Shacks Gone By

Here's a picture of the 1970 shack and me as WB6DQT in Riverside, CA. I had just gotten a Gonset Linear, which I should have kept, and had not yet traded the MN-4 tuner for a MN-2000. The HW-100 was just three years old, and I kept it for another six years. It was a great rig at the time. 73, Ron (Ed. note - WOW! Ron with hair! Yeah, I know, I should not be one to comment! Har!)

Here is Hoss, WA5ZAI in his ham shack in the Dayton area in November of 1970.

This is my shack at San Antonio in 1971. I was k8AIT/5 then. Rick, KK8O

Hi fellow IOOKer! This is a representation of the early 1970's Six meter operation. The two stacked units on the left is the latest state of the art converted from surplus commercial gear (bought from Haliburton for about 37 cents per pound) to six meter FM. Complete with simplex or repeater offset with the flip of a switch. The Unit in the middle is a home-made six meter AM transmitter. To it's right is an all band receiver with Six meter converter sitting atop. Joseph - WA5FLT (see below)

KF8KK (then WB2VTN) - 1974 - That's my very first shack.. A Heath DX40 and a Drake 2B... I had a very much jerry mandered 40 meter dipole in the attic... Later I took that down and just put up a good 15meter dipole in the attic... The house dimensions being about 24 x 24 or so... You could imagine how a 40mtr dipole was in that attic.. More like a Z-pole... Across from the ham desk is a custom 'home AM broadcast station' which I had built. My brother was a budding DJ at the time and we both got into doing a little flea power AM music playing on the radio... A mixer, couple of turntables, reel deck and we were broadcasters!....

This Shack Shot was taken in 1978. According to Jim "I still have all the things in this photo except the amp and the girl. I sure miss the amp at times! The Kenwood equipment was the Grand Prize at Dayton in 1978, my first year to attend." Hey Jim, we only miss your amp every time you check into the net with a KBob signal!

(KF8KK) The first shot... KF8KK 1983 is me standing on the roof putting doing my very first roofing job.. In the background is the 40' tower with my super-stationmaster 440 antenna... That was for my 442.000 repeater at the time, and that is the very same antenna that presently is on the tower in Empire for the 444.725 machine. The 85A photo shows the front of my 3 racks of repeaters...I'm not altogether sure why I had three racks for all the stuff... In fact, I seem to think there were four... But I don't remember... The left most rack had a bunch of broadcast style cart machines in there and a mixer and some other surplus NBC stuff.... Then a rack with the 440 repeater... And then a rack with the power amps (both the repeater and the 2m remote base ran through 100w+ amplifiers)... Not sure about the last rack...

The 85B photo is the view from the back of the racks and you can see the carousel cart player under my workbench... That was what I used for the ID's.... I had multiple ID's per cart, and then 24 carts... It ended up playing the hundred or so ID's in random fashion... Pretty nice... I got tons of kerchunks.

The 85C photo shows a glimpse of the actual 440 repeater.. The same RCA700 that was in the repeater shack in Dave Dell's shanty in Cedar... Of course, in this photo it was on 442.000... Atop that on the left is a Kenwood TR8400 440 transceiver which I used (via a large stacked array on the roof) as an in-band remote base to get into the NYC (Chrysler bldg) 449.80 repeater. That TR8400 is now in my 64'Tbird... To the right of the TR8400 is an old Tempo VHF-One which I used at the time for a 2m remote base. I wish I still had that vhf one... But it's long gone ???...

The shack on the left below was in Maple City, MI. The one on the right was on top of the hill behind his parents home in Cedar, MI.

Below ; WA8ZWJ's Michigan cottage ham shack This shack consists of a Kenwood TS-440S, Heathkit SB-200 Amplifier and a Kenwood TM-721 dual band rig with an RF Concepts RFC 2-417 amplifier. The PK-232 has been replaced with a Rig Blaster Pro which is interfaced into the Dell computer. - This set up became out-of-date 7/05.

(WB8NSL) - Help! Preparations are underway to move the shack. This maze of wires and conglomeration of technology will no doubt entangle me forever if I don't approach this beast with trepidation. The elusive duck is talking single sideband on the microphone. Har! Thought that would quack you up! Stay tuned....Sincerely, Charlie D. (Ed. Note - Charlie RARELY uses voice modes on HF)

Below you will see WB8VSU's computer/ham shack. Jim will be moving in the next month or so, so this shack will soon be a "Shacks Gone By" shot and we will have a new shack shot from him! Good luck in the move Jim! (Moved to "Shacks Gone By" on 5/1/05)

KC4US moved from Homestead, Florida up to the Orlando area last year. Lew has recently updated his shack picture. This picture is of his former ham shack in Homestead. (Moved to this page 5/8/05)

Lew, KC4US moved last year. He has been working on getting his new station set up. He has a driven element of a beam in the attic to use on 20 meters and he recently installed the Force 12 Flag Pole Antenna in his front yard with the 40 meter add on kit. He has plans to put his station on a mobile cart that he can move into place and use when he so desires. In the mean time, he has this temporary set up in the garage. In Lews' own words "That is my present garage ham shack. It doesn't look like much, but I am happy just to be on the air again. 73's Lew"

This snap shot was taken in the late fall or early winter of 2001. It shows John, KF8KK and his Kenwood TS-120S HF rig. This shack shot was replaced 11/05 with an updated shot in the Shack's Now Page.

