can any of you identify this truly amazing piece of American engineering?



I got to take a look inside one, with a guided tour by a _______ engineer... truly an amazing mechanical wonder. still the finest of it's kind-- better than any modern high tech variant! this 50 yr old box still sets the standard!

no wonder we won the Cold War. even when they captured one of these, the Soviets couldn't replicate it.

(I won't fill in the blanks or tell what it is unless someone correctly identifies it )

 

That is an old old wooden ship.



All kidding aside, that looks like a frequency detector for either morse code interception, radio communication interception, or vibration interception. Im not sure if I am correct, but the presence of a headphone jack indicates it is a listening device of some sort.

 

R-390A

 

cassette deck

 

Steve c is the man!

http://www.radioera.com/r390a.htm

 

Nice "This is no light panty-waste for sure..."

 

you are correct, sir

 

that link says it all.

if you guys could look in and see the gears within gears, and more specifically the asymmetrical cams (like rounded kidney & heart shapes, and circles with dimples)... that actually physically raised and lowered rocker arms attached to dozens of individual crystals (each tuned for a specific frequency)... a true marvel of engineering.

when I got to see what our finest RF engineers put together in the Cold War-- BEFORE modern computers! pre-CAD programs!-- I felt tremendous pride. I hold these guys up there in the same category as the engineers who designed the SR-71.

(where's that patriotic "salute" gif?)

 

i was gonna say it was a karaoke machine, but i would've been wrong.

cool machine though

 

edited