Unass'bl'd Heathkit Transistor Tester on Ebay

[Watson A.Name - \Watt Sun, the Dark Remover\]

An unassembled Heathkit transistor tester alreadty has 9 bids and is
over $200. Looks like kitbuilding is still a hobby with some folk.
Too bad Heathkit isn't around any more.

<http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5796969240&rd=1&sspa
gename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1>


--
@@F@r@o@m@@O@r@a@n@g@e@@C@o@u@n@t@y@,@@C@a@l@,@@w@h@e@r@e@@
###Got a Question about ELECTRONICS? Check HERE First:###
http://users.pandora.be/educypedia/electronics/databank.htm
My email address is whitelisted. *All* email sent to it
goes directly to the trash unless you add NOSPAM in the
Subject: line with other stuff. alondra101 <at> hotmail.com
Don't be ripped off by the big book dealers. Go to the URL
that will give you a choice and save you money(up to half).
http://www.everybookstore.com You'll be glad you did!
Just when you thought you had all this figured out, the gov't
changed it: http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
@@t@h@e@@a@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@m@e@e@t@@t@h@e@@E@f@f@l@u@e@n@t@@

 

[Michael Black]

An unassembled Heathkit transistor tester alreadty has 9 bids and is
over $200. Looks like kitbuilding is still a hobby with some folk.
Too bad Heathkit isn't around any more.

<http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5796969240&rd=1&sspa
gename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1>

No.

Things become collectible, and hence valuable, when they are scarce.
Since people didn't normally buy kits to leave on the shelf, there are
a very limited number of unbuilt Heathkits lying around. Plenty can say
they have Heathkits lying about, few can say they have one that's never
been built.

But the moment it is built, it moves from one category to the other.
When it's built, it's just a Heathkit, and unless it's a rare item
it's no longer valuable.

They pay the price not to build it, but so they can boast about
having an unbuilt kit.

Michael

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

An unassembled Heathkit transistor tester alreadty has 9 bids and is
over $200. Looks like kitbuilding is still a hobby with some folk.
Too bad Heathkit isn't around any more.

<http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5796969240&rd=1&sspa
gename=STRK%3AMEWA%3AIT&rd=1>

They are still around, but they left the kit business.
http://www.heathkit.com/index.html

--
Link to my "Computers for disabled Veterans" project website deleted
after threats were telephoned to my church.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

 

[RST Engineering \(jw\)]

Heathkit's downfall was an ill-advised policy that "We will not let you
fail". You could send a kit that didn't work when you got through with it
and for a fixed fee (10% of the price of the kit, as I vaguely recall) they
would fix the kit, no matter how bad you screwed it up. That is absolute
insanity.

My company has been making kits for avionics for 33 years and guess what? I
**WILL** let you fail. Didn't put it together right? Sorry, ten thousand
other folks have done just fine. I'll help you troubleshoot it, but I'll be
damned if I will fix it for peanuts.

Jim

 

[Chuck Harris]

Heathkit's downfall was an ill-advised policy that "We will not let you
fail". You could send a kit that didn't work when you got through with it
and for a fixed fee (10% of the price of the kit, as I vaguely recall) they
would fix the kit, no matter how bad you screwed it up. That is absolute
insanity.

Of all of the literature I have read on the demise of Heathkit, the "we will
not let you fail" policy was never mentioned as a cause. The causes were
more along the lines of:

1) sale by Schlumberger to Zenith to appease the FTC's antitrust zeal.
2) sale by Zenith to Group Bull to gain the much coveted computer division.
3) miniaturization of all consumer grade electronics.
4) drastic reduction of the price of consumer electronics.
5) uncontrolled costs of development of complicatated HR gear (SB104, SS9000).

My company has been making kits for avionics for 33 years and guess what? I
**WILL** let you fail. Didn't put it together right? Sorry, ten thousand
other folks have done just fine. I'll help you troubleshoot it, but I'll be
damned if I will fix it for peanuts.

Probably why no one has ever heard of you outside of your own little niche.
It took a lot of encouragement to get folks to risk "building it themselves" on
high priced items like color TV's and SSB rigs. The slightly higher price, that
offset the "we will not let you fail" guarantee was one of Heath's best ideas.

