Martin personally gave me a tour of the factories back in 2002. I got to see first hand things being made from parts. I overheard him pitching an idea to an engineer, and then a year later seeing the product reviewed in QST. I still use the clock he gave me.
MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
51–60 of 116 posts
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#52Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah, the letter didn't say whether they'd tried to sell the business, or find other management for it. That's definitely a question that comes to mind. (There might not be buyers, the business might not be sustainable, the company space might be built into their home, they might have to sell commercial real estate for medical expenses or to get their estate in order, etc. Or maybe they're preoccupied with personal m…
He was trying to sell the company. The scuttlebutt is he declined an offer from DX Engineering, which is a shame because that would've been perhaps the best match.
Indeed. DX Engineering is exactly what I would have thought as well. Half their catalog is MFJ.
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm a ham. I communicated with someone 8,000 miles away from me (Midwest US to South Africa) by bouncing radio waves off the ionosphere from an antenna I built myself using as much power as a light bulb. The hobby is definitely dying, but it still provides some awesome moments. Tons of nerds here would find it time well spent.
Incandescent or LED?
Probably the former but possibly the latter. Sometimes "conditions" are such that a tiny amount of power will go a very long way. Right now, near the peak of the solar cycle, 4 watt CB radios are sometimes heard thousands of miles away.
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#54It's a bit sad to make such a decision when you're almost 80. Realizing the importance of time with your family so late gives you so little time. A few years ago, I read about the regrets of dying people, and many of them related to spending more time with their families... That was one of the reasons I decided to close my company last year (after 20 years; I'm 45 now) and start over, working with just a few customer…
You have to be in a position of extreme privilege to even make a decision like that. I'm barely getting by and yet work more than I should. I don't have the option of just working less.
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Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#55Earlier quoted context omitted.
TONS of it. Everything you could need. Need a key for Morse code? A Morse code trainer? An antenna tuner? Antenna? Power supply? Test equipment? They had EVERYTHING. https://mfjenterprises.com/ If you’re a ham this is sort of like CDW or NewEgg closing, but they’re #1 by a massive margin and well loved. No one else had the variety of stuff they did as I remember.
My neighbor, around 1984 or so had what appears to be the LP-1009A antennae right by my bedroom. No one believed me when I told my family and friends that I could hear a person speaking French from my record player.
Where were you?
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#56MFJ had the coolest iambic keyer:
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#57Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm a ham. I communicated with someone 8,000 miles away from me (Midwest US to South Africa) by bouncing radio waves off the ionosphere from an antenna I built myself using as much power as a light bulb. The hobby is definitely dying, but it still provides some awesome moments. Tons of nerds here would find it time well spent.
Incandescent or LED?
Incandescent :)
It was FT8, which is a weak signal data mode. Very often you can make contacts hundreds of miles away using less than 20 watts.
However, I was probably using between 40-100 watts for that contact - you can't get much further apart on earth than we were!
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Incandescent or LED?
Probably the former but possibly the latter. Sometimes "conditions" are such that a tiny amount of power will go a very long way. Right now, near the peak of the solar cycle, 4 watt CB radios are sometimes heard thousands of miles away.
It might be possible those CBs heard that far away are actually 4 watts - but it's much more likely they're illegally boosting their output.
Still, you're totally right that in ideal conditions propagation can be astounding.
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Respectfully, this isn't true at all. We just do different stuff these days. We experiment with meshes, lora, digital modes (sometimes with internet backhaul, sometimes not), and other things like that. I just built a 5w 440 repeater small enough to mount in my VTOL and fly overhead for two hours. Ham isn't dead, it just looks different than it did for our grandfathers.
100% When I went to defcon in 2013, I saw all these kids covered in piercings and ink, studying for their exams. They grew up in a wireless world, except it wasn't about DX, it was all local stuff, low power and multi protocol. The tragedy of the ARRL was being too hardware oriented and not getting on board with open source, until it was too late.
Isn't the ARRL kind of outmoded these days though? Before the internet they were the US clearing house of all quality ham publishing and a great deal of organization. They had a big role to fill. Today, however, that communication flows independently on the internet.
I'm writing as an ARRL member that renews every three years. But I spend way more time learning from forums (groups.io, QRZ, blogs, etc.) and YouTube than anything the ARRL is doing.
Re: MFJ is ceasing its on-site production
#60I wonder what the ARRL is going to do for advertising. Half their ads were from MFJ and Ameritron. And sad for all the people in the Starkville area who have had jobs there for so many decades.
> I wonder what the ARRL is going to do for advertising. Half their ads were from MFJ and Ameritron.
They just stopped printing their monthly QST magazine at the start of 2024. It's digital only now.