Jul 11, 2009

Es IV, more nostalgia

President Madison
The Bentley of ancient CB radio.
I bought this rig via a local auction website. It is fully functional and has the following specs:
  • 120channels, 40 low, normal, 40 high
  • AM/FM/LSB/USB
  • +10KHz switch for the so called Alpha Channels
  • Upgraded power supply
All is due to modifications done, as the unit originally only has 40ch and AM/SSB.
The mic is neccessary for operation of the speaker. Need to get that fixed sometime, cause I do not use this rig for TX.
The sound is lush and shows good selectivity. On opening the hood I found a real SSB IF filter having 6 crystals. Now that's truely amazing !

Now take a look at those large meters, they are dying for or what?




Es?
Ah yes, I'm drifting off again. Sorry about that.
The Madison is for 3 days in use now and usually parked on 27.555 (triple-five). Its sensitive receiver shows Es openings already from 09:00 (local) onwards from Italy (what else is new) and later Spain. At 10:30 the band is filled with many loud signals from all southern Europe.
And 6m, which was quiet for two days in a row, is starting too. I'm hearing Italy, Greece and some Ukrain stations.
The Es openings on 27MHz come in waves too, just like 50MHz. However, there's always life on CB, whereas 6 usually stays total quiet in between.

I need to start becoming active on 28MHz again.