This article may be copied freely. THE FINAL CHAPTER OF THE RADIO RESTORATION by Jerry Proc VE3FAB After four years of intensive effort, I can safely state that the radio restoration project aboard HMCS Haida in Toronto, is for all practical purposes, complete. The main body of work is finished and all that remains is some minor antenna installation which has been scheduled for 1997. Enhancements and maintenance to keep all this vintage gear operational will continue into the foreseeable future. The activities in 1996 were not centered on any given radio room. Rather, it was a year of miscellaneous tasks. Some pieces of equipment which were bypassed for various reasons were made operational. Two examples were the Marconi PV500 HM transmitter and the Marconi FM12 medium frequency direction finding receiver. Both units were missing service manuals and these were successfully located this year. The remainder of the wire splicing in the radio remote control system was also completed. Haida's Coding Office, which is lacking the two KL7 crypto units, was refinished and converted into a display area which features some of the equipment fitted aboard the ship during World War 2 and the post war period. Examples of this gear include: the Marconi MSL5 low frequency receiver, the Marconi B28 general purpose receiver, the SCR 522 VHF radiotelephone and the TE236 low frequency receiver. In September of 1996, the RCN contributed an number of pieces of outdated equipment thus causing Haida's missing equipment list to shrink down to one unit. The only piece of radio gear that is now missing is the AN/SRC501 HF marine radio radiotelephone. Within the consignment, there were four TED3 transmitters which completed the 'fit' in Radio 3 and a AN/UPD 501 radar direction finding receiver which was installed in Radio 4. Since the navy is obligated to remove any PCB laden components prior to scraping any piece of electrical or electronic equipment, the UPD example we have cannot be made operational until a service manual is located. In spite of this, it's certainly nice to have the second last 'hole' filled in Radio 4. On the last day of the 1996 season, Jim Brewer and I erected the pair of 28 foot, aft whip antennas which were missing since 1963. These were removed from HMCS Mackenzie in May of 1995 by Keith Kennedy VE7KWK of Surrey B.C and temporarily stored at the residence of Tom Brent in Dewdney B.C. Tom's company, Versacold Services of Abbotsford B.C, donated transportation for the antennas and they arrived in April of 1996. Rod Pears VA3RP of Hillsburgh Ontario arranged for Sam Jones of Georgetown Ontario to come down to the ship and weld the antennas back together since they had been cut in half to facilitate transport. Now that's team effort! There are some statistics associated with the restoration. The fours years of effort can be translated into approximately 1400 hours aboard the ship and hundreds and hundreds of uncounted hours at home repairing, building and researching. In 1994, Jim Brewer, one of Haida's volunteers, came on stream to assist with wiring and his hours have been included in the total. Jointly, that represents about 171 Saturdays worth of work. To rebuilt the radio remote control system alone, it took 10 months and 4,000 wiring slices. A total of $2,850 was expended on direct costs and the author contributed $1,650 towards 'soft' expenses over the period. Some of the direct costs were offset with donations from radio clubs around Toronto, however, the Skywide Amateur Radio Club of Etobicoke, Ontario continues to assist consistently. This support is greatly appreciated and we hope that it continues into the future. 'Friends of Haida', a registered charitable organization which provides funding for many of the activities aboard Haida, was also instrumental in offsetting some of the costs. In total, there are 107 pieces in the radio system including four crypto units. In 1992, there were only 32 pieces on hand when I arrived on the scene. Junction boxes, cables and speaker enclosures had to be built. Missing equipment had to be located along with service and operating manuals. As of this writing, only the AN/SRC 501 is missing and I rather doubt that we will ever acquire the four missing crypto units. Efforts are still underway to secure photos of these devices. During the four year time span, a 184 page document titled 'Radio Systems Aboard Haida' was produced. This required two years of research to obtain the initial information and took roughly a year to process a major update. Work continues on a similar document relating to sonar, radar and IFF systems used aboard the ship and the RCN in general. What was achieved during the project? Today, the following systems are operational: UHF - All of the seven UHF channels have been made operational, however, since the equipment was designed to operate in the 200 to 400 Mhz military band, all transmitters have been fitted with dummy loads to prevent inadvertent transmissions. VHF - The ships TDQ transmitter is capable of operating in the 2 metre amateur band, unfortunately, no one uses AM any more so this capability sits idle. The