A Crummy Commercial

Senseless Destruction but Fun: source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bdp9nk0NZk I never would have thought of this idea.  Now I have (like most experimenters) accidentally connected power backwards.  The center ground pin on a coaxial power connector was the culprit when I popped the big electrolytic in my old Koss amplified computer speakers (I should have used the wall wart !).  What an amazing stink was discovered !  Yuck, hopefully whatever gas is released doesn't cause disease :)  Now I routinely incorporate some kind of reverse polarity protection circuitry into any project. The only willful destruction of electronics that I recall participating in was using a tube tester in the Nicolet Radio Club to "supernova" the filaments of innocent vacuum tubes :)  What a waste - it got old rapidly though. Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

A Kentucky high school student brought some radios to school in January 2025.  The school and a local deputy appear to have then gone off the deep end: seized the radios, concocted requests for a warrant after the seizure and generally messed things up.  Now they may have to PAY. Three links with a few details: https://www.kentucky.com/news/local/article316639936.html https://www.wkyt.com/2026/07/29/lawsuit-alleges-pulaski-co-students-two-way-radios-were-seized-without-warrant/ source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddi3l9TCcIY I suspect the narrative was something similar to this:  - a ham/student brings handie talkie/s to school so he can listen for fire callouts  - some other kid asks him: "is that all it can do ?"  - then the ham demos a QSO on a ham radio repeater  - a teacher witnesses this and gets hysterical  - off-duty cop takes the radio/s and later fabricates a paper trail to make the seizure appear legal  - the kid's family goes...

Previous blog post on the June 1979 QST cover photo: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2023/11/an-error-in-qst.html I got an email from a person in London, England and he attached this: He wanted to know if it was my picture and whether I was open to having it used as artwork on an album of electronic music. And also: did I have a higher resolution picture.  I pointed him to the Glen Gates Gang page: http://wb9kzy.com/ggg.htm which has this scan: http://wb9kzy.com/cover3.jpg Unfortunately I don't have the original slides, Sam Sansone, WB9LAB, had them and after he and his wife died I don't know what happened to them.  I was given a dupe of the slide (which is where that scan came from) but I'll be darned if I know where it is - along with all the other junk I've misplaced over the years - it must be here somewhere. So if that scan isn't good enough the second chance for that picture to be published is going to evaporate.  Stuff happens after over 4 decades - I'm hopin...

I found this Ameco HP-300T during my eternal search: Here is the packaging: And the instructions: I have no recollection of buying this - must have been a tail-end addition to get to a minimum order amount ? I was thinking of maybe looking at it with the NanoVNA but then would need baluns and also possibly attenuators and became mentally exhausted !  :) I wonder if anyone ever needs these anymore ?  I remember the evening cries at my house when I was in high school:  "TVI - TVI !"   In other words, time to pull the switch, Chuck.  I don't know why I didn't have one of these Ameco or equivalent filters.  TVI always depended on the channel being viewed and the band being transmitted on.  But reading the instructions above, maybe the problem was harmonics from the HW-16 ?  A filter like this wouldn't have helped.  In a way I miss those days. Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm  

I remember hearing in high school during Field Day that our radio club advisor, Mr. Gates was a Swiss Miss hot chocolate drinker.  I can't confirm or deny that but I do know that sometimes I'll get an urge for hot chocolate when the November winds are blowing and there's no hot chocolate mix in the house, not even the store brand !  So today I came up with this simple, better than nothing, recipe for hot chocolate mix (taking a recollection of the old pound cake recipe as a guide):  For 1 serving made with 6 oz. of boiling water: 1 tablespoon of cocoa powder 3 tablespoons of dry milk 1 tablespoon of sugar 1 tablespoon of butter (3 pats) Mix the powdered ingredients together in a mug, heat up the water to boiling, pour it in and mix.  Stir like crazy and then finally add the butter pats and keep stirring until melted. Of course marshmallows can be added and vanilla extract too but I didn't have them on hand.  I would take it very easy with mint extract - easy to ...

Wisconsin is fine as far as being a nice state to live in, blah blah blah.  But I gotta admit, Michigan has it all over us when it comes to geology.  Here is a geological map of Wisconsin: From Autumn 1967 issue of Wisconsin Tales and Trails magazine, page 28    Wisconsin is a geological dome.  In a geological dome the youngest rocks are on the outside diameter and the oldest rocks are in the center.  For example in Wisconsin the Milwaukee formation has the fossils - almost everywhere else is OLD. But Michigan is a basin: The youngest rocks are in the middle (Jur => Jurassic) and the older rocks are the outside rings.  So Michigan's got fossils (as well as hydrocarbons) ! One video I saw a while back by Alexis Dahl was on a big underground salt mine in the Detroit area, an amazing video, who knew ?: source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViFl7qWQF5U Another video which I saw just today from Scishow but featuring Alexis Dahl was on copper in t...

