Heathkit to reenter the kit building business!

[jackinnj]

Allied is still around, and their service is pretty good. I think I had committed their 1963 catalog to memory.

[anatech]

You know, if they could get their act together and persevere - they might just recreate the magic of building kits. With a Heathkit, you actually built the entire thing. Many other kits were simply a job of connecting built up, pretested circuit boards. My last Heathkit was maybe 5 years ago now. My father found an unassembled IT-121 kit transistor tester. I had a great time building it, and it works fine (except for really oxidized switches - and I cleaned those before building it!). I'd like to repeat the magic again.

Heathkit's strength seemed to be an amateur radio and test equipment (naturally). Marine equipment and gadgets came next, then audio. The one thing many people do not realize is that the AP1800 preamp and AA1600 amplifier are actually really good. Some slight tweaking to those designs and you have a winner. These could be built at home and run with some of the big boys in performance.

I'm going to bet that AM radios (with a big speaker so they sound good) and "stuff" like weather stations, "atomic clocks" and metal locators would sell. Give people a chance to build a meter (7106 ~ 7129 would work), oscillator or any other test stuff they can build and you have a phenomenon ready to launch. They would have to begin carefully of course. Lead solder would be a required material unless industry can get the lead-free variety sorted out for hand soldering use. As educational material, they may be able to exclude it from RoHS.

As for legal liability, it's high time we accept responsibility for our own actions. Have a disclaimer or release to be signed in order to build anything. Some 'States may have to be excluded if they want to be silly. Texas is looking attractive for this!

I really think that the world would be a better place if they were to come back to selling kits. I can't see surface mount in kit form unless they make advanced kits. These would be a disaster if offered to the general public. They would make an excellent kit for any electronics courses. The student ends up with something useful at the end that they can be proud of.

Yes, simple AM radios in a larger cabinet with a nice speaker would sell. Remember those 5" Philips hexagonal drivers with the whizzer cone? Those would sound amazing, as they did in those European radios you see around. A personal stereo using the same concept would work for an office / bedroom / work area setting.

This could work. Don't expect high end audio right away though. I'd be happy with little projects for fun.

-Chris

[anatech]

Hi labjr,
You can easily build your own jig to match these parts. There are some circuits sprinkled around diyaudio as well. It doesn't need to be complicated in order to do the job.

-Chris

[River757]

I'm going to bet that AM radios (with a big speaker so they sound good) and "stuff" like weather stations, "atomic clocks"

I love radios myself and own too many already but to be perfectly frank, I'm pretty sure an AM radio would not sell very well to anyone under age @40. That's because at least here in the States - and definitely here in southwest Texas - music on AM is basically non-existant and has been taken over by religious, sports and right-wing talk stations, along with stations that broadcast in other langauges other than English. Plus on another forum someone told me that AM is sounding worse than it ever has because something most broadcasters are doing is decreasing the *audible* frequency range of the AM signal.

Commercial FM still has some life in it, but such a kit would not be good for a beginner (a so-called internet "radio" would be really cool - there is SO much great music available nowadays via the net - but ummm, those are basically single-purpose computers and definitely not for the beginner!).

As for legal liability, it's high time we accept responsibility for our own actions. Have a disclaimer or release to be signed in order to build anything.

[jackinnj]

Originally Posted by River757

I love radios myself and own too many already but to be perfectly frank, I'm pretty sure an AM radio would not sell very well to anyone under age @40. That's because at least here in the States - and definitely here in southwest Texas - music on AM is basically non-existant and has been taken over by religious, sports and right-wing talk stations,

Which is why commercial A.M. radio is now a success -- prior to elimination of "The Fairness Doctrine" it was an economic wasteland.

Much of 60's music was mixed so that it sounded good on a car a.m. radio -- but I could never figure out why my cousin built a Heathkit a.m. transistor radio when you could buy a little G.E. for about 1/4th the price.

[smoking-amp]

A few ideas for kits.

An obvious one is Wash. State Univ. is looking for partners to produce it's 3d printer designs. These are designed so that the 3d printers can make mechanical parts for more printers. Some electronic control board/PC interface to go with them is needed.

How many times have you wanted to vary the speed of an induction motor on say the band saw or the drill press but couldn't? Just takes two class D power amplifiers and a variable frequency source with 90 degree phase shift to do this.

