Sunday, August 12, 2007

HRO


I remember that Radio Amateurs in Bolton like G3XCI and G3YGJ used HRO's as their main receivers. I went to Tom's Cottage in Harwood (G3XCI) and he showed me this wonderful receiver with it's plug-in tuning modules and weird looking dial. In fact, hundreds of these receivers were used during the war at Bletchley Park for monitoring and code breaking.
One night in Winter 1970 I went to the Bury Radio Society with my friend Pete on a Tuesday night for the meeting. When we got there nobody was there! It seems that we got the date wrong! As we sat in the empy room wondering what to do as buses to and from Bury only run once every hour, a guy walked in that we had never seen before. We chatted with him and he was coming to the club for the first time...got the date wrong. Then out of the blue he asked us if would like and old HRO receiver that he had at home and was going to throw it away. We were stunned...come and collect it he said! We had no transport, but the bus was not due for another hour or so so we walked down to his house on Manchester Rd, about a mile away to collect this beast. We carried this heavy HRO complete with PSU and tuning module all the way back to the George Hotel in Bury where we waited for the next bus. Then, we had to take it back to my house on the bus!
What did we do with it then? Well, we decided to 'Toss for it' if I win I give Pete my R109A and if he wins he gives me £10...fair enough? Trouble is...Pete lost...and he wasn't happy, cos he wanted it really...in the end I let him have it and he gave me some money.
Imagine how naffed I was when a month later he sold to the guy on St Georges Rd for a fiver!!!

I never understood why???
We still stayed friends though!
http://www.iwm.org.uk/upload/package/10/enigma/enigma9.htm

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