Scanner Tales: Radio Shack Stuffage

[w2lpa]

Great stories and reminiscing! Our Mall Radio Shack had a gray carpeted floor and smelled like stale cigarette smoke. Bought components there to build little things. Later in the 90's a couple of CB's and a scanner. In the late 70's and 80's .. computer stuff: I'd save up my money and buy a game in a ziploc bag off the shelf. I would stop in, or haunt the place if I was going to the mall with the family. There was another kid who hung around there all the time - I don't recall him ever not being there whenever I stopped in - that was well versed in electronics and stereo equipment in particular. He'd built pretty much every electronic kit you could get from RS, everything from the Forrest Mims books, projects from those "101 Electronic Projects" magazines, and many Heathkits. No one's really mentioned the TRS80 .. but it changed many of our lives and sent us on a path. Store managers were all different. One liked that I would sit down and compose little display programs or load and play a game (from cassette ), as it attracted attention to the computer. Others didn't and shooed me away.

 

[MiCon]

Stuffage (noun): materials and items related to a specific general topic.

Good write up. RS had a well deserved poor reputation in it's final years, but before that it was the go-to store for communications and electronic parts. I bought my first CB transceiver (HE-20c) at Lafayette Electronics in 1965, and at some point I had a Bearcat 20 channel programmable scanner, but I started in 1971 with the first RS scanner, an eight channel base/ mobile crystal receiver, and stuck with RS products for about thirty years until they went belly-up. I didn't realize it until recently, but I have about fourteen RS scanners sitting around. I'm currently using about eight of them, the newest being over twenty years old.

 

[JDKelley]

Those books by Forrest Mims were great - that was how I learned most of what I know about electronics! I picture him being incredibly patient IRL, given how he wrote those books (the big textbooks, and all the "Engineer's Mini-Manuals" - had everything he wrote for Radio Shack.)

Back home, Radio Shack was one of my definite haunts. (Two Radio Shacks, CWY Electronics - they had the stuff that RS didn't - and the NAPA parts house. I'd hang out, discuss projects - and the NAPA had a vending machine with beer, so I'd take my dog in and buy him a beer about once a month while talking shop. I was always working on something weird. . .

 

[kc2asb]

Great write-up!

A lot of fond memories of Radio Shack. In 1988, in my high school days, I had been into the hobby for a couple of years, using a Hallicrafters S-40A gifted to me by my uncle's father-in-law and a Realistic SW-60. I had also gotten my first scanner, a Uniden 140XLT

I went into Radio Shack and asked about constructing a shortwave antenna. The salesman was very knowledgeable about the hobby and electronics. He showed me the kit they had, with 50ft of copper wire, insulated lead in wire, and insulators. He gave me some tips about stringing it up in the attic since my folks did not want any outdoor antennas.

While at the register, he recommended Popular Communcations magazine. I picked up my first copy that day at the newstand across the street, the Feb 1988 edition. The rest is history.

At the same store during the "Cellphone Shack" era, the salespeople looked puzzled when I asked about PL-259 connectors. It was sad to see Radio Shack go. There will never be anything like it again.

 

[ladn]

Those books by Forrest Mims were great - that was how I learned most of what I know about electronics!

I still have a couple of Mims' books in the garage (somewhere). I learned a lot. I wonder how many of the IC's used in Mims' projects are even available today?

 

[kc2asb]

My first "scanner" was one of those circa 1970! It was tunable, VHF HI/LOW. Like @es93546 said, accurate tuning wasn't possible, but it worked fairly well for that time period where agencies had fewer frequencies and 30 KHz bandwidth channels.

View attachment 169457

I bought a PRO-2 on Ebay years ago. I was surprised by how decently it performs, and it picked up the WX, marine, and numerous other signals. The AM/FM mode switch is unique also. Mine has a 1970 date code. Very sold build too.

I also picked up a PRO-3, which has the addition of UHF. It's huge and heavy! I had fun tuning in the NYPD with it when they were still analog.

 

[RichM]

Believe it or not I actually have a Radio Shack store still open for business about 40 miles from me. I drove up for a visit last week and it was like walking into a Time Machine. Located in a strip mall just off the main drag they still have the old familiar red and white Radio Shack sign over the entrance. Inside it‘s set up just like you remember. Some RC toys by the door, tucked in the corner were a few CB and 10 meter radios and associated accessories (no scanners but they did have a discone antenna), all band and weather radios and even some stereo equipment. Cell phone, tablet and computer stuff took up about half the wall space just like back in the day.

In the aisles were every imaginable adapter, plug and cable along with a very nice selection of
wire by the foot and many small electronics parts as well as a good selection of tools of the trade. In the back corner they have an electronics repair service sectioned off but still open so you can watch them work and talk to the techs while they are performing repairs. This store is a 3rd generation family business and they have performed tens of thousands of repairs. These days it’s mostly device screen repairs and computer work but they were very well equipped and capable of handling just about anything.

I picked up a couple SMA to F connector adapters for my growing SDR collection and made a mental note of what I saw for future needs…I sure miss that old catalog. Nice folks, very knowledgeable and welcoming. If you’re ever in Charlevoix, MI take a trip down memory lane and pay them a visit.