-Chuck

 

[John Fields]

Of all of the literature I have read on the demise of Heathkit, the "we will
not let you fail" policy was never mentioned as a cause. The causes were
more along the lines of:

1) sale by Schlumberger to Zenith to appease the FTC's antitrust zeal.
2) sale by Zenith to Group Bull to gain the much coveted computer division.
3) miniaturization of all consumer grade electronics.
4) drastic reduction of the price of consumer electronics.
5) uncontrolled costs of development of complicatated HR gear (SB104, SS9000).


Probably why no one has ever heard of you outside of your own little niche.
It took a lot of encouragement to get folks to risk "building it themselves" on
high priced items like color TV's and SSB rigs. The slightly higher price, that
offset the "we will not let you fail" guarantee was one of Heath's best ideas.

---
I agree.

I don't think it was Heath's "We won't let you fail" attitude as
much as it was everybody else's: "We can get it to you, already
built and working, for less than Heath can", that caused their
demise. There was also their abortive excursion into consumer
electronics which didn't help them at all (Hey, I don't want to
_build_ the TV, I just want to watch it) Plus, for serious
industrial customers, GR, Tektronix, HP, et. al., so far
overshadowed them, technically, that wiping the tear from your eye
while signing off on the P.O. wasn't even a consideration.

I still think their "Cantenna" was brilliant.

 

[Jim Thompson]

Of all of the literature I have read on the demise of Heathkit, the "we will
not let you fail" policy was never mentioned as a cause. The causes were
more along the lines of:

1) sale by Schlumberger to Zenith to appease the FTC's antitrust zeal.
2) sale by Zenith to Group Bull to gain the much coveted computer division.
3) miniaturization of all consumer grade electronics.
4) drastic reduction of the price of consumer electronics.
5) uncontrolled costs of development of complicatated HR gear (SB104, SS9000).


Probably why no one has ever heard of you outside of your own little niche.
It took a lot of encouragement to get folks to risk "building it themselves" on
high priced items like color TV's and SSB rigs. The slightly higher price, that
offset the "we will not let you fail" guarantee was one of Heath's best ideas.

-Chuck

I agree. Heathkits were remarkably easy to debug as well. I remember
an insurance agent neighbor building a preamp that wouldn't play. I
simply walked thru the wiring step-by-step and quickly found the
miswire.

...Jim Thompson

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

I agree. Heathkits were remarkably easy to debug as well. I remember
an insurance agent neighbor building a preamp that wouldn't play. I
simply walked thru the wiring step-by-step and quickly found the
miswire.

Jim Thompson

Heath's documentation was better than that used by some manufacturers
for production work. I have seen bad photocopies of the silk screen for
a board with a group of parts color coded and the stock number on the
page that was hanging on a homebrew PVC pipe stand. The pages were in
page protectors and were hung from the stand. There were so many pages
that it usually took both hands to flip to the next page.

They didn't like my suggestion of using a digital camera on a stand
to take good color photos of each step and use an old PC to let the
operator hit page up or down to scroll through each page as needed to
place parts or verify their work. It would have helped the techs and QC
as well, but they complained it would cost too much to implement.

--
Link to my "Computers for disabled Veterans" project website deleted
after threats were telephoned to my church.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

 

[Spehro Pefhany]

They didn't like my suggestion of using a digital camera on a stand
to take good color photos of each step and use an old PC to let the
operator hit page up or down to scroll through each page as needed to
place parts or verify their work. It would have helped the techs and QC
as well, but they complained it would cost too much to implement.

That's an excellent idea, Michael.

An old PC, maybe a new 17" LCD display and ACDSee would be all you'd
need. Probably $300 total. You can hardly buy a good soldering iron
for that.


Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

 

[ehsjr]

---
I agree.

I don't think it was Heath's "We won't let you fail" attitude as
much as it was everybody else's: "We can get it to you, already
built and working, for less than Heath can", that caused their
demise.

Exactly. They didn't fail because of their guarantee. They
were "evolved" out of existance - at least as it was.