An LTspice course book would be a great learning tool. Then a PC curve tracer card that lets you make software device models of any parts for LTspice to use. Then a premium tube modeler version?

How about RC controlled helicopter spy drones with camera feedback. (back to their airplane roots?) We'll leave out the firecracker bombing capability for now!

Or radio camera spy collars for pets. Or your kids. Hehe..

How about a GPS transponding cell phone that calls back periodically to your PC (with a display map) where it is and has been. (keep track of the kids or pets)

Then there are these people who seem to think you can build a nuclear reactor at home. This would obviously be pushing liability problems to the limit: The Open Source Fusor Research Consortium II - messages (OK, just a joke) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ED3qoGEiWcU

[River757]

Originally Posted by jackinnj

Which is why commercial A.M. radio is now a success -- prior to elimination of "The Fairness Doctrine" it was an economic wasteland.

Since politics is forbidden here, the only thing I'll say about this is that now a station can spew into the airwaves whatever they believe are "facts" with no responsibility to provide any opposing viewpoints to help the listener decide which are actual facts and which is opinion.

Anyway..............

Much of 60's music was mixed so that it sounded good on a car a.m. radio

True. And why I am glad more and more albums from that era - the Beatles for example - are being remastered without such a low-fidelity sound source in mind. Those sources also included the lousy "record players" (I hesitate to call them turntables) that so many people owned back then with their crummy tonearms and ceramic cartridges. Lowest bass frequencies have particularly benefitted from these remasterings, since low-quality record players could not handle it and I've read stories of styluses literally jumping out of the groove when they encountered such frequencies.*

-- but I could never figure out why my cousin built a Heathkit a.m. transistor radio when you could buy a little G.E. for about 1/4th the price.

Like Chris Carter always says he could point at it and say "I made that!" though actually, if he's like me and many others, it was simply the fun of building it that was the main attraction for buying the kit.


* the first time I heard the Beatles like they should have been heard was on the LOVE album that debuted back in '06. Remixed from the original multitracks, among the mash-up tracks there are many songs on there that are bascially identical to the originals....and the bass is so much more full and rich. And it's not just the bass that has been improved but everything else too (and in a tasteful/realistic manner i.e. no overcompression or "tinkly" high frequencies), so now the songs have even more energy & emotion than the originals, something that should have been there in the first place!

BTW the CD+dvd-audio version of LOVE contains some excellent multichannel mixes, several of which are demo quality. The dvd-audio disc also contains Dolby Digital and DTS tracks for conventional dvd-video players.

[benb]

Originally Posted by smoking-amp

A few ideas for kits.
...
Then there are these people who seem to think you can build a nuclear reactor at home. This would obviously be pushing liability problems to the limit: The Open Source Fusor Research Consortium II - messages (OK, just a joke) Report Finds Troubling Rise In Teen Uranium Enrichment - YouTube

The "Fusor" thing appears to involve fusion, which with all the large quantity of big-bucks research thrown at it, seems unlikely to have much happen by a bunch of underfunded amateurs. From a quick glance at the site it appears the main dangers are high voltage and x-rays.

But for nuclear fission, at least two people have attempted it...
David Hahn - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Swedish man's plans for home nuclear reactor spark alert - CNN

[labjr]

How about an MRI machine. Or an entire medical diagnostic suite. All color coordinated with that blue Heathkit color. Minor assembly required. I got some shoulder pain. I figure I could build one for less money than the amount of the bills I'm receiving and instead bill the medical insurance for my services.

Sort of like having my own two megawatt wind generator.

[smoking-amp]

"But for nuclear fission, at least two people have attempted it..."

Rather odd that such apparently bright people would be pursuing activities causing fairly obvious damage to their health. This may actually be an indication that the now scarce DIY hi-tech learning kits are needed to keep some budding genius's out of trouble. With high quality kit guidance, we might get more success stories like this one:
Jake: Math prodigy proud of his autism - CBS News

"How about an MRI machine. "
Have you checked Ebay?
I think I have actually seen some science news articles recently on breakthru technologies for cheap MRI. Just needs copper electromagnets, no super... When you get down to it, most of the effort is just a control-analysis program on the PC.