International Crystal Model 1500 CB radio

 

 This ad was found in the March/April 1963 issue of Electronics Illustrated magazine on pages 113 and 114.  The ad also appears in several other magazines in the early part of 1963 including S9, Popular Electronics, Electronic Experimenters Guide, Radio-Electronics and Electronics World.   

I think that only a few of these rigs were ever sold but I thought that the concept was really interesting.  A complete beginners CB station including rig, antenna, cabling, all crystals (of course),  even a key !  This was a 100mW no license required design (aka Part 15) with the really interesting feature that at least part of the rig was located in a box at the antenna, in other words no worries about feedline loss (which is fairly high at 27 MHz), all 100 mW is delivered right to the antenna.

The bulk of the transmitter and receiver were in the box inside the house but a receiver pre-amp and transmitter final amplifier are in that little box in the middle of the dipole.  The antenna looks short probably to meet the Part 15 restrictions of a 3 meter long antenna. Note that this 3 meters also includes any transmission line length so that is another reason for remoting the transmitter final.

February 10, 2022 Correction: The antenna was 5 feet long which was the limit in Part 15 in 1963.  The present maximum antenna length for Part 15 is 3 meters.

In addition to the ads there was this blurb in the Jan. 1963 S9:

And another blurb in Popular Electronics. 

And finally this blurb in S9 (from Tom Kneitel) from May 1963:

So the rig was at least loaned to a couple of the magazine columnists.

Also there was this classified ad in S9 magazine in August 1965 for the rig (offered at $200) so some were actually sold.

But why didn't it sell in quantity ?  That price of $299.50 (or over $2700 in December 2021 dollars per the inflation calc) must have been the killer.

Finally here is an epilogue from S9 in August 1980:

What were the good points of the model 1500  ?  First, as a beginner it's bewildering when it turns out that the rig is only a part of what is required to get on the air.  Antenna, cabling, power supply, key, microphone, speaker, crystals (or a VFO), SWR meter may all be required.  This was certainly true with my first ham rig, the HW-16.   But the Model 1500 packaged everything together for the beginner. No à la carte menu with zillions of choices to be made.  They even included a tripod for mounting the antenna.

Second, the concept of separating the rig into desktop receiver/exciter and a final amplifier/receiver preamp was a stroke of genius.  This eliminated any loss through the transmission line of a conventional rig while meeting the Part 15 regulations and allowing maximum range.  Just think what could be done today with synthesizers, the entire rig could be remoted and just the audio I/O and power supply would be in the shack.

The only similar Part 15 rig which I've ever seen for sale is the http://am1000rangemaster.com/.  Apparently one unwritten regulation for Part 15 rigs is that they must be expensive :)

Old timers like W6AM often had a rig per band, maybe in the future new time operators will have a black box per antenna ?  A dreamland for transmission line haters :)

Best Regards,
Chuck, WB9KZY
http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm