest Mitchell
Indiana November 7th, that's Saturday and and
by the way, I I just Just found out today, you
know We were we were having dinner and and we
talked about a lot of things and caught up on
a lot of things But but I was able to talk Scott
into a free bag with every purchase at Bedford
this weekend. So So there you go No, seriously,
he said If you say you heard this on HamTalk
Live tonight, you will get a free gift at the
Medford HamFest. So if you see Tower Electronics
at Medford, tell them you heard this on HamTalk
Live and you'll get a free surprise. Coming up
in their schedule, they actually have several
HamFests as long as they... They keep going here
Fort Walton Beach, Florida next weekend November
13th and 14th November 20th and 21st, Montgomery,
Alabama, December 4th and 5th in Ocala, Florida,
and December 11th and 12th in Plant City, Florida.
But you can visit them anytime, anywhere at PL
-259 .com. HamTalk Live is on the air every Thursday
night, 9 p .m. Eastern Time, right here at HamTalkLive
.com. Be sure to check us out on Facebook, Twitter,
and Instagram. And before we get back to Lee
and Jay talking about the Exhibit it is time
for the ham talk live ham radio joke the week
within nine Gsu now it's time for the ham talk
live ham radio joke of the week the part of the
show where rick tells us a ham radio joke the
ham talk live ham radio joke of the week is brought
to you by qrm labs now here's rick garrett in
nine gsu with today's ham talk live joke of the
week I inadvertently offended a fellow ham so
I sent him an apology in CW. It was in remorse
code. This has been the ham talk live ham radio
joke of the week with Rick Garrett in 9GSU. Tune
in again next week for another joke from Rick.
Okay there we go. Oh my goodness. Remorse. code.
Well, there it is. Thank you, Rick. You'll be
back again next week for another joke of the
week. So we'll take your calls here in just a
little bit, but we still have a ton of stuff
to talk about here. So we're going to try to
move through this quickly. So we have some time
to get some calls here, but Jay, you were leading
right into, and this is a tremendous story of
how all this got started and what happened to
the business, but that really leads into the
origins of this collection that's now at the
Voice of America Museum in Westchester, Cincinnati,
Ohio, if you will. So tell us a little bit about
how all of that transitions into the exhibit.
So, in 2012, when the company was sold, a lot
of people recognized the fact that the collection
that was on display in the lobby at the Franklin
facility, which really started with Bob squirming
away one of everything that came off the line
in the closet. It was beautifully displayed in
the lobby of the company. I realized that Blondertongue
really had no interest in that collection and
it really needed to remain in southwestern Ohio
to memorialize the great company that Bob Drake
started. So we made a pitch to Blondertongue
and it had a lot of help from Steve Kubler and
Bill Frost to former employees. of R .L. Drake
and we were able to strike a deal for a permanent
loan of the collection to the museum and actually
Steve and Bob brought it down and helped initially
get it on to display. Now it sat there for a
number of years without a lot of guidance and
then along comes this guy by the name of Lee
Hite. And I think he should pick up and tell
us a little bit more about what he's done. Yeah,
Lee, you put this together, but recently you
really did a nice revamp on this. So tell us
about the changes that you've made to this exhibit.
Yeah, sure. We'll do here, Neil. And thanks,
Jay. As Jay mentioned, when it came down from
Miamisburg out of the lobby for R .L. Drake,
It was an enormous collection. We were somewhat
space limited. And so everything in that collection
got pushed into three display cabinets. And when
you see the pictures from the R .L. Drake lobby,
they had very large display cabinets. They had
room for all of this. Unfortunately, in our display
cabinets, they were, it was very crowded. Things
were just pushed in there. You could see them.
But it was it was awfully crowded. So we took
on the project of taking everything out of the
cabinets. And I got rid. I didn't get rid of
I put up in our archives all the duplicates.