 

[JDKelley]

Believe it or not I actually have a Radio Shack store still open for business about 40 miles from me. I drove up for a visit last week and it was like walking into a Time Machine. Located in a strip mall just off the main drag they still have the old familiar red and white Radio Shack sign over the entrance. Inside it‘s set up just like you remember. Some RC toys by the door, tucked in the corner were a few CB and 10 meter radios and associated accessories (no scanners but they did have a discone antenna), all band and weather radios and even some stereo equipment. Cell phone, tablet and computer stuff took up about half the wall space just like back in the day.

In the aisles were every imaginable adapter, plug and cable along with a very nice selection of
wire by the foot and many small electronics parts as well as a good selection of tools of the trade. In the back corner they have an electronics repair service sectioned off but still open so you can watch them work and talk to the techs while they are performing repairs. This store is a 3rd generation family business and they have performed tens of thousands of repairs. These days it’s mostly device screen repairs and computer work but they were very well equipped and capable of handling just about anything.

I picked up a couple SMA to F connector adapters for my growing SDR collection and made a mental note of what I saw for future needs…I sure miss that old catalog. Nice folks, very knowledgeable and welcoming. If you’re ever in Charlevoix, MI take a trip down memory lane and pay them a visit.

"Trip down memory lane," indeed!
We've been losing all of our useful major electronic supply houses here in the SF Bay Area - Fry's is gone, Radio Shack went to "consumer electronics' and no parts before they folded up, we lost an outfit called Quement years ago (and they were great for 'anything RF,' even though they did mainly big TVs and such,) and now I have to look for a hole-in-the-wall place, or figure out what I need then order it.

Which is awfully strange for Silicon Alley - you'd think there would be more parts houses, not less - gotta allow for prototyping, right?

 

[JDKelley]

Great stories and reminiscing! Our Mall Radio Shack had a gray carpeted floor and smelled like stale cigarette smoke. Bought components there to build little things. Later in the 90's a couple of CB's and a scanner. In the late 70's and 80's .. computer stuff: I'd save up my money and buy a game in a ziploc bag off the shelf. I would stop in, or haunt the place if I was going to the mall with the family. There was another kid who hung around there all the time - I don't recall him ever not being there whenever I stopped in - that was well versed in electronics and stereo equipment in particular. He'd built pretty much every electronic kit you could get from RS, everything from the Forrest Mims books, projects from those "101 Electronic Projects" magazines, and many Heathkits. No one's really mentioned the TRS80 .. but it changed many of our lives and sent us on a path. Store managers were all different. One liked that I would sit down and compose little display programs or load and play a game (from cassette ), as it attracted attention to the computer. Others didn't and shooed me away.

Had a buddy with a Trash-80 that I wrote programmes for. Has a neighbour with a Timex ZX-100 that I wrote programmes for as well.

For me, my "breakthrough" machine was an Atari 800XL, which rapidly got a Commodore C64C to share its desk and monitor, and a stack of floppy drives and a cassette player for each (I used to clean out the RS about once a month on those 15-minute answerphone tapes.) Only had a printer for the 800XL, tho - didn't have room for a second printer.

Then I started troubleshooting and diagnosing castoff parts from the CS school at Purdue, and built myself most of a VT100 terminal - which impressed the school's professors enough that I got a login to talk to the Cray at Purdue. (I also learned to read card decks and paper tape by eye, running my eye down the length of the card, or along the tape, with my right hand while writing down what I saw with my left. I was entirely too far into computers middle school and high school - when we took "computer literacy" about 7th grade, I did the entire book's worth of work in the first week, and got left alone to play Lunar Lander and Lemonade stand as long as I kept it quiet.)

 

[kc2asb]

Believe it or not I actually have a Radio Shack store still open for business about 40 miles from me. I drove up for a visit last week and it was like walking into a Time Machine. Located in a strip mall just off the main drag they still have the old familiar red and white Radio Shack sign over the entrance. Inside it‘s set up just like you remember. Some RC toys by the door, tucked in the corner were a few CB and 10 meter radios and associated accessories (no scanners but they did have a discone antenna), all band and weather radios and even some stereo equipment. Cell phone, tablet and computer stuff took up about half the wall space just like back in the day.

In the aisles were every imaginable adapter, plug and cable along with a very nice selection of
wire by the foot and many small electronics parts as well as a good selection of tools of the trade. In the back corner they have an electronics repair service sectioned off but still open so you can watch them work and talk to the techs while they are performing repairs. This store is a 3rd generation family business and they have performed tens of thousands of repairs. These days it’s mostly device screen repairs and computer work but they were very well equipped and capable of handling just about anything.

I picked up a couple SMA to F connector adapters for my growing SDR collection and made a mental note of what I saw for future needs…I sure miss that old catalog. Nice folks, very knowledgeable and welcoming. If you’re ever in Charlevoix, MI take a trip down memory lane and pay them a visit.

Wow! That store is a gem. You are lucky to have it, and in reasonable driving distance.

 

[kc2asb]

I was entirely too far into computers middle school and high school - when we took "computer literacy" about 7th grade, I did the entire book's worth of work in the first week, and got left alone to play Lunar Lander and Lemonade stand as long as I kept it quiet.)

Lunar Lander! That was a fun and aggravating game. Thanks for the flashback.

 

[Omega-TI]

Lunar Lander! That was a fun and aggravating game. Thanks for the flashback.

YES! That game with it's limited vector graphics still holds up to this day. It proves you don't need 4K lifelike graphics with a VR headset to enjoy playing a game now and then.