Heath glory

[Larry Gauthier]

Terry (et all),

Yes, I saw many of the things you mention (although the solid mass of solder
is a new one!) but my personal favorite was the kit builder who brought in
his inoperative guitar amplifier. "Blows circuit breaker" was the formal
complaint.

Removing the amp board from the case, the upper side of the PC board looked
OK. Components dressed cleanly, all transistors about 1/4 inch off the
board, banded end of diodes aligned properly. However, upon flipping the
board over, I discovered that the kit builder had somehow missed the section
of the manual where it said to trim all excess lead lengths of the
components. Sure, he had soldered all the components to the board, but then
took the remaining lead lengths and twisted them together in random little
hay sacks of 5 - 10 components.

Amazingly, after trimming the leads off and timidly applying power (we
_always_ used a rheostat to power up "basket cases"), the amp worked! The
only component that had to be replaced was the circuit breaker, which had
probably been cycled more times than the designers intended by a kit builder
who kept resetting the breaker and hoping it work the next time.

-larry
K8UT
a former ham from heath


----- Original Message -----
From: "Terry Perdue" <terryp at HALCYON.COM>
To: <HEATH at LISTSERV.TEMPE.GOV>
Sent: Saturday, July 15, 2000 3:14 PM
Subject: Re: Heath glory


> The service techs had some real horror stories to tell - and I saw some of
> the kits that were returned. In one, the builder had somehow managed to
> completely cover the bottom of the board with a solid mass of solder.
> Another had installed all the parts above the PCB on full length leads.
> These are extreme examples, but I often wonder how some kits worked at all
> after being built as sloppily as many were.
>
> I started restoring a W5-M amplifier a friend gave me the other day. It
was
> exciting to see how nice the outside was cleaning up. Then I removed the
> bottom cover - what a dog. I suspect that in a majority of cases, those
that
> complain about Heathkit's quality are the ones who never learned to
solder.
>
> Terry
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Bill Crowell <bcrowell at EXCITE.COM>
> To: <HEATH at LISTSERV.TEMPE.GOV>
> Sent: Friday, July 14, 2000 10:42 PM
> Subject: Heath glory
>
>
> > When I worked as a repair technician while putting myself through
school,
> we
> > used to refer to Heathkits as "Griefkits", and not without reason.
N6AYJ
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
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