Thanks Curtis. That is above my level but it is still interesting.

Johnny

Curtis,

Speaking of AVC, my HQ160 exhibits very large volume swings due to signal fading. I wonder if a complete alignment might correct or reduce the large swings.

Johnny

I am sorry I can't be of much help on that. I'm not overly familiar with the characteristics of the HQ-160 (never owned one). So perhaps an alignment might help, or perhaps what you are experiencing is completely normal for the ionospheric conditions that you are experiencing at this time. I simply have no way of knowing. I am assuming you are talking about reception of AM stations. If you are talking about reception of CW or SSB stations then you have no AVC and of course there would be large volume swings.

Curtis Eickerman

Thanks again. More to learn. More fun.

Johnny

Yes, indeed. There is ALWAYS something more to learn. OTOH, there seems, here, to be an institutional bias AGAINST mods.

John

Hi John, responding only to your post, regarding bias.

I suppose to a fair extent that's true, probably because so many examples people come to get help with, have had a rough life including modifications that, often aren't documented anywhere, and/or do nothing, or are actually detrimental to the operation/performance of the equipment.

There are lots of mods that are well known, well documented and improve performance, in whole or in part, but for each of those, I'd venture a guess that there are at least an equal number that are useless, undocumented, done incorrectly, and/or detrimental to the equipment's performance.

Personally, if I find a radio, be it a transmitter or receiver, that shows signs of having a checkered past, I usually research any such mods if possible, but often wind up returning the unit to "stock" condition because I can't find anything on the changes, then I use it for a while. If I find well documented changes that fix problems I've found to be sufficiently irksome, I'll put a note in the service manual, for the next time its on the bench.

Generally, I too am reluctant to modify a well designed circuit. However, if there is a well documented tweak known to enhance performance, I will jump right on it.

I am attracted to the best designs because of my time in the US Army. Even forty or fifty year old equipment was mission essential and we bet our lives on it. Many of the howitzers I have fired contained more than 50,000psi. Never had one blow up in my face.

Johnny Coleman
SSG, US Army
Retired

I'm not saying the institutional bias is always WRONG, mind you, just present. There are all sorts of threads here of people undoing ham-fisted (yes, there's a pun here) mods on command sets that were just dumped on the surplus market in the -50s and -60s. To be honest, I prefer working on unmolested equipment, primarily because soldering skills in general are nonexistent.

OTOH, as far as "well designed" is concerned, in the -60s when I was in the Corps, I saw TMs with over 20 changes, and in one case, over 40 changes, posted.

John

As I recall, most of those changes were tweaks or the result of changes in doctrine. Very rarely were they show stoppers.

Johnny

Mostly, you are correct. But every once in a while, when you are poking around deep in the dark, dusty corners at the -40 or -50 level, you run into a truly off-the-wall problem. OK. You manage to solve the problem and you write it up. It gets incorporated into a change. Is a once-in-a-blue-moon problem a showstopper?

I shifted out of Army HAWK (as opposed to Marine HAWK) into Patriot in the early '80s before the Army had eve officially accepted Patriot. In many places, the TMs were absolutely abysmal and the diagnostic software wasn't much better. We were at the bottom of the learning curve and there was no institutional memory. That's one of the "benefits" of getting into a major weapon system on the ground floor. I am just glad that I wasn't around to dig the basement.

OTOH, fun (in the military sense) times.

John

I'm glad you found service interesting. I was in combat arms. My experience was different in many ways.

Johnny

I have been very lucky. I have had three MOSs and I have been a round peg in a round hole each time. I have always been either in school learning maintenance, doing maintenance, training maintenance troops, or leading maintenance troops.

But you guys, smh . . . I have the upmost respect for. I have never served in a mech unit, but I have been around them - a lot. Mech units, especially tracks, are maintenance hogs. If not in combat, they are always doing one of three things. They are training and:
1. Getting ready to go to the field,
2. In the field, or
3. Recovering and fixing what broke while they were in the field.
And usually, there is not enough time between #3 and #1.

John

Yup. I have watched many track mechanics shiver, in wet clothes, from fixing it where it broke. As an NCO i never griped at them for looking a little rough around the edges. I was in the Cavalry too. So many memories.

Thanks for your service.

Johnny Coleman
SSG, US Army
Retired

KE5YRV

"Fixing it where it broke" is an Ordnance, "Fix Forward" concept pretty universal. I have spent a lot of time on a frozen German hilltop at night working on a balky radar. We did, however, try to avoid working in the rain. Rain and high voltage do not mix well.

John

I see you have your share of memories too. A life well lived.

I am about to start working on my Drake T-4XB. 650 volts really gets my attention.

Johnny