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Nostalgic Kits Central
Wow - this site has been alive for over 16 years! The time finally came (Febuary 15, 2007) to move to a dedicated domain. I hope the name www.nostalgickitscentral.com will be easier to remember than www.qsl.net/kb7rgg. The move should also provide a bit of improvement in response. I am planning on adding future technology to the site (SQL database, PHP, searches, etc.). These things are nicely supported by the new hosting company. It has been a long time since updates and new material has been added. This is due in part to demands of my professional life. I am also finding it more difficult to find good material. The tables are far from complete. Like I say under Submiting To The Site, I welcome any contributions or corections. Thanks to Allan Waller (K3TKJ) of QSL.NET for providing a free place to host this site in the past. I hope it continues to be of value to its visitors.
Dale Wentz KB9JJA has decided to pursue other interests and as of October 31, 2002 he has passed his terrific Heathkit Matrix site on to me (Ken Kaplan KB7RGG). Dale's Heathkit Matrix was first made available on the Internet on November 22, 1997. Since then, it has grown considerably thanks in large part to contributions made by the great people who visit and use the site. I was one of those users and contributors. Early in 2002, the thought crept into my head that there was little information available on the Web about Heathkit's competition such as Allied Radio, EICO, etc. Using Dale's website as a model, I created what I called (for want of a better name) the Boatanchor Kits Information website which went on-line in March 14, 2002. I bought a few old catalogs, "borrowed" pictures and info from an on-line auction site and built what I could. When I learned that Dale no longer wanted to manage his site, I suggested to him that I merge the two sites into one "Mother of a Kit site". He agreed and here it is. Thanks, Dale, for your hard work and inspiration.
The purpose of this site is to provide some (but not exhaustive) information on electronic kits sold by these companies as well as info to help in restoration. I hope to at least provide a picture of each item and additionally some specifications where available. Also, a schematic will be provided if available. Links to other sites will also be provided. A few years ago, I got back into the Ham radio/shortwave/electronics hobby after spending many years with my focus on my career as a systems engineer. Like many my age (39 and holding), I was mostly interested in items from an earlier era. I found and joined several Internet discussion lists to learn more about the state of the hobby. Often I would see a For Sale posting that offered a Heathkit model HM-2140 or an EICO 720. The problem was that I wasn't sure just what those things were. Maybe I wanted one and maybe I didn't. For those of you in this position, I hope this site will prove helpful. For others, perhaps this site will help bring back memories (good or bad) of kits built after school/work/chores/whatever. Perhaps you will find an item you currently own. Many of the listed items are available on Internet auction sites, hamfests or swapmeets at reasonable prices.
I eagerly solicit contributions. Contributions can be anything; pictures, specs, links, bug notices or suggestions for improvements. One thing I am not looking for is complete manuals. It has not been part of my plan to host manuals. This is partly due to copyright issues regarding Heathkit. Also, the BAMA website does a fine job of hosting manuals. I see no reason to duplicate that effort. If you are looking for a manual or you would like to contribute documentation in the form of a scanned manual, please direct your contribution to the excellent BAMA site. At some point, I might consider hosting manuals for some kits as long as copyrights are not an issue. I hope eventually to add a search capability. My professional work is still competing with my hobbies for time so any help I can get, I'll take. There are still lots of pictures and specifications missing from the product tables. Perhaps I'm missing a company that was an important kit provider. Before anyone suggests Lafayette, I've looked into that and have not found much in the way of kit products from them. Maybe they offered kits as a reseller but as original designs? I'll happily provide credit (in the form of recognition) on this site.
Most of the images have been edited by me for clarity and size. This is especially true of the schematics. My goal is to have clean schematics. If you would like to link to this site from your site, feel free. If you take content from this site to use on your site, please use some form of credit, acknowledgement or linkage. I put a lot of work into image improvements (especially the schematics) for the good of the hobby. Finding my material hosted on other websites without any acknowledgement is a great demotivator. Please don't download my content for any commercial use. Regarding schematics, most have been cleaned up and are now in PDF format. I got rid of the dots, smears and fuzzy lines and tried to make the text clear. When I created the PDF file, I specified a large format. I have found that a very nice enlarged copy can be printed at a professional copy center. For example, I had the Heathkit SB-102 schematic printed on a 3x4 foot sheet. It looks great.
| Could Use a Little Help I want you to know that I have absolutely no intentions of making this a commercial venture. This is a hobby. Hobbies cost the hobbyist a little something (some hobbies are killers in this respect). My cost in this site is my time and a hosting/domain fee of $63 a year. If you have found this site to be of value and feel inclined to contribute a little something to help with the cost, it would be very much appreciated but not necessary. |
There are a number of other sites linked on this site which offer services, parts or documentation, etc. In no way should you infer that they are endorsed because of that linkage. I have not done business with many of them. I've simply attempted to collect as much info as I can and present it to you. Use your own best judgement about how you spend you hard earned money. Enjoy.
I do have a modest but growing kit collection. I even used a Heathkit IP-17 to charge a Tesla Roadster battery once. It was slow but it worked.
Following is a list and some pictures of kits that I currently have:
| Heathkit | |||
| SB-100 | SB-102 | SB-110A | SB-600 |
| SB-610 | SB-620 | SB-630 | SB-650 |
| HP-23 | HP-23A | HN-31 | RX-1 |
| HX-10 | AM-1 | HD-1418 | HD-1420 |
| HD-1422A | AA-1 | AV-3 | IT-28 |
| IP-17 | IP-27 | IP-2715 | IO-20 |
| T-3 | TC-2 | HM-102 | GD-31 |
| IB-2A | IT-7400 | IT-121 | IG-5257 |
| IM-11 | IM-18 | IM-5238 | IM-102 |
| IB-101 | IB-102 | IG-72 | HD-1986 |
| EUW-16 | ET-3100 | GC-1A | IG-102 |
| SB-200 | IM-30 | ||
| EICO | |||
| 369 | 667 | 955 | |
| EMC | |||
| 107-A | |||
| PACO | |||
| C-25 | |||
| Precise | |||
| 630 |
Just for statistical entertainment, I calculate the following:
All content on this website is the property of KCS and may not be copied or duplicated. Feel free to link to anything on this site. All trademarks are property of their respective owners. I have tried hard to insure the accuracy of the information presented on this website. Please understand, however, that there may be some inaccuracies. I will gratefully accept and promptly publish corrections. I have no affiliation with any of the companies or organizations listed on this website. This website does not use "cookies" or collect any user information. It has been designed to be as user friendly as I know how. All downloadable materials on this website have been checked for viruses or other malicious content. I hate that stuff as much as I'm sure you do. No one but my ISP and I have access to the hosting servers. Given the nature of the hacker world, we can't accept any liability for any negative experiences from downloading from this website. It is wise to use due precation with anything you download from any website.
Last update: 22 Sep. 2023