We had a lot of duplicates. And so I wanted to
keep just individual items that were representative
of when they were introduced. And so they've
all been staged chronologically. from the time
the A1 well actually from the time of the filters
we have I think one of every filter that Bob
designed. So we have the filters and then beginning
with the A1 receiver all the way through the
digital phase spread out and the unusual thing
I did here that I have not done anywhere else
in the museum There's signage on each piece of
equipment, the model number, and the year that
it was introduced. The unusual thing is I also
include the weight of the device, and that's
for a very specific reason. One of the things
that Drake became very famous for was solving
the weight problem that was deliberately designed
by Hammerlin, National, and Helicopters. to provide
stability for their receivers. Their local oscillator
in the receiver was the traditional resonant
circuit that you would tune through to do the
band pass tuning. And if you would bump the case,
I think anyone that's used an old receiver would
kind of get familiar with the wobbling sound
that could occur. as an instability in the receiver,
just because the physical coil or capacitor was
moving a little bit. Bob Drake did something
highly innovative, and he came up with this phase
-lock loop, and that reduced... Hamelin and Helicrafters
and National deliberately made their receivers
heavy. Just as an example... When you see the
collection, I have at one end, I have a Helicrafters
receiver that weighs 85 pounds. At the other
end, I have a National that weighs 95 pounds.
And Bob Drake, when he did the A1 receiver, as
Jay mentioned, it's lightweight, it's 19 pounds.
And technically, specification -wise and performance
-wise far exceeded the performance of those three
receivers in stability. and performance also.
So one of the reasons for putting weight on all
this stuff was weight was a really big deal.
And it's nice to see these smaller products perform
as well or better than the great big heavy ones.
So it's nice to see the spread of products and
innovativeness that was going on at RL Drake
at the time. When you come to the museum, You'll
see a lot of other things. We have a lot of other
amateur. We have a Collins collection and a collection
of other items. You'll see those, but one of
the things you might consider doing is when you
look at all of this Drake equipment that's produced,
they had a linear that they could produce a kilowatt,
is then step into the other room and see what
it takes to produce 250 ,000 watts. We have opened
up the Collins transmitter, and you can literally
walk through that. And it's an interesting tour.
Just getting B+. How do you get 17 ,000 volts
to the plate on a final amplifier tube? So look
at the Drake, and then go over and look at the
Collins, and you'll get a real education on the
evolution of power in the business. So that's
kind of a snapshot, Neil. Yeah, and one thing
I really like about the Collins, the big one,
which was in use at the Voice of America facility,
is that you've gone through and just labeled
everything and pinpointed everything to where
you can see every part and it really makes that
transmitter a lot more interesting when you can
see just exactly where everything goes and it's
it's something you need to see if you can if
you can get there well Jay I know that that Collection
from from Drake Was not a Totally complete collection.
I know that most of those were like, you know
the first one off of the line, but But it wasn't
complete and there are some pretty rare Items
in there and some of those are yours So tell
us about some of the items that people are going
to see in this exhibit that they may not be able
to see anywhere else Well, first of all, we've
got some of the World War two products so we've
got a power supply we've got filters and I think
a piece of test equipment products that That
you would not find in the typical amateur radio
collection again Lee's looking very hard for
that Kresge lamp But I I have a fairly decent
collection of C -line, 4C line gear, and an L4B,
and of course the TC6, TC2, and I have a TR6
and a TR4 and so forth. But Lee who twisted my
arm real hard one day at a board meeting and
I turned my L4B over, which was beautifully restored,
over to the museum. for display. That's not really
that rare. But I do also have, I would say, almost
a mint condition C4 station control with all
of the peripherals. And Lee was able to talk
that out of me, too. Those are blank spots in
the ham shack here, and they're on display at
the museum. happily sharing those with the Ham
community. And we very much appreciate that,
Jay. They are an important part of the collection.
I didn't even remember the rotor control and
phone patch and everything integrated. I do not
even remember that. I remember using the four
-line at Field Day growing up. But I just I don't
even remember that one so and I and phone patches
just fascinated me at that point so I'm surprised.
I don't remember that one well We have two or
three phone patches on display. Oh That's cool.
Well if somebody wants to come and see the exhibit
Lee How how would they do that and and find out
more information about the museum and and if
you want to operate? at the museum. How do you
do that? We are open every weekend Saturday and
Sunday 1 to 4 p .m. and with the current COVID
-19 situation we do require a mask and all of
the personnel on duty at the time, the docents,
also wear a mask. So we are trying to be very
cautious and careful about the virus. And the
other good thing is that over the last several
years, I've put signage on almost everything
in that museum. So you can very much do a self
-guided tour. We're not so much doing docent
guided tours because of the virus. They will
be available to answer questions, but you can
go through the Collins, the 250 KW transmitter,
the control room. the Drake exhibit and what
we call the great history of wireless which are
two rooms full of antique wireless. So Saturday
and Sunday 1 to 4 p .m. come see us and I think
you will be quite amazed at what's in that building.
