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Ever Heard Of Heathkit’s SS-8000 Digital Transceiver? …. Me Neither!
15 November 2022 | by  |
| courtesy N8RS |
The Heathkit SS-8000 was a unique synthesized HF transceiver (160-10m) originally designed as a kit in 1978. The reason that very few hams have heard of it is that it was never released … and only three were ever prototyped!
Robert Sumption, N8RS, is an ex-Heathkit engineer who worked on the project back in the late 70s. He recalls that after evaluating the project, it was deemed too complicated to be offered as a kit, since once built, most builders would not have the test equipment needed to align it properly. Consequently all three units were dissembled and sent to a local scrapyard!
Fast forward to 2015 when Bob came across all of the boxes of ‘scrap’ that someone had rescued from the scrapyard back in the day and the entire pile was now selling on eBay.
Would the SS-8000 live to meet it’s intended destiny? Bob describes this very challenging project in his six 5-minute videos.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Part 4:
Part 5:
Part 6:
I hope you find the videos as interesting as I did. It seems that Bob has some terrific skills and a lot of patience!
2 Responses to “Ever Heard Of Heathkit’s SS-8000 Digital Transceiver? …. Me Neither!”
|
Ever Heard Of Heathkit’s SS-8000 Digital Transceiver? …. Me Neither!
|
| courtesy N8RS |
The Heathkit SS-8000 was a unique synthesized HF transceiver (160-10m) originally designed as a kit in 1978. The reason that very few hams have heard of it is that it was never released … and only three were ever prototyped!
Robert Sumption, N8RS, is an ex-Heathkit engineer who worked on the project back in the late 70s. He recalls that after evaluating the project, it was deemed too complicated to be offered as a kit, since once built, most builders would not have the test equipment needed to align it properly. Consequently all three units were dissembled and sent to a local scrapyard!
Fast forward to 2015 when Bob came across all of the boxes of ‘scrap’ that someone had rescued from the scrapyard back in the day and the entire pile was now selling on eBay.
Would the SS-8000 live to meet it’s intended destiny? Bob describes this very challenging project in his six 5-minute videos.
Part 1:
Part 2:
Part 3:
Part 4:
Part 5:
Part 6:
I hope you find the videos as interesting as I did. It seems that Bob has some terrific skills and a lot of patience!
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I have an OLD “Trans – Portable” Radio that my grandfather owned. We found it in his closet when we went through his things recently. I would like to see if anyone knows of a repair site that we can send the radio too, to see if we can get it working again. It is in good condition.
Since I was not a ham until after Heathkit was gone, I always hoped for them to come up with test gear for me to add to my bench, to no avail.