Dow Key relays ?

[Brian Carling (Radio G3XLQ / AF4K)]

Do you have an address/phone number for them Don?

On  7 May 97 at 16:06, Don Buska spoke about Re: Dow Key relays ? and
said:

> Dow-Key is still very muck alive.  They go by the name Dow-Key
> Microwave these days.  Many of those same relays we used as hams in
> the 50's and 60's are still available from them today.
>
> 73
> Don N9OO
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, 7 May 1997 16:01:47 -0500, Nick England wrote:
>
> >One of the reason's to pick up an older ARRL Handbook from the
> late 50'
> >or early 60's is that there are lots of interesting and
> illuminating
> >advertisements in the back.
> >
> >Anyway, Dow Key was a very successful manufacturer of antenna T/R
> relays
> >for ham gear in the era of separate receivers and transmitters.
> They
> >were co-axial relays with little effect on SWR and were rated for
> a
> >kilowatt or more. They weren't particularly fast (no QSK) but they
> >did make a satisfying ker-chunk when switching. Most often, hams
> would
> >have a Dow-Key relay with a 115 vac coil (because most
> transmitters
> >had connections to supply 115 vac when switched to "transmit") and
> a
> >set of auxillary contacts to mute your receiver while
> transmitting.
> >
> >They pretty much disapppeared when SSB, VOX, and transceivers
> appeared
> >on the scene.
> >
> >By the way, for QSK operation, hams usually had an electronic T/R
> >switch using a tube to clamp the receiver input when transmitter
> RF
> >input was present. Dow-Key made one of these too, but Johnson was
> >probably the most popular commercial unit. They weren't hard to
> homebrew,
> >either.
> >
> >73 & Have Fun,
> >Nick England  KD4CPL  nick at cs.unc.edu   Univ. Of North Carolina
> >http://www.cs.unc.edu/~nick             Chapel Hill NC
>
********************************************************
*** 73 from Radio AF4K / G3XLQ in Gaithersburg, MD USA *
**  E-mail to:  bry at mnsinc.com                         *
*** See the great ham radio resources at:              *
**  http://www.mnsinc.com/bry/                         *
********************************************************