It really is a treat and and you know bring your
license along and you can Get on some of the
modern equipment and a little bit of vintage
equipment But there's there's all kinds of modern
icon stuff in there and some others That you
can operate from the museum as well. So if you
get a chance Westchester, Ohio Northside of Cincinnati
Saturdays and Sundays one to four Eastern time
and check them out at voamuseum .org and it's
time for your phone calls right now so if you
have a question for Jay or for Lee give us a
call at 859 -982 -7373 again it's 859 -982 73
73 or you can tweet us at ham talk live and if
you're listening to us on WTWW or on the podcast
edition You're you're not gonna reach us because
we're doing this on Thursday night here and We're
gonna go over time here a little bit and and
answer some questions So we already have a call
on the line. So let's go to the phones. Welcome
to ham talk live Hello? Oh, hello. Yes, you're
on. My name is... Okay. My name is David, W -5XU.
I'm in Covington, Louisiana, just north of New
Orleans. I enjoyed the program. Hi, David. Well,
welcome. Do you have a question here for Jay
or for Lee? Well, I have a comment. One, the
TR5 was actually manufactured after the introduction
of the TR7. That's correct. Yes, you're right.
TR7 came out and was very expensive and they
basically made a solid state TR4. Oh, I hear
myself on the computer. Let me turn that down.
And also they were investigating a new radio
which would have taken the place of the TR7.
They had a preliminary nomenclature of TR8. I
know of two of the prototypes of that TR8. I
have one of them. and the other is that they
also made a prototype of a new amplifier called
the L85 and also they had a kind of a modified
TR7 that was I believe used as the testbed for
the TR8 and I have that as well. All these are
functional. However, there's no documentation.
I have tried all over the world to see if I can
find documentation on those radios and they're
none to be had. So I just wanted to point it
out. I enjoyed the talk and I was hoping that
if anyone had any of that documentation, I could
get a hold of them and see if I could get some
of that. It's our understanding that the documentation
for all of that was destroyed. And I'm surprised
to even hear that the TR -8 was out there. I
understand that there was one that was actually
destroyed when they cleaned out all of the amateur
radio stuff a couple years after they ceased
operations. I really appreciate you calling.
Yeah, let's say here Lee may have some kind of
lead on so if anybody has a lead on it, it's
Lee. So yeah, I appreciate you calling in. I've
been looking for a TRA and I realize they're
rare and I'm probably not going to find it, but
I appreciate you calling in and identifying that
you have one. I think that's really great. Is
it possible you could share a picture of that
with us at some point in time? Well, remember
I can I can if you give me the the link I will
send you some photographs of these radios They're
not finished there. They're obviously in a in
a You know, let's see if this will work mode
if you recall sure if you recall the TR7 was
supposed to come out with a with a encoder based
PTO Correct. But they couldn't develop, according
to what I have been told, they couldn't develop
that encoder -based PTO in time to put it into
the TR7. So the TR7 basically used the same PTO
as the TR4 line. Then when it was eventually
perfected and made available, They use that in
the TR5. So the TR5, although it's an earlier
number, it's actually a later radio that came
out after the TR7, and the TR5 has that solid
state encoder. I have a TR5 as well, and it's
very, very stable. There aren't too many of those
TR5s left, because I understand Closing the factory
down and in a big accident Where TR5s were scattered
all over the road there's only a couple of hundred
of those radios left You're very much correct,
and that's one of the ones I'm looking for for
the collection. We do not have a TR5 Well every
once in a while that can't they come up for sale
If you send me your link, I will send you one
that's on for sale right now. However, the performance
of the TR -5, except for the PTO, is not as convenient
as the TR -7. TR -7 is a very easy, intuitive
radio to use, and there's still many, many of
those out and being used. So anyway, I just thought
you may wish to know that there was a step beyond
that that apparently still exists. I understand
that there are actually two of the prototype
of the TR8s. I've only seen one, the one that
I have, but I understand that there's another
one out there which I've never been able to identify
where it is. But appreciate your show, sir. thank
you very good thank you thank you for calling
and yeah if you can send us uh jay if you've
got some place or if you want to show them to
me i can forward them to you guys what whatever
you want to do very simple it's k8cjy at a double
rl dot org is that org cjy k8cjy right k8cjy
at a double rl dot net All right, I'll send you
some information Good. Thank you very much Very
good. Thank you so much You're welcome. Thank
you. Appreciate your show. All right. Have a
good night. Thank you Good night. Good night
Thanks for no guys We can, we can add to it.