companion receiver, the model RCK monitors transmissions from Toronto Island airport and the audio is piped to the bridge and operations room to simulate a naval communications environment for our visitors. Whenever Haida came into the St. Lawrence Seaway system, a temporary VHF set was fitted for purposes of communicating with other vessels within the Great Lakes. This function is now implemented using a solid state marine transceiver which is hidden from view but connected to the remote control system. Transmissions from pleasure boats on Lake Ontario and the Coast Guard station in Toronto are also piped to the bridge and operations room. REMOTE CONTROL - All of the fourteen radio Remote Control Units can switched to any of the Haida's twelve transmitter/receiver pairs. In addition, there is a complete intercom facility between the bridge, the operations room and two radio rooms. RTTY - Most of the radioteletype system is functioning. In today's world of modern communications, 60 WPM RTTY transmissions are not very common, but it's still possible to copy W1AW, the headquarters station of the American Radio Relay League in Hartford Connecticut. HF - The original four operating positions for receiving the HF naval broadcast have been restored complete with functioning CW keys and typewriters. One of the Marconi CM11 transmitters in Radio 2 will remain unserviceable because the trunking for the open wire transmission line was razed many years ago and cannot be recreated without incurring a great expense. DIRECTION FINDING - The Marconi FM12 MF/DF is now functioning, but one of the coax cables is defective and requires replacement. As stated previously, the UDP 501 radar D/F will remain unserviceable until a service manual can be located. It would also be proper to mention those who made a contribution to the project this year. Special thanks are extended to Cdr Bill Rupka of the RCN, who was instrumental in arranging for a sizeable contribution of equipment which was obsolete to the RCN. Name Location Items donated or sold ---------------------------------------------------------------- Frank Deluca Parry Sound, Ont. Dynamotor for SCR 522 radio Terry O'Laughlin Madison, Wisc. IE-36 test kit for SCR 522 Sid Lipkowitz Toronto, Ont. Receiver Switching Unit (RSU) Michael Hanz Heradon, Virginia Accessories for SCR 522 Don Smith Scarborough, Ont. FSC107 Freq. shift converter Bob Fugard Burlington, Ont. RCN Electronic textbooks Tom Brent Dewdney, B.C. AN/UPD 501 Radar D/F set Ken Lakin Redmond, Oregon RA62C Rectifier Jim Croll Oakville, Ont. CSR5 and BC348 receivers Cdr Rupka, RCN Halifax, N.S. Four TED3 UHF transmitters " " " " " Three AN/URR35 UHF receivers " " " " " AN/UPD 501 Radar D/F set " " " " " AN/SPA4 radar indicator Rod Pears Hillsburgh, Ont. FTDX100 amateur transceiver Mark Hovda Cedar Rapids,Iowa Hallicrafters HT11 manual John Scelo Barrie, Ont. AVO volt/ohm/millammeter Andy Guibert St.Leonard, P.Q. VK5 radar indicator John Dill Kingsville, Texas Info on KWR37 crypto receiver Sam Jones Georgetown, Ont Welding services John Brewer of Raleigh North Carolina (no relation to Jim), donated space on his Web page and wrote the HTML code in order to display photos of the restoration. For those readers with Internet access, the photos may be viewed at: http://www.mindspring.com/~johnmb/haida.htm Jan Skirrow of Duncan B.C., is now in the process of making the 'Radio Systems Aboard HMCS Haida' research paper available on his Web page. The document is currently under construction but will soon be available at: http://www.islandnet.com/~dma/Boatanchors What's in store for the future? As previously mentioned, enhancements to the main body of work will continue and the radio equipment will require on-going maintenance. The arrival of the two radar indicators means that I can now contemplate a partial restoration of Haida's main radar room while Jim Brewer tries to make the VK5 operational. Haida's amateur station, VE3CGJ, has laid somewhat dormant the last two years due to lack of operators. That situation will definitely change with the arrival of Bruce Baillie (SWL) and Rod Pears, VA3RP this year. Bruce spent much of his summer talking with radio room visitors and hopefully he will have his ticket by next season. Together with Rod, we hope to form a team which will keep the station very active next season. Was the expenditure of time worth it? You bet it was! In retrospect, the outcome turned out to be one of the most fulfilling and rewarding endeavours of my life. I also have to thank my kind and wonderful wife Dori, who graciously understood why it was necessary to devote so much time and effort towards this project. My thanks are also extended to Cdr. Bob Willson who provided me with much needed support over the duration of the project. Bob will be missed since he is scheduled to retire in December of 1996 after ten excellent years of service as Haida's Captain. It was also a great privilege to have been able to recreate a historical display which illustrates RCN radio operations from a bygone era and to commemorate all those Sparkers and Communicators who operated that equipment. --EOF--