Collins Radio, KHT, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

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D.J.J. Ring, Jr.

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Feb 11, 2021, 3:07:28 AM2/11/21
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Great radio station, anyone ever use it?


Click on Satellite view, see the towers!

KHT was a private coast station that companies hired, they ran the 1,000 watts, the legal limit for such stations. They had digital sequential calling so you knew when they had a phone call for you.

Their license expired and wasn't renewed.


Without radio officers, no used radio any more!

Very sad!

73

DR 

 

spud roscoe

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Feb 11, 2021, 4:02:40 AM2/11/21
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Was that the station the MANHATTEN used on its run to the Arctic? They had Collins equipment and worked a Collins station.

 

Spud

 

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Dr Jim Kennedy

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Feb 11, 2021, 12:16:09 PM2/11/21
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image1.jpeg


73, Doc - K2PHD



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D.J.J. Ring, Jr.

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Feb 11, 2021, 1:02:51 PM2/11/21
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Thanks Jim,

I've never seen a photo of the radio room of "MANHATTAN.

I've yet to find the name of the ship's master who sailed Manhattan on that voyage, nor the call sign of MANHATTAN.

I understand she stirred up Canadian / USA relations with her taking a trip through Canadian national waters :-)

Quite a feat though.

73
DR

spud roscoe

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Feb 11, 2021, 1:54:12 PM2/11/21
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There is the Collins Equipment. A New York technician told me they had installed Collins equipment and had direct communications with Collins and did not use her RCA equipment. The best icebreaker the Canadian Coast Guard had JOHN A. MACDONALD escorted her through the north in 1969. I was at Inuvik at the time. They were lucky she did not hit a pingo because they knew little or nothing about them at the time. A pingo is a harp object sticking up from the bottom and had they hit one it would have made a hole in her as I understand it.

 

Thanks for this greatly appreciated.

 

73

Spud VE1BC

 

 

 

 

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Eric

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Feb 11, 2021, 2:51:33 PM2/11/21
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Still operational, they have a military call sign now, don’t have the details... 
The station was always doing military and aircraft work along with ships.
All transmitters were 10KW adjusted for the limit on the service they were providing.

The current antennas are a 360 degree set of large log periodics.

Their original location was next to the factory in Cedar Rapids, they now have a larger facility on a farm area nearby.

Rgds:
Eric
On Feb 11, 2021, 12:54 PM -0600, spud roscoe <spudr...@outlook.com>, wrote:

There is the Collins Equipment. A New York technician told me they had installed Collins equipment and had direct communications with Collins and did not use her RCA equipment. The best icebreaker the Canadian Coast Guard had JOHN A. MACDONALD escorted her through the north in 1969. I was at Inuvik at the time. They were lucky she did not hit a pingo because they knew little or nothing about them at the time. A pingo is a harp object sticking up from the bottom and had they hit one it would have made a hole in her as I understand it.

 

Thanks for this greatly appreciated.

 

73

Spud VE1BC

 

 

 

 

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From: 'Dr Jim Kennedy' via Radio Officers
Sent: February 11, 2021 1:16 PM
To: radio-o...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [Radio Officers, &c] Collins Radio, KHT, Cedar Rapids, Iowa

 

<image1.jpeg>

Dr Jim Kennedy

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Feb 11, 2021, 3:32:33 PM2/11/21
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Collins equipment listed above. 
73, Doc - K2PHD





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Dr Jim Kennedy

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Feb 11, 2021, 3:38:41 PM2/11/21
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As a consulting member of technical staff at Bell Labs I spent some time in Cedar Rapids in 2009 on a job for the government and had the opportunity to tour the Collins factory. They were mostly making gear for military clients. They had several huge log periodic antennas that they used for testing and service support of fleet and overseas operations.

Great gear; great history.



73, Doc - K2PHD


 



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spud roscoe

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Feb 11, 2021, 4:45:55 PM2/11/21
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Thanks. I have the book on the history of Collins. Very interesting. Apparently, according to the technician I was talking to it was an antenna like that pointed to the arctic that kept in contact with the MANHATTAN. We did not work her.

 

73

Spud

 

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spud roscoe

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Feb 11, 2021, 4:47:55 PM2/11/21
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Thanks

 

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Jeff Woods

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Feb 12, 2021, 11:37:05 PM2/12/21
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Cedar Rapids native, Former R/O, and current Collins engineer here.  

It was a sad time when the big antenna farm went down a decade or so ago.  That antenna array was mostly designed and built in-house.  It was a true work of art (pun intended).  KHT also did a lot of aeronautical mobile work - phone patches for aircraft.  This was a larger business than any maritime work.  

We no longer run the "Comm Central" radio room.  Instead, access to the station is leased.  Users can operate the radios remotely.  With our recent acquisition by Raytheon, nothing is certain.  

We still do build a lot of aeronautical HF gear.

-Jeff
W0ODS

spud roscoe

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Feb 13, 2021, 3:29:17 AM2/13/21
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Thanks Jeff. How is your A2 project coming along?

 

Spud

 

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bs....@comcast.net

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Feb 13, 2021, 1:15:13 PM2/13/21
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Also provided long range Comms for US Customs/DEA.

Radio KH6O

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Feb 16, 2021, 1:23:13 PM2/16/21
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The photo of the Manhattan shows the porthole windows open. Because salt air is so highly corrosive to radio equipment, weren't most radio rooms air conditioned? 

73,
Jeff KH6O

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D.J.J. Ring, Jr.

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Feb 16, 2021, 3:35:25 PM2/16/21
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I think MANHATTAN was an old ship that was rebuilt, in one of the articles submitted to this list was a mention of how naval architecture changed during the period of her life, with the original being built as "strong as possible", and later when computer simulations were available, "strong as needed."

They used this massive construction as the basis of the icebreaker she became.

Ships built in the 1950s didn't have air conditioning, I'm guessing she was from this period of time initially and that on rebuild it was impractical to install air conditioning ducts especially when she was bound for the extreme North.

73

DR 

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spud roscoe

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Feb 16, 2021, 3:43:02 PM2/16/21
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According to my records MANHATTAN was built in 1962,  62435 GRT and she arrived in Philadelphia on November 2nd, 1971 on a run from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

 

Any help?

 

73

Spud VE1BC

D.J.J. Ring, Jr.

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Feb 16, 2021, 4:45:29 PM2/16/21
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From Wikipedia:

SS Manhattan was an oil tanker constructed at the Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts, that became the first commercial ship to cross the Northwest Passage in 1969. Having been built as an ordinary tanker in 1962, she was refitted for this voyage with an icebreaker bow in 1968–69. Registered in the United States at the time, she was the largest US merchant vessel as well as the biggest icebreaker in history.

In 1965, she was taken to Portland, Oregon via the Columbia River, to be cleaned and used to transport 50,000 tons of grain. The size and draught of the ship required careful preparations for her transit on the river.[1]

SS Manhattan passing Astoria, Oregon, 1965.
Manhattan remained in service until 1987. After an accident in East Asia she was scrapped in China.

73
DR
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