So, all right. Well, we've got another call.
So let's see if we can take another call. Good
evening. Welcome to am talk live. Hi, good evening.
My name is Peter seven Papa Sierra in Grand Forks,
British Columbia, right on the U S border, both
halfway across the problem. And thanks for calling.
Well, it's been entertaining. Drake has been
part of my life since 1970, February of 1970
when I got my first Drake 2C. And unfortunately,
it's gone a bit haywire since then, but that's
fine. It's been a great love over the years.
Lee and Jay, I want to thank you for giving this
presentation tonight. Very informative. I have
not been to the museum yet in Cincinnati, and
I look forward to doing that. I've been to Dayton
many, many times, been involved with the forum,
the Drake Forum there for many years, but have
never made it down to the museum, the VOA Museum.
And next time we make it back to Virginia, count
on it, I'll be there. So I do look forward to
visiting. A couple of things I just wanted to
mention. Sorry, go ahead. Very good, Peter. I
was going to mention that we have quite a bit
of open house time starting on Thursday all the
way through Sunday afternoon at the museum for
the hams. And we even have some special tours
of the 500 kilowatt transmitter at WLW. So the
hams have have a great time at the museum over
the Hamvention weekend. And I'll add, Peter,
when you do come down, make sure you let me know
and I will make sure I'm there and will personally
give you a tour. You can get my email off of
QRZ. The call is K8 CLI Kilo 8 Charlie Lima India
and just use the email in there. Thanks, guys.
And Lee, I think we've probably already contacted
through Facebook. And I will do that for sure.
That would be really nice. There's a couple other
things. I'm also have been in the past part of
the CCA group as well. And I would love to see
that Collins transmitter that you moved down
there as well. Just a couple of things. Jay,
you mentioned that the... Foreline kind of wound
up in 1974. Actually it went through to 1979.
So another five years after that the last of
the R4Cs came out in 1979 according to the serial
number database that WB4HFN publishes. And I
personally went with a friend of mine in December
of 1978 to pick up his brand new R4C and FS4.
He has one of the very latest ones. So I just
wanted to throw that by there. Also, I've got
a question. I visited the factory many years
ago. It's probably close to 20 years ago now.
and was able to get a very quick tour. Not sure
it was sanctioned, but was able to get through
the tour. We actually saw the prototype L6 amplifier
that I believe has ended up in Sindre's hands,
Sindre Torp, L6OP over in Norway. The interesting
part was that when I went there, saw something
in the display that appeared to be one of the
product detectors that was made for the Colin
7582 and 7583 receiver. I had already picked
up one of those because it just looks so much
like a Drake to me. I thought this has got to
be made by the Drake factory. I got it for next
to nothing at a ham fest one day. It's got to
be 25 years ago now. And I thought that was confirmed
when it showed up, when I visited the display
in the lobby at the factory and saw it there.
I thought that confirmed it, but I guess memory's
fuzzy. I'm just wondering if you guys have seen
that there by any chance. So many of, I had a
75A2 with a product detector and many of those
came from Universal Electronics up in Columbus,
Ohio. And I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Gibby
didn't have Bob Drake build those for him, but
they actually, I believe, sold them under their
universal brand. Yeah, I understand they were
sold under the universal brand, but I highly
suspect they were made by Drake. Yeah, I have
no proof of that, but you're probably quite correct
because there was a strong relationship between
Bob and Gibby. Okay. Well, if that product detector
shows up in the displays there, the equipment
that you have at the display someday, maybe that
will confirm that. I'm pretty sure I saw one
there when I visited in 2000 or 2001 or 2002,
somewhere back around then. And that's a question
that's been bugging me for years. I still have
the product detector. For what I don't know,
I don't have a 75A2 or three. I've got a one
and a four, actually three of the 75A4s. Interestingly
enough, my 75A4s and the KWS1 sit very proudly
next to my little 1A, number 457. which outperforms
the 75A4s. I know a lot of the CTA guys are going
to kill me, but I'm sorry for a 20 -pound box.
It's just unbelievable. It's an amazing little
receiver. Yes, it was. Peter, I can confirm that
product detector. I was reading a document written
by Bill Frost a couple days ago, and in his history,
with Drake. He does talk about the product detectors
they made for Collins. So it's in the documentation.
