So I was helping clear out the estate of a friend’s mother who recently passed. My friend pointed out her dad (who died in 1991) had some radio stuff she wanted to give to me that had been sitting untouched since then.

Initially I thought he was into ham radio as she talked about him having a beam antenna on a rotator he would raise up at night. But it turns out her father was into CB, back from the day licenses were required and he had his license framed on the wall to show for it.

The radio on the desk is a Ranger 3500 100 watt modded for 11M. It also had some other mod added to it that left a variable pot hanging out of it.

The mic (as any self-respecting CB operator would have it) was an Astatic Golden Eagle.

There was also a Cobra 2000 GTL buried in the back of some stuff that had a Digi-Scan UFO Attached to it. Basically a VFO type contraption that lets it operate out of band. Of course it is marked for “receive use only.”

Threw a dummy load on the Ranger and measured some AM output. 40 watt carrier with over 150 watt peaks.  Did the same with the Cobra and it was doing a simple 4 watts.

What was curious was a device labeled “Wilson power supply & pre-amp.”  Coming off the unit was a 120V 3 prong cord. I thought it curious that a power supply would incorporate a pre-amp. I turned the device around and instead of seeing DC output terminals I see a pair of SO-239s. Plug it in and turn it on and an orange glow comes from within. Hmmm. Certainly not like any power supply I’ve ever seen. So I crack the case open and find a basic linear powered by a pair of 6JE6C tubes.  Oh well, CB’er gotta CB.

Some pics:

Wilson amp:

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Cobra 2000 w/ UFO:

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The battery from the Astatic mic. Apparently it’s legit for radio use:

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The Ranger 3500 and its mod board:

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Hah! Noticed the face plate on the amp was sitting a little cockeyed. When I pulled it off I find this:

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So that seems to make a little more sense.

That’s hilarious.

Stealth leen-yar.

Those 6LQ6s are going to give about 100 Watts output, and that's under ideal conditions and pushing the hell out of it.
My 1970 ARRL Handbook shows the max. ratings to Vp=175 Volts and Ip=95 ma.

The amp gave me a craving for Underwood Deviled Ham on saltine crackers.

In the first picture I recognized what that was. I thought to myself, "back in the day we called those linears".

I've got some potted meat in the pantry. I think I'll add in some sharp cheddar and dill slices for lunch.

Very nice.  Brings back a few memories.  The face plate is priceless.

More than one fella had to scramble and hide his linear in the closet when the FCC van drivers came knocking.

Apparently those tubes were for the horizontal sweep driver in TVs back in the day.  Can't image there'd be any strange harmonics coming out of this thing.  No, none at all.

The linear was on a shelf in the closet.  I'm guessing he originally ran that with the Cobra 2000 (free-banded of course) and once he had the Ranger 3500 with the 40 watt carrier and 150+ watt modulated output he no longer had a need for it.

That Cobra actually had a nice sound to it.  Didn't have a proper mic to talk but the Rx audio sounded good.  Well, except for the content of the audio.  It was CB after all.

CB is very educational around here. There is one lady who has taught me a few things. At my age I thought I knew every swear word. Not even close!

Back in my CB days the Cobra 2000 was the radio to have.

Especially if you splurged for the twin external speakers.

Plug in an old Astatic Silver Eagle mic, a Moonraker beam

on a 50ft tower and you were king!

I never really liked the Ranger 3300/3500 series nor the

RCI 2950's. I was a Uniden HR-2510 guy.

The old linear can be cannibalized for it's power supply and chassis

if you ever get the urge to build a tube HF amp.

You could convert it to, say, 20 Meters and drive it with a QRP rig. Run the tubes within their ratings and you should be able to get ~50 watts out without distortion.

As a kid op we had a CB dude with a heck of a 2nd harmonic in the 6M band.

Id be interested in that Ranger AR3500 if its for sale.