Wireless Set No. 52 Canadian - Project

[David Dunlop]

Several years back I had purchased a preassembled 12-foot Aerial Connector Cable Assembly for use with an FRG-7 I owned at the time. It was a run of RG-58A/U Coax with a UHF Plug at each end. The first time I tried it; the Central Conductor of one Plug jammed in its Socket and tore out of the Plug Assembly. A close inspection showed the Plugs used were cheap; using folded central pins, rather than rolled ones. The folding was off, creating one large sized face that stuck. Set the cable aside and forgot about it.

This morning I dug it out of a bin and decided to lop off the duff end and convert the cable to a small ring terminal at that end to allow for the future fitting of a turned brass PLUGS, Aerial. The type that sits at 90 degrees to its cable and has a cheese head BA screw holding it in place. I could then use this coax cable to connect either of my two 19-Sets, or my 52-Set to my external dipole aerial.

I got the job done this afternoon, and decided to see how the Main Set Receiver reacted to officially being connected to the dipole through all its proper fittings. I use ‘proper fittings’ carefully because at the moment, the Connector between the Sender Output Socket to the Coils, Aerial Tuning No. 2A, is about 4 times longer than it should be and that might be putting a bias into the works for a while.

It was so much fun listening to the WWV Time Signal at 5.0 MC slowly improves as the Sender and Coil Tuning came into play. I cannot help but wonder when the last time was, here in Winnipeg, when the Receiver of a complete 52-Set operated this way.

The three photos are of the cable I reworked for the task, the 52-Set up and running with all bits finally interacting and the output feed to the dipole on the wall, with the running CPP-2 Power Supply doing its thing on the lower shelf. If you look carefully in the last photo, you can see the output leads from the CPP-2 connected to the DC Voltage Distribution System I built for the Wireless Bench. On the back wall, just above the bench and between the two 19-Sets, you can also see the Battery Cable for the 52-Set connected to one of the 3 Distribution Boxes in the system.

A big thanks to Bruce Parker at this point once again for sending me the spare Coils, Aerial Tuning No. 2A he had on hand when I started this crazy project. Between it and what I had on hand, I now have a complete and functioning Coils and was even able to send a couple of spare bits to a fellow 52-Set Restorer in Northern Ireland to help with his work.


David