I was paging through the October 2025 QST online when I came upon this on page 94: Really unexpected but a pleasant surprise !  I took that picture in June 1975 with my Olympus 35RC.  When the Glen Gates Gang Field Day entry was sent in the picture got included.  Somewhere around here I've got a plastic bag with several copies of that issue - I remember going over to Amateur Electronic Supply (on Fond du Lac in Milwaukee) and buying them.  I've mentioned the November 1975 cover before: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/06/field-day.html  The picture reminded me of Scott Tilton who died this year: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2025/04/a-novice-trio-no-more.html  Scott was the brains behind repurposing the tower to a transportable unit.  It's a shame that Scott's article for the tower wasn't published. Here's the Glen Gates Gang page with more of my pictures from Field Day: http://wb9kzy.com/ggg.htm  The fact that that magazine cover was from almost 50...

Myron Cook has a lot of enthusiasm for geology, it's easy to see that - and this video was no exception: source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=906cxbrk_yM  He enjoys being outside and making observations.  And then his videos communicate that to the viewer by weaving them into an explanatory story.  Either Myron has help or he is a wiz at video, too, because the presentation is first rate.  The use of drones is particularly effective for communicating the scale of the formations.  This shot of Myron walking across these limestone / gypsum formations was particularly cool: It reminds me of the flagstone driveway and patio we had when I was a kid in Fox Point in the 1960s.  Only these "flagstones" are maybe 100 times the size. I took an Earth Science class as a freshman in high school.  The teacher was Alden Larson who also had that enthusiasm for his subject.  Sometimes we got out of the classroom, once we did a cross section of the Milwauk...

I had posted an inquiry on the Glen Gates Gang page this morning: http://wb9kzy.com/ggg.htm One of Mr. Gates' former students had seen the page and was wondering about Mr. Gates in an email.  This reminded me of the first time I went on Field Day in 1972 and we met at Mr. Gates' house across the street from Maple Dale school. After posting that inquiry I took a look at the obits and saw this one for Scott Tilton: source: https://www.jsonline.com/obituaries/pwix1156191 Scott was WN9JHX, his friend Morris Hornik was WN9JHW and Morrie's brother Bob was WN9JHY - a Novice trio !  Now Scott has died and Bob seems to have given up his call so Morrie is the only one of the trio still licensed as WB9JHW. from the 1972 Winter Callbook Scott was the lead member working the conversion of a commercial tower to the transportable tower used on Field Day by the Glen Gates Gang.  I had emailed Scott a few years ago wondering if he knew what had happened to the tower.  The last I reme...

I scratched off one of my favorites, the house with the cats in the chimney: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2023/06/cats.html The reason: the cats are gone: source: https://www.realtor.com/realestateandhomes-detail/7138-N-Lake-Dr_Fox-Point_WI_53217_M87785-00662 It is a nice house with a small indoor pool but no cats ? Then I recalled my very favorite house in Fox Point (early 1970s): It is still there: https://www.redfin.com/WI/Milwaukee/140-W-Dean-Rd-53217/home/ Finally, my very favorite tree, an enormous elm: Unfortunately it is long gone, I remember standing on the stump, must have been 3 feet in diameter at a minimum.  I'm sure it finally got the Dutch elm disease and got turned into wood chips and lumber. Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

I have been listening to this book: source:  https://www.wpr.org/shows/chapter-day/remarkably-bright-creatures-19-of-20 It's an interesting book - one artifact that figures into the story is a high school class ring. I asked a few classmates if they had gotten a Nicolet High School class of 1973 ring.  None of the four who responded had gotten one.  I also tried searching online for one to at least see a picture, nope !  So I guess that class rings had fallen out of favor in 1973.  Also I didn't find any record of prices for the 1973 class rings online. For some reason I seem to recall that the price was under $40 - that would inflate to: a little on the expensive side My Mom had offered to get me a class ring but I refused - I feel bad about that now - not so much for the ring itself but that I think it meant more to her than to me - a symbol of a small achievement by her son ? Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

I was searching for The Time Machine on Archive and found this: https://archive.org/details/uncommon-ephemera-f00121-part-1-the-time-machine Kind of a Reader's Digest version of the Time Machine movie with Rod and Yvette in 21 minutes !  Is that really a prompt to advance to the next picture or a T ? Of course there is a wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filmstrip And Archive has hundreds of filmstrips:   https://archive.org/details/uncommon-ephemera-filmstrips I noticed that many of the titles shown are "in living red and white": At first I thought this was Anscochrome syndrome:"it's really good for taking pictures of pizza"   https://spruemeistermodelwerkes.com/2019/02/24/the-heartbreak-of-anscochrome/ or maybe The Cisco Kid syndrome: But no, it appears that they were toned black and white photographs - I'll never understand why this was done . I know we had filmstrips in school, sometimes projected for the whole class, sometimes with a viewer for a...