There was also their abortive excursion into consumer

electronics which didn't help them at all (Hey, I don't want to
_build_ the TV, I just want to watch it) Plus, for serious
industrial customers, GR, Tektronix, HP, et. al., so far
overshadowed them, technically, that wiping the tear from your eye
while signing off on the P.O. wasn't even a consideration.

I still think their "Cantenna" was brilliant.

Absolutely. I wonder what their best seller was.
The HW101 was my favorite. I built a few of their
kits as part of a course I took under the GI bill.
The color TV was beautiful, but the 'scope stunk.

Back to the guarantee:
Elecraft may have a similar guarantee - I don't know.
A young friend of mine built a K2 (messed it up
pretty bad) and asked me to help him. The Elecraft
people stood behind the product, far above and beyond
what you'd ever expect. In de-bugging it, I found a number
of bad parts - they were killed by wiring errors. I told
the Elecraft people that I wanted to buy the parts because
they were destroyed by miswiring - but they sent them to me
for free. Based on that experience, I would buy from them
in a heartbeat, just as I would (in the past) from Heathkit,
if they had something I wanted. And as an aside, the K2
kit and instructions are superb, and the rig plays wonderfully
well.

Ed

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

That's an excellent idea, Michael.

An old PC, maybe a new 17" LCD display and ACDSee would be all you'd
need. Probably $300 total. You can hardly buy a good soldering iron
for that.

Don't forget a decent two way foot switch so the operator doesn't have
to let go of their tweezers or other tools to change images. Today you
can buy a $ 29 US DVD player that will display JPEGs on a TV or
composite monitor

Best regards,
Spehro Pefhany

We had a 10' * 10' room half full of 100 Mhz or faster pentiums and
17" or large monitors they finally threw away. They had a Sony digital
camera with a decent macro capability and a stand that would work. On
the other hand, they had an even bigger case of N.I.H. in the M.E.
office. No matter what the problem was, they wouldn't listen to anyone
about anything, until they were forced into a corner. Their standard
answer was, "That's ok for your little shop at home, but it won't work
here".


Like the day the pressure sensor froze on the air compressor and they
almost lost a 5 HP 3 phase motor. I had had a similar failure on my
compressor so I suggested a modification that let them use a quick
disconnect on the air line and a plug to disconnect the wiring so it
could be repaired in a couple minutes, rather than wait three days for
someone to arrive and repair it. I also added a second sensor to my
compressor set 10 PSI higher to sound an alarm if the first failed, and
remove power from the contactor and controls. As usual, I got the
standard answer, and we lost the rest of the day for production, that
weekend's overtime and part of Monday waiting for the tech to arrive for
15 minutes work. They would lose $1000 from extra labor and material
costs instead of spending a few dollars to fix a problem.

I managed to get them to switch from Alpha solder to Ersin by getting
a sample roll of .015" SMD rework solder sent to engineering. I gave a
couple feet to each of the assembly and rework people. Two days later
that had a whole line of people demanding a roll of "That good solder!"
They figured out where it came from and threatened to fire me, but it
was too late. Everyone who soldered SMD parts wanted a half pound roll
for their bench so the M.E.s had to order 100 spools while I continued
to give out small amounts.

--
Link to my "Computers for disabled Veterans" project website deleted
after threats were telephoned to my church.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

 

[Robert Baer]

Heath's documentation was better than that used by some manufacturers
for production work. I have seen bad photocopies of the silk screen for
a board with a group of parts color coded and the stock number on the
page that was hanging on a homebrew PVC pipe stand. The pages were in
page protectors and were hung from the stand. There were so many pages
that it usually took both hands to flip to the next page.

They didn't like my suggestion of using a digital camera on a stand
to take good color photos of each step and use an old PC to let the
operator hit page up or down to scroll through each page as needed to
place parts or verify their work. It would have helped the techs and QC
as well, but they complained it would cost too much to implement.

Mistake!
Never tell a boss how to do anything better.
Cannot change anything, it has *always* been done this way.
Do not confuse me with the facts.

