E.F. Johnson is now big in the commercial 2-way stuff. They used to make
decent public service band scanners.
Jim Bruce
President/ Owner
Bruce Communications, Inc.
(410) 482-2682
brucecom@shore.intercom.net
-----Original Message-----
From: Paul R. Valko <prvalko@oakland.edu>
To: Jim and Kate Belt <jkbelt@spiritone.com>
Cc: TenTec Net <tentec@contesting.com>
To: <tentec@contesting.com>
Date: Tuesday, January 27, 1998 10:13 PM
Subject: Re: [TenTec] Hmmm
>
>On Tue, 27 Jan 1998, Jim and Kate Belt wrote:
>
>> I hestitate to bring this up but have things shrunk up a bit in amateur
>> radio. Back when I started there was Collins, E.F. Johnson, Drake,
>> Hallicrafters, Hammerlund, Swan, WRL, Allied, and Heathkit who were major
>> players. Now we have Kenwood, Yaesu, Icom, Ten-Tec and a new one from
Long
>> Island. What's happened?
>
>I'll take a stab at it...
>
>Collins - hand made high-end (expensive) radios and left to pursue more
> lucrative military/aviation market. REALLY popular now with the
> yuppies with more money than brains crowd.
>
>E.F. Johnson - Sunk by going into CB radio, crashed when the CB craze did.
>
>Drake - Clobbered by the efficient japanese manufacturing process.
>
>Hallicrafters - could not keep up with technology changes.
>
>Hammerlund - couldn't even keep up with Hallicrafters.
>
>Swan - came up with one too many crappy radio designs.
>
>WRL - Never really a player in the post-transatlantic period anyways. I
> think my grandfather may have heard the Hindenburg blow up
> on a WRL radio.
>
>Allied - Swallowed by Tandy.
>
>Heathkit - Swallowed by Zenith, bet big on computers and lost.
>
>So that leaves those dear people in Tennesee... who have a day job selling
>lots of plastic cases and other enclosures. Every now and then they turn
>out a quirky little low-production radio that just enough people fall in
>love with. The phone gets answered by english-as-a-native-language
>technicians and they keep parts in stock for radios out of production
>before Icom, Kenwood, and Yaesu sold rig number one in the US.
>
>73! =paul= W8KC
>Collector of Ten*Tecs and other fine plastics
>
>www.acs.oakland.edu/~prvalko
>
>
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>
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