The first tube radio I ever "built" was a kit for a 3 tube regenerative receiver from a kit company called Graymark. The entire thing was chassis wired. I built it in an afternoon. In addition to wiring all the components, they gave three coil forms and a spool of enamled wire. You had to wind and solder the plug in coils. 1 for the AM Bcash band and 2 for segments of the HF spectrum. By evening I was listening on it and it was pulling in stuff from all over. Then I hit the 75 meter phone band and I heard for the first time in my life the great East-Northeast / New England AM sound !! I heard for the first time some great call signs like Steve/WA1QIX, Pete/WA1SOV, Dirk/WA2CYT. WA1HLR/TimTron, Ed/WA3PUN, Chris/WA2OMH and a few others. Years later I finally got to join them on the aire. But, it all started with that little 3 tube regen kit.
The first transmitter I ever built (in 1974) was a two tube 40 meter CW rig. It was entirely scratch built up from a schematic. I spent most of the spring and summer scouring the local Radio Shack, Lafayette radio, Canal Street for the parts I needed. I ordered the crapstals and the B&W Coil stock from a company called "Trigger". When finished I got it to power up but I could never get it to oscillate properly. In those days I didn't have enough experience in laying out RF circuits so it was very unstable.
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