Woofie says "I have been doing some reading and looking at the IOOK Web page and saw a lot of IOOKer's ham shacks. I have enclosed the new and always improving Woofie shack. This is my basement hideout, nothing but Woofie all over the place HAR HAR! Notice in woofieshack3.jpg the Indian guarding my humidor full of gars! :) More to come......Mr. Woofie"

Below is WF0E's ham shack and computer area. Thank goodness for the HT on the bench - at least there is one radio here! Notice how lonely those fine accessories look without an HF rig. Hopefully, Woofie will soon find the right rig and install it and submit more pictures as well as one with himself in the operating position! Nice preparations Bob! Good luck on your quest for the right HF rig!

According to Woofie, WF0E, "HERE IT IS! I have an FT-100 and it plays great! I worked Toronto , CA and NC on 40 last nite. WOOFIE" Way to go Woofie! I count 3 HT's and an HF rig in the picture. Now, that IS a Ham Shack!

The WOOFIE Multi-station is on the air ! Station one on the your left is the Kenwood TS-570D with my new Ameritron Al-811H and my 204 foot G5RV Flat Top at 60 Feet. Station two is the Yaesu FT-100 with my Newly re-furbished SB-200 and my 102 foot G5RV sloped from 70 feet to 25 feet. 73’s...Bob

WE1L has moved and now has a new shack. The shack shown below was moved here on 10/23/06

Jim, WB8VSU moved into a new home about a year ago. (unknown date now...) He is in the process of building a new room in his new home to serve as his ham radio shack. Below are some pictures showing his progress.

I think I am about two months away from finishing it and moving my stuff in. Maybe by end of summer to the point of putting up a tower.

Mike recently moved into Traverse City. Mike's new G5RV antenna was installed today and after initial tests with the antenna analyzer, he made his first 40 meter contact on Mid-Cars and received a favorable report. Then, after a quick call on Skype to Hoss, WA5ZAI in Texas, he got a good report on 20 meters as well! Mike hopes to soon have his amplifier and an antenna tuner set up as well!

WE1L has moved to Virginia Beach to start a new job - double dipping! Below you see his new digs as well as his new shack. (10/23/06)

In Bob's own words..."Here are pics of my new shack and the end fed Dipole antenna. You will have to look close to see it coming out of the window and running down behind the corner molding. KBob (W8JUK/Dad) came up with the idea. It is a half wave on 20 and a full wave on 10 meters. We are on the top floor as the pic shows our balcony set up for Cigars and Martinis.

I worked Frankfurt,

Germany

as my first contact with 50 watts…not too shabby….THANX DAD! 73’s WE1L"

Below is a shot of Jim, W5JCS's Ham Shack... See antenna farms for his antenna system.

(de KF8KK/7- AZ - In his own words...) For those who look at things very closely, the little white box that sits underneath the FT100 and on the seat is my "frequency stability system". Without that box, the tuning knob of the FT100 rests on the fabric of the seat and the mass of the radio, working in conjunction with the knob being in contact with the seat, causes the frequency to go up the band when I brake, and down the band when I accelerate. While this frequency movement is more reminiscent of the old dynamotor days of mobile operation, I didn't want to be accused of falsely imitating a classic radio phenomenon (drifting with vehicular motion irregularities). The 'AZ view' shots were taken during the net.

Mike has updated his shack recently. Here's a shot of his former set up from 12/10/06.

Below is a shot of Ron, W6KJ and his shack as well as his antenna system in Yuba City, CA!

Laptop running Ham Radio Deluxe Software, with Rig Blaster Plug & Play
Digital interface, Icom IC-7000, and MFJ-949-e Tuner.
all going to an Eagle One Vertical Antenna.

This is a view of Mike's Ham Shack. Mike likes to chase DX. Above his hand on the right are two remote antenna switches. With these, in addition to the ones on the wall, enable him to use his assortment of antennas in an efficient manner.

This is another view of Mike's ham shack. Notice the assortment of antenna switches on the wall...

Here is an older photo of Jim, W5JCS's ham shack. All he needs now in an amplifier and a tower and a high profile antenna system!

Charlie has submitted a more up-to-date shot of the overall look of his ham shack!

Here's a more up-to-date shot of Charlie's primary operating position in his shack!

For detailed information about what you are seeing above click on the link below:

If you have any old ham shack photos you would like to add, please send them to wa8zwj@iook.org

IOOK Ham Radio Shacks Gone By...