Great. That was Jay, right? Is that Jay? No,
that's Lee. go online and Google or search for
Bill Frost. He's the service manager, was the
service manager. I know Bill. Okay, well Bill
wrote a very nice history of Drake and you can
download it. It shows up very quickly on a search.
Download that and you'll see that he talks about
that product detector in his history document.
I think I have seen that, but I don't remember
reading about that. I'll have to take a look
at that again. I appreciate that. Well, okay,
that's about all I've got, guys. I want to thank
you for doing this. It's always exciting seeing
something like this presented with the RL Drake
Company. I appreciate being a part of it. Thanks,
everyone. Thanks for stopping by, Peter. Yeah,
thanks for calling. Yeah, thanks for calling
in. Yeah, and if you get to if you get down to
Ham Finch and by all means Go to the museum.
I go every year on Saturday night and and really
enjoy it and kind of help Move some people in
and out of there. So if you get a chance make
sure you stop by and and Lee Lee I think you
were able to confirm right that that this is
the largest single collection Yes, it's it's
the largest physical collection in the world
for RL Drake equipment. No question about it
All right, well thanks for so much for the call
we appreciate it Thank you all right you two
seven three All right, well We'll see if we have
more calls. I'm not Not seeing any tweets here
So, let's see if we have anybody else lined up
in the phone bank here And if not, we're going
to finish things up Although I will say Jocelyn
KD8 VRX says hello by text so We'll throw that
in Okay, guys, I think we're through everything
and we're way over time. So let's take some final
comments. Go ahead, Lee. I'll make a final comment.
The gentleman that just called, Bill Frost's
history paper, it's on page two. So download
that document by Bill Frost and then the product
detector that they made for Collins is on page
two. But other than that, thanks for having us
on, Neil. Appreciate it. Been a great program.
Okay, we'll remind everybody remind everybody
how they can check out the museum Yep, like come
on down every Saturday and Sunday 1 to 4 p .m
And if you plan to come in if you're out of town,
particularly look me up on qrz the k8 cli My
email is accurate and let me know and I will
for sure be there to give you a personal tour
And it's voamuseum .org and Jay go right ahead
Okay, I would just point out if you want to learn
a little bit more about Drake, there's a great
book out called A Family Affair, The R .L. Drake
Story. It's written by a fellow that I worked
with for many years, John Lockmiller, KB9AT.
John came out of the broadcast industry and we
worked together at Midwest Communications many
years back, but he has done a... great job of
documenting some of the history and pulling together
some other notes about the various products,
including some tips on that. And I'd also point
out you had Rob Sherwood on last week. Rob and
I grew up together. He's originally from the
Cincinnati area and he has done a great job of
providing some upgrades for the particularly
the R4. sea -line receivers. One of the R4s that
I have has been fully upgraded with all of his
mods and kits. So there's a lot of folks out
there that support the, if you will, the refurbishment
of some of the four -line gear and it's a great
hobby. I got into refurbishing some of this stuff
shortly after I retired and did a lot of work,
not only on my own gear, but equipment for other
hams. I don't do that anymore, but it was a lot
of fun for a number of years. And Lee, thanks
for your great input. And Neil, I appreciate
having us on board tonight. All right, guys.
Well, thank you so much for being here. Found
out all kinds of things tonight. So we really
appreciate you being here. And of course We feature
the voice of American Museum every chance we
get again. It's voa museum org and If you get
a chance come visit would love to see you there
and Hamvention is always a good time to do that
just a little drive in the evening and and the
doors are open so Come on down to the to the
voice of American Museum of Broadcasting in Westchester
Well, that is a wrap for this week's edition
of ham talk live. Thanks to my guests jadric
k8 cjy and leigh height k8 cli and everyone out
there in cyberspace for listening and Calling
in and invite you back next Thursday night 9
p .m Eastern time when Marcel Strieber ai6ms
will be here to talk about Remote license testing
and for a list of all of our upcoming guests
just go to ham talk live Dot -com and if you
like ham talk live, please consider leaving us
a review on iTunes or wherever you listen it
helps others find us faster and and now we may
have to To do equal time here. We may have to
do a Collins show. I don't know. We'll see how
that goes So for now, this is Neil rap WB 9 VPG
saying seven three seven five and made the good
DX be yours