As I wondered the parking lot I gazed over the treasures that lay in front of my eyes. Some /\/\otorola gear at decent price, a box of parts from an old Heathkit set, a MFJ 10m radio, and all the other glorious stuff you see at these types of gatherings. It seemed as if it was just an excuse for all the locals to get together and play mock field day and sell the junk stuff of little use they have around.

I found myself making my way over to a trailer that was flanked by two tall 1950's era rack mount cabinets. The old man approached me with his camouflaged Army hat, airborne pin proudly displayed on the front. His ZZ top beard was gloriously flapping in the wind as we spoke. He had come into an SK estate of an old man that was a communications officer in the Marine Corps.

This is the point where I decided no matter what worthless thing I purchased that day I would purchase it off this man's trailer. I went through a few boxes of odds and ends and found some different neat stuff that I had no idea what it was or how I might use it. The limiting factor in my decision was that I was about 30 miles away from home and on my motorcycle with no saddle bags. Whatever I decided on would have to fit in my small fork bag.

I saw them looking at me. A set of "cans" that had to be from the 50s. The leather looked so new that I could read the markings that were stamped on them over 50 years ago. Maj ZZ top saw that they had caught my eye. He said "take them" I insisted that I had to pay something for them. We settled on $5 after I had offered him $10.

I brought them home and cleaned them up. I found some markings and did my research. They are HS-33 air crew headphones from WW2. 1943 looks like the year until I can nail it down better.

They were said to be 600 ohm so off to my garage I went to find a 1/4" to 1/8" adapter. I brought it inside and wasted no time hooking it up to my phone that was playing swing music (seemed appropriate) . Nothing, then a little crackle so I wiggled and jiggled the adapter until I heard the sweet sound of a trumpet tooting out notes of beautiful music.  They worked! I danced around the house while my wife looked on in amusement. It wasn't long until I had realized that I had found the hipsters dream, however these will adorn my ham shack for years to come.

Cool headphones!

Sick!

They look great!  Nice find!  

Nice cans! Also, loved the 'saga'.

I think a pic of them plugged into an adapter for the latest iPod would complete the effect,
70 years of tech that still works together.

Well seeing that they were communication headsets I thought this might be appropriate.

Nice!  Cool saga too.

What all have you got going on in that pic?  I have a BB Pi that's just dying for a purpose.

Thanks

The pi is just using rtl_fm to pass the 440 freq to the default sound device.

Pretty much using the RTL and pi as a receiver. If you want to get fancy you could use this to make it into a mini repeater.

Congrats on the very cool cans GCW.

If I saw somebody beebopping along with those plugged into an ipod it'd be hilarious and yet cool at the same time.

The iPod goes Steampunk

Actually the iPod would nearly tell you to FOAD with a 600 ohm load. Now a Bottlehead headphone amp-THAT is the ticket!

I wish you had called. YL worked all day and me and my daughter were looking for an adventure!

Nice score. Got a BC-348 to use 'em with?

See how they work for copying CW. Some of those old headphones have a nice little mid-range peak that reduces high and low frequency noise.