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Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2015 1:49 pm
by PETNRDX
Over the years I had collected MANY of the Motorola portable and pager products.
Kind of my own "museum". Sort of started with the radios & pagers I had either owned, or used in my PS carreer.
Then, like a fool, I gave or traded most of them away several years ago.
Decided to go back to collecting as many as I can, by trading with others doing the same, or maybe buying small or cheap items to fill out my collection.
I have around 60 different portables and packsets "again". And a few pagers.
So, wondering if anyone else is going to admit to doing this, and maybe we can start a trading thread on such things.
For example I am looking for : HT10, HT50, HT 200, HT220 Universal, HT100, MT500 VHF, MX300 VHF, STX, HANDIE-COM, P50,P100, P110, MTX 900 with KEYPAD, SP10, and any of the old pagers.
For my purposes, they don't really have to work, but it would be nice.
I have most of the newer stuff, and maybe one band for the above, so looking for the other bands.
I have some GE PCS era handhelds to trade, and SP50, HT600, MT1000, HT750, HT 1250, P110, GP300, GP350, M1225 and maybe even a Saber to trade.
Depends on what you have, versus what I need.
Trying to come up with "examples" with DTMF, UHF, VHF, LB, etc.
Also have SYNTOR, SYNTOR-X, X9000, and Spectra stuff to trade. Sys 90 heads, etc.
And have some Micor chassis that people doing cop car or apparatus restorations might be wanting.
Lets talk...

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2015 2:39 pm
by KitN1MCC
i have some P100 and Ht50

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 10:00 am
by Will
" And have some Micor chassis that people doing cop car or apparatus restorations might be wanting.
Lets talk... "

I have two Micor California Highway Patrol low band radios. No control heads. They do have channel elements.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 10:17 am
by alex
There is already a oddball's over the year thread that could possibly be added to. Do some searching.

Alex

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Wed Apr 15, 2015 10:55 am
by PETNRDX
I have been reading the oddballs one for years.
But, that is more of a "look what I found" and I am thinking more of a discuss and swap thread.
Its just a thought.
If no one is interested, then the thread will just get pushed off the bottom.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Sun Apr 19, 2015 4:42 pm
by d119
Will wrote:" And have some Micor chassis that people doing cop car or apparatus restorations might be wanting.
Lets talk... "

I have two Micor California Highway Patrol low band radios. No control heads. They do have channel elements.
I've got the cables, control head and microphone for that, Will... Save me one.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Sun Apr 19, 2015 6:38 pm
by PETNRDX
I really need to dig out my toters of SYS 90 heads...

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 20, 2015 6:42 am
by fineshot1
When i was in my early 20's i had a Pageboy II pager that i converted to carrier squelch
and re-crystaled to a local PD so i could listen while in town. The pager would be
in my shirt pocket and i could here everything well going on in town. I still have it
but of course its no longer needed as i live far from there now.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 20, 2015 12:55 pm
by PETNRDX
I did a similar thing in about 1976. A few of us got together and made up a small circuit board to put into the PageBoy ( Often called the Pageboy One).
It replaced the two reeds with a carrier squelch circuit.
We crystalled them up for our favorite agencies on UHF.
They worked really well.
I wish now I still had it.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 20, 2015 8:10 pm
by JRUTA
Wow, makes me wish I still had my first Moto! an original Minitor in "shadow bronze". 1980's. I was in my senior year of HS and was a Junior volley. We were all given old Plectrons. Me? I wanted a Minitor! I remember ordering it via phone lol. (rotary of course) and explaining to the rep what tones/reeds I needed (was a dual alert, and I was clueless) I remember drooling over the color brochure from Moto showing it in three colors. Wow, wish I still had that!

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2015 9:08 am
by mikegilbert
I'm also a collector of every day radios from the past few decades. For me, it's about getting radios I'd see in the hands of peace officers, municipal workers and others when I was growing up. I'm also partial to the DTMF variants.

I've been photographing all of mine in an effort to submit updated pictures to the main site. My goal is to document every variant of every Motorola made since the 80s.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2015 9:24 am
by PETNRDX
Wow. Great pictures on your site.
I have been thinking of a similar thing.
Plain photos of all the usual portable and mobile Motorola stuff as far back as I can find.
Needless to say, my photos would not be of your kind of quality. ( I have NO talent )
Just example photos of everything I can find.
Not sure if anyone would be able or want to "host" them.
And it seems like one would want to superimpose "Batwing labs" or "Repeater-Builder" in the middle of the photos so people can't steal them for use on other WebSites.
I am not sure how that is done.
But, it seems that would be kinda necessary anymore.
Not for the really common stuff, but like you mention DTMF versions.
Probably not very many high quality photos of earlier radios with factory DTMF.
I am already finding that storing piles of this stuff is problematic.
Maybe after I get really good photos of some radios, I will trade them off for others I don't have...

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Mon Apr 27, 2015 4:09 pm
by WB6NVH
There are a few of us who like this sort of thing. I have a lot of vintage gear in my collection and am working on assorted pages of specific two-way radio history at my website at http://www.wb6nvh.com

We have tried to get assorted groups going on Yahoo and QTH but they kind of fizzle out after awhile. Such as these Yahoo Groups:

Motorola-Metrum-Motrac-Motran-Mocom

Motorola_twin-v_and_t-power

Vintagemotorolaradios

There should probably be just a catch-all group called something like "Vintage Two Way" or "Vintage Land Mobile" that would cover all manufacturers. Link is not represented anywhere, nor is DuMont or obscure names such as Doolittle Radio and Industrial Radio.


Geoff
WB6NVH

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Wed May 06, 2015 5:21 am
by steveloomis
I have a couple MX330's UHF in working condition last time I used them many years ago. Interested in trade.

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Thu May 07, 2015 6:22 am
by PETNRDX
What sorts of things are you interested in that you might consider for trades?

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Fri May 08, 2015 3:58 am
by dearles
Also interested what you might like to trade for?

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Sun May 10, 2015 10:04 am
by desperado
Saw this thread and thought about something I have that is probably made of unobtainium. I have a MOCOM-70 head that is in the plastic. I have just the head, and it's missing the lower aluminum plate that the photocell mounted in and the photo cell. Any idea of value or where to try listing it besides here to sell it?

Re: Old portable and pager nostalgia thread?

Posted: Tue Jun 02, 2015 11:40 am
by NSPD
desperado wrote:Saw this thread and thought about something I have that is probably made of unobtainium. I have a MOCOM-70 head that is in the plastic. I have just the head, and it's missing the lower aluminum plate that the photocell mounted in and the photo cell. Any idea of value or where to try listing it besides here to sell it?
I just picked up a couple new in the box myself... 4ch with "extender".