 

[Pooh Bear]

Mistake!
Never tell a boss how to do anything better.
Cannot change anything, it has *always* been done this way.
Do not confuse me with the facts.

Ah yes !

The well-trodden path to insolvency.

Graham

 

[Michael A. Terrell]

Mistake!
Never tell a boss how to do anything better.
Cannot change anything, it has *always* been done this way.
Do not confuse me with the facts.

Not always true. I made a lot of changes there in a little over four
years, to the point that some of the test techs could write an updated
test procedure and engineering had 72 hours to either approve it, or
come to a compromise. If they didn't, we shut down production on the
related parts or systems while management fought it out. They told me
that as a tech I couldn't have a soldering iron on my bench or do my own
rework. I had three Edsyn "Loner" irons on my bench when I left the
company. I also had a stereo microscope on my bench which were
supposedly only allowed in the assembly area. I was allowed to design
and build new test fixtures, write test software and do a lot of other
things that weren't allowed the day I was hired.

On the other hand, I was banned from engineering for a month or so
because I don't take "NO" for an answer, and sometimes I call people a
liar when they say yes but I know they don't mean it. If I found a
design problem I found what was needed to fix the problem, then I
checked to see if we already stocked the right parts before limping into
design with a stack of papers. It was funny because a couple times
someone must have called them from the production floor because they
were all running out the other end of the department as I limped into
the room.

They soon realized that all they had to do was review the changes,
put it on the proper forms and sign it off, because all the design work
as already done. I worked on a number of products that had no one in
design who was familiar with, and the techs on the floor knew those
products better than the current engineers. In fact, there was one
circuit using the old MC1496 that was designed by one of the founders of
the company and I had to talk to him to get it changed, because I was
the only full time employee who understood the circuit and what needed
to be done. It was used as a diversity combiner for a dual receiver
telemetry system and it could track within .01 dB across the entire
linear 0 to 5 VDC AGC range after the changes were made.

BTW: The M.E. that had the bad N.I.H. attitude is working part time
at a local hardware store now that the plant is closed. The second M.E.
is working for the county's technical division, and the third just
retired when the plant closed.

The last change was in the way a couple people acted in the plant.
We had a 300 pound bully that thought it was funny to sneak up behind
someone and slap them hard on the back while they were working,
including an old man who worked on 1500 VDC power supplies. I saw him
coming one day and warned him that it wasn't a good idea to try it on
me, or any of the other veterans, because he would probably find himself
laying in the floor, bleeding. He turned to our boss and said I was
threatening him. The boss shrugged and said, No, it sounds like he gave
you good advice. I pointed to my HP 331 distortion analyzer and then to
the heavy bench stool and reminded him that either would make a good
weapon if assaulted, and that there were six or seven other vets that
might do the same thing so he stopped his sneak attacks.

--
Link to my "Computers for disabled Veterans" project website deleted
after threats were telephoned to my church.

Michael A. Terrell
Central Florida

 

[Tom Del Rosso]

5) uncontrolled costs of development of complicatated HR gear (SB104,

SS9000).

What were those two?

I never saw them up close, but I was skeptical about the more complex kits
like scopes or even TVs, where it seemed that no matter how well you built
it, the engineering couldn't be as good as what major name brands do.

And what's HR?

 

[Tim Shoppa]

5) uncontrolled costs of development of

What were those two?

The SB-104 was a solid-state HF SSB transceiver. Not badly designed
(lotsa daughtercards) but it had its complicated glitches. The SB-104A
was an improvement but still not ideal.

The SS-9000 was a horrendously expensive HF SSB transceiver. (like
$3000, back when that was a truly serious amount of money). I've never
seen one except in the catalog.

I never saw them up close, but I was skeptical about the
more complex kits like scopes or even TVs,
where it seemed that no matter how well you
built it, the engineering couldn't be as good as
what major name brands do.

I don't know about their high-end scopes, but their lower-end ones were
pretty solid if a little simplistic and large. Not-too-dense is looked
upon as an advantage by many!

And what's HR?

I think a funny way to write ham radio.

Tim.

 

[Tim Shoppa]

The HW101 was my favorite.

