HEATHKITs

Lightwin 3

Petty Officer 1st Class
Joined
May 18, 2010
Messages
300
I have a Heathkit self contained depth finder. All inside a nice metal clamshell case.

My father and I built it in the late Sixties, early Seventies. It still works!

It uses one of those big square 6 volt batteries. We used it on our canoe trips into Ontario.
 

minuteman62-64

Lieutenant
Joined
Apr 12, 2011
Messages
1,350
Remember the Heathkits well. Built my first in the late 1950's - a transistor radio I think. Still had it in 1966 when I came to Cali and began working for the State - in those days the State cars/trucks did not have radios. When out in the field I used to lay the radio on the dash and use it while driving from location to location (hmmm, may have been a bit of a safety issue there :( ). Still worked great right up till the 1980's, when I became more of an office type.

As I recall, I also built a VTVM, 12" TV, 19" color TV, 21" color TV, stereo receiver and auto timing light. I think it was around the 1980's that the combo of printed circuits and Asian assembly plants signaled the end of cost-effective component-by-component electronics assembly.

Used to really impress friends and co-workers when I told them ".... yep, built it myself."
 

jimmbo

Supreme Mariner
Joined
May 24, 2004
Messages
12,944
In the 80s Zenith bought the company for its Computer division and had no interest in the Kit division. Printed circuit boards were introduced to Heathkits in the 1960s. I know my Stereo kit was intro in about 1968, and it had PC boards(3). All of the kits I built were primarily PC, with little component to component assembly. I really wanted to build a TV, but by the time I had sufficient money to buy one, Zenith was in control and... Yes the Asian assembly plants did lower the price on some equipment, on others it just increased the margins for the dealer, as the lower wholesale price wasn't passed on to the consumer
 

minuteman62-64

Lieutenant
Joined
Apr 12, 2011
Messages
1,350
Come to think of it, PC boards were used in almost (if not all) my Heathkit projects.

Regardless, something occurred in the 1980's that resulted in the cost of a Heathkit color TV kit, without cabinet, being greater than the purchase price of a similar, off the shelf, model already enclosed in a cabinet. In spite of the great memories and experiences, that was game over for me and Heathkit..
 
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