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Hammarlund comprison HQ-145X, 170A, 180A
On Sat, 29 Oct 2011, Cadiscase wrote:
Can someone compare the above receivers or direct me to a site that does? I am interested in buying one of these and need to make a decision of which one does what. I did look up the reviews on eham. It was good but lacked a bit of comparitive info. Thanks From "73" for March 1963, where there's buying guide that is pages and pages long, likely quite extensive up to the time of publication. HQ-145X Four bands (pretty normal for the time), full shortwave coverage from the bottom of the broadcast band to 30MHz. Double conversion above 10MHz (the SP-600 did the same thing). The X is supposed to denote a single channel crystal oscillator so you can have one crystal controlled channel. A crystal filter, which is bound to be a single crystal, with loading to allow for different bandwidths. A banddspread dial, sounds like an actual extra variable capacitor (unlike the SP-600 that just had an extra dial for finer calibration). The description mentions a notch filter, but that may be the crystal filter too. The HQ-145 came out in 1958 and variants ran at least until 1963 when this article was published. Apparently the C model had the clock. So the lettering in the model, unlike some manufacturers, is used to denote options rather than a slight modification of an earlier model. On paper it has about what every general coverage receiver has, the double conversion above 10MHz definitely would make a difference though. HQ-170 HQ-180 These sound like identical receivers, with the 170 being Ham band only (160 through 6meters, triple conversion for the 40meter band and up), the 180 being general coverage (540KHz to 30MHz, triple conversion above 7.8MHz with calibrated bandspread dial for the ham bands. Noteworthy is that it breaks into six bands which will be an improvement over average SW receivers of the time). The 170 came out in 1958, the 180 in 1961 and both still on sale in 63 when the feature was published. It says the 170 has 15 tubes, plus rectifier and regulator, the 180 has 16 plus the rectifier and regulator. IFs for both is 3035MHz, 455KHz and 60KHz. Both seem to have some sort of filter at 455KHz, and then better (and variable bandwidth) filter at 60KHz. It's hard from the description to see how much of a difference there is between these two due to one being ham band and the other general coverage, and how much due to the general coverage coming after the ham band one and maybe getting some improvements. Both have product detectors, and it sounds like selectable sideband. Clearly these last two are better than the first. The 170 and 180 clearly are much fancier design than the average shortwave or ham receiver of the era, especially when a lot of them didn't deal with SSB (so you had to turn down the RF gain, turn up the audio gain and sometimes fuss about). Unless there's a big price difference, better to get the 170 or 180. Which one depends on what you want to do with it. A general coverage receiver can always be useful, and since the ham band one doesn't have the WARC bands (that came well after the receivers came out) the general coverage does get them. Back then, it made sense to get the ham band only, so you'd have a lot better dial for the ham bands, but nowadays most hams have transceivers already, so a general coverage receiver supplements that, rather than because it's cheap or dual purpose and then ending up being a bad choice as a ham receiver. If the 180 is as good for SSB as the 170 (which seems implied by these listings), the 180 is probably the better choice at this point, so long as the two are in equal shape. The 170 does have the six meter band, which might be handy. When I had an SP-600, that did go up to 54MHz, I found it was good enough at the time for SSB at 6meters, though I had nothing to compare it to back then. It seemed stable enough, and because of the double conversion (a similar first IF frequency) image rejection was good; of course, that may not translate to Hammarlunds less expensive receivers. Michael VE2BVW |
#2
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Hammarlund comprison HQ-145X, 170A, 180A
On 10/30/2011 05:49 PM, Michael Black wrote:
On Sat, 29 Oct 2011, Cadiscase wrote: Can someone compare the above receivers or direct me to a site that does? I am interested in buying one of these and need to make a decision of which one does what. I did look up the reviews on eham. It was good but lacked a bit of comparitive info. Thanks From "73" for March 1963, where there's buying guide that is pages and pages long, likely quite extensive up to the time of publication. HQ-145X Four bands (pretty normal for the time), full shortwave coverage from the bottom of the broadcast band to 30MHz. Double conversion above 10MHz (the SP-600 did the same thing). The X is supposed to denote a single channel crystal oscillator so you can have one crystal controlled channel. A crystal filter, which is bound to be a single crystal, with loading to allow for different bandwidths. A banddspread dial, sounds like an actual extra variable capacitor (unlike the SP-600 that just had an extra dial for finer calibration). The description mentions a notch filter, but that may be the crystal filter too. The HQ-145 came out in 1958 and variants ran at least until 1963 when this article was published. Apparently the C model had the clock. So the lettering in the model, unlike some manufacturers, is used to denote options rather than a slight modification of an earlier model. On paper it has about what every general coverage receiver has, the double conversion above 10MHz definitely would make a difference though. HQ-170 HQ-180 These sound like identical receivers, with the 170 being Ham band only (160 through 6meters, triple conversion for the 40meter band and up), the 180 being general coverage (540KHz to 30MHz, triple conversion above 7.8MHz with calibrated bandspread dial for the ham bands. Noteworthy is that it breaks into six bands which will be an improvement over average SW receivers of the time). The 170 came out in 1958, the 180 in 1961 and both still on sale in 63 when the feature was published. It says the 170 has 15 tubes, plus rectifier and regulator, the 180 has 16 plus the rectifier and regulator. IFs for both is 3035MHz, 455KHz and 60KHz. Both seem to have some sort of filter at 455KHz, and then better (and variable bandwidth) filter at 60KHz. It's hard from the description to see how much of a difference there is between these two due to one being ham band and the other general coverage, and how much due to the general coverage coming after the ham band one and maybe getting some improvements. Both have product detectors, and it sounds like selectable sideband. Clearly these last two are better than the first. The 170 and 180 clearly are much fancier design than the average shortwave or ham receiver of the era, especially when a lot of them didn't deal with SSB (so you had to turn down the RF gain, turn up the audio gain and sometimes fuss about). Unless there's a big price difference, better to get the 170 or 180. Which one depends on what you want to do with it. A general coverage receiver can always be useful, and since the ham band one doesn't have the WARC bands (that came well after the receivers came out) the general coverage does get them. Back then, it made sense to get the ham band only, so you'd have a lot better dial for the ham bands, but nowadays most hams have transceivers already, so a general coverage receiver supplements that, rather than because it's cheap or dual purpose and then ending up being a bad choice as a ham receiver. If the 180 is as good for SSB as the 170 (which seems implied by these listings), the 180 is probably the better choice at this point, so long as the two are in equal shape. The 170 does have the six meter band, which might be handy. When I had an SP-600, that did go up to 54MHz, I found it was good enough at the time for SSB at 6meters, though I had nothing to compare it to back then. It seemed stable enough, and because of the double conversion (a similar first IF frequency) image rejection was good; of course, that may not translate to Hammarlunds less expensive receivers. Michael VE2BVW The HQ145 is one of the 'cheaper' Hammarlund radios. Unlike the HQ120,129X,140,150,160,180 series it has only 4 bands (the others have six for greater bandspread), a higher quality tuning capacitor (two rf stages?) and higher quality parts thoughout. |
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