I never built one, but I fixed up many (and its predecessor, the
HW-100) over the years. The amazing thing is that HW-101 production
continued up through the 1980's (it was a mostly tube with a handful of
semiconductors) quite succesfully.

Nobody should take the "fixed up" as a bad point... the ones I got were
all circa $100-$150 at hamfests and with a very little amount of effort
(and a few spare parts ordered from Benton Harbor) they all worked like
champs.

The one manufacturing flaw was that the PCB traces seemed to open up a
lot (often intermittently just to confound me). This was not high-tech
PCB stuff but 0.05" or 0.1" wide traces on phenolic boards. Don't know
if it was the heat, high volts, or what. But a dab of solder over the
top always did the trick.

Tim.

 

[Chuck Harris]

SS9000).

What were those two?

The SB104 was Heath's first 100W all solid state CW/SSB rig. It covered 80 to 10 meters
with no tuning. It was designed by consultants, and cost Heath all of its budget just to
get it right... sort of.

The SS9000 was an excellent radio. Again, 100W all solid state CW/SSB. It covered 160
through 10 meters, including the WARC bands, was computer controlled, and had all
of the bells and whistles that were available on the Jap rigs.... But it cost way too much!
About $3000 when the Icoms were $1200.

The SS9000 was so complicated that Heath never offered it as a kit. It came preassembled,
and ready to go.... The problem was hams didn't go to Heathkit to buy ready made gear, they
went for kits.

I never saw them up close, but I was skeptical about the more complex kits
like scopes or even TVs, where it seemed that no matter how well you built
it, the engineering couldn't be as good as what major name brands do.

Not true, the difference was they could be built without a room full of test equipment
and test jigs. The color TV's had dot/bar generators built in. The engineering on
Heath's gear was very good. But it was what it was. You didn't buy one of their
signal generators for $100 and expect it to be a $1500 HP.

And what's HR?

Ham Radio, Heath's major market.

-Chuck Harris

 

[Michael Black]

The SB104 was Heath's first 100W all solid state CW/SSB rig. It covered 80 to 10 meters
with no tuning. It was designed by consultants, and cost Heath all of its budget just to
get it right... sort of.

Don't forget, shortly after that, they released that 2M synthesized rig, their
first, and had to recall it because of spurs. And then they came out with
a second rig to replace the model.

Michael

 

[Joerg]

Hello Jim,

Heathkit's downfall was an ill-advised policy that "We will not let you
fail". You could send a kit that didn't work when you got through with it
and for a fixed fee (10% of the price of the kit, as I vaguely recall) they
would fix the kit, no matter how bad you screwed it up. That is absolute
insanity.

I am not so sure. Knowing Schlumberger a bit I doubt their accountants
would have let a loss leader service policy fly if it would have meant
lots of red ink. Also, many people felt way too embarrassed to take them
up on that offer. It was a matter of pride I guess. I resurrected a lot
of "suboptimal" Heathkit assemblies for friends and learned a lot along
the way. It really hones your debug skills. No, there wasn't any pay
except for the occasional booze but they sure were glad that word about
them getting stuck didn't spread.

What turned me off after lots of Heathkit builds was that the stuff
became too flimsy. The last was a FET meter, IM17 I believe. Poorly
engineered IMHO but that could have been fixed by temp coupling some
transistors in there. It wasn't worth it though because the cheesy
plastic housing began to fall apart within a short time.

However, my Heathkit dip meter is still alive and kicking. The plastic
case fell apart but the dip meter housing is aluminum. The best was a
HW100 (HW101's grandpa). I bought it used and heavily banged up from
riding along in someone's Jeep. Then it served me another 15 years or so
without a glitch. Those things were virtually indestructible. The only
change from the original was a custom VFO for a bit more stability
although the original wasn't bad at all.

I wish there still was a Heathkit company. It brought lots of folks into
an EE career, including myself. Nowadays it seems that many newly minted
engineers have never held a soldering iron and that shows.

I still chuckle when thinking back about Heathkit's instructions for a
static-free staging area: Cut-up egg cartons. Nowadays the lawyers would
be all over them, looking for potential salmonella cases ;-)

Regards, Joerg