My Novice Days

The Beginning

When you look at these pictures you have to remember how proud a 12 year old kid could be of something like this when he knew it was his very own ham station. My Novice exam was given by John, W6UOL who I often hung around with at his radio & TV repair shop. He was like a member of the family to me. Sadly, my two Elmers, dad and John are both Silent Keys now.

My dad got the HQ-120 receiver from a guy he worked with. We checked all the tubes and I seem to remember replacing a few. It wasn't the greatest receiver in the world at the time but it was all mine ! I worked quite a few guys who had them as a Novice.

The Heathkit HX-11 which actually was a newer version of the old Heath DX-20 was the first Heathkit I ever built. My dad paid a whopping $43.50 for it.  I put the transmitter together while awaiting for my Novice license to come in the mail. It was a long six week wait. Oh what a thrill it was tearing open that little envelope when it came to see what my call would be and then run screaming into the house  W N 6 C M H .

With the HX-11's mighty 35 watts out I terrorized the 40 meter novice bands with my four crystals. I developed many long friendships on the novice bands.

Once I tried the rig on 15 meters and made a few contacts.  I also got a notice about my "Chirp" from an OO once as well. So that ended any hope of working DX as a novice.

Most Fun

I believe my time as a Novice was the most fun I have had as a Ham. I still have all my Novice QSLs and most of those are on my shack wall today.

See my new webpage on a 60's station.

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