Well this "guy" out in California, had this "ham-fest Queen" in
the form
of a 1 Kilowatt Match Box up on E-Bay.
I wondered why it was in an obscure list, and also why it had no
bids after
being listed for 5 days. I waited and
no one bid on it at the closing so I bid the 100.00 opening bid
and "Won"
this item. I paid for the shipping back
to Buffalo, and waited for it to arrive, as I just knew, there
had to be
something "WRONG" with it.
It turns out the guy must have been dragging this tuner around to
every
ham-fest on the "Left" coast, because it
showed up looking beat. Somewhere in all the hauling around the
unit must
have gotten dropped, as on inspection
I found the coil had a broken support bar. Also the unit had
about three
pounds of sand inside it. So I did the
general inspection, and figured, I can save this unit. Ah, it was
missing
a foot off the cabinet also, hum, get to that
later. First I opened the case and dumped the loose sand out and
did a
close-up inspection.
I decided to remove
most of the parts and give the unit a good clean and lube job.
The antenna
relay was fine and worked ok I had to
burnish the contacts as they were coated with a mild tarnish. The
relay
switching power supply was in good form
also, just needing cleaning, even the cap
was good! I took a look at the coil support
bar and saw the damage to
it was minimal and used my favorite glue to repair the bar. Yes
for repairing
broken coil supports of this type the
best resource is "Quick-Tite",
it doen't run and if placed properly and then held for a few minutes
you
have a
resurrected mount bar and after a few days you can't tell where
the break
was.
I removed the variable caps and air hosed them down and then
checked the
bearings for the rotors and applied
dabs of sewing machine oil to the front and rear, used 409 to
clean the porcelain
mounts and the result
was just
great.
After reassembly and applying the knobs and new feet, I took it inside,
and I fired it up on 80 - 20 meters
on AM from my BC-610(I) in high power mode, and this matchbox worked
"JUST FINE". There were no
sparks or arcs, the relay works like it is supposed to, I was switching
it with the relay switch output (provides
a closure to the "MB" from the BC-610(I)) and even the relay works
great. I am really glad I ran across this
unit, it gave me an opportunity to tear down and service the Kilowatt
Matchbox for the first time, and the job
was quite enjoyable. Yet another triumph for the folks from E.F.
Johnson. I think it is a shame that guys ruin
these units making modifications to them, to make them do something
they were not designed for. I say "if it
works don't fix it"!
Follows are some before and after shots documenting the cleaning and
testing phases and reassembly of this
wonderful unit. They work if you find one grab it!
Have to mount the knobs, after cleaning and polishing.
I also found a reasonable replacement for the feet,
so as to maintain the normal height of the unit.