I started listening to this reading of The Hobbit on Youtube: source:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPeDWpHo4KY&list=PLiprFMdUvCYi9dzAxLbjUHaNswbsORq5O&index=1&pp=iAQB I can really see the attraction of audio books, at least with a story like The Hobbit .  There is just something nice about hearing the words rather than reading them and this is a wonderful reading. One thing that I didn't remember about The Hobbit were the rhyming names of the Dwarves: source: https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/hobbit/characters/ That reminded me of the denizens of Hoopeston, Illinois mentioned on the Vic and Sade show: source: https://vscharacters.blogspot.com/2012/01/cupid-and-stupid-golfbake.html Hoopeston seemed to have more than a fair share of dizzy twins :) I'd like to think that either Tolkien or Rhymer cribbed the idea from the other but I suspect it was just coincidence that they both liked rhyming (and funny?) names :)   Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.co...

I always watch: Call The Midwife each season on PBS.  This week the show (season 13, episode 4) takes place in July 1969 during the Apollo 11 launch and landing. https://www.pbs.org/call-the-midwife/ Of course the whole cast watches the landing via the BBC but I *think* at my house we watched the CBS broadcast with Walter Cronkite and Wally Schirra.  This was the summer between grade school at Maple Dale and high school at Nicolet. Wally on the left, Walter on the right   And there is a video of this on Youtube: launch source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zYnF31el-ik landing source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMF58ZP681A Somehow the BBC (as portrayed on Call The Midwife) was able to show live footage of the landing while CBS had an animation :) CBS did kinda jump the gun though showing the Lunar Module on the surface while it still hadn't landed: One thing that Call The Midwife didn't show and that I didn't remember was this commercial: source: https://www.youtube...

I was reading a book which mentioned the Hagoth voice stress analyzer.  It was a contraption that could be hooked to a phone.  If the 8 green lights went on, no stress.  If the 8 red lights went on => vocal stress => indicating falsehood. The Inventor: http://www.rickbennett.com/aboutrickbennett.html So it turns out he is an ad man  ? https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/when-i-refused-sell-my-invention-stirling-moss-most-famous-bennett The Hagoth got a mention in the NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/1978/02/20/archives/telephone-voice-analyzer-is-designed-to-spot-a-liar-telephone-voice.html something similar ?: https://www.ebay.com/itm/326076975510 I can't find any pictures of a Hagoth on the internet.   I dunno, I lost all faith in lie detection in high school.  During a psychology class lab one of the guys had a galvanic skin response tester attached to his hand. Then the teacher had one of the girls in the class sit on his lap - the needle didn't move ...

I have mentioned basements before: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/05/fallout-shelter.html but Shorpy had two pictures of a finished basement from pre-war Nyack NY that fills me with envy: https://www.shorpy.com/node/27383 https://www.shorpy.com/node/27382 Of course it wouldn't have been much for radio or electronics but probably was great for small parties or just somewhere to go to escape everyday life. Best Regards, Chuck, WB9KZY http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm

I saw these uncredited pictures on Face: Coincidentally also saw this ad in the October 1962 issue of QST, page 135: I recall that when I made my first contact at the Nicolet High School radio club: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/06/first-contact.html https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/11/found-it.html There was a Dow-Key coax relay that had a corresponding toggle switch (can't quite remember the details of how it was hooked up).  But I had to throw the toggle switch to transmit on the Adventurer and then flip it off to listen on the Swan - definitely not break-in - my HW-16 was so nice in comparison.  As I recall the relay kind of hummed when it was engaged  :) Semi-obligatory inflated price: Yikes, consider 10 times the price of some of the other gear in that issue of QST like the HT-37 at $495, wow !! I did mention the fact that Dow-Key and Digi-Key were both located in Thief River Falls: https://wb9kzy.blogspot.com/2022/09/dow-key-and-digi-key-both-in-thief.html Best ...