My receivers since 1963
When I was introduced to DX-ing back in 1963 I had no money of my own and I had to use the family radio, a Grundig valve receiver with 6-20 MHz shortwave in one band with a dial accuracy around 200 kHz!!! Later I bought my own Luxor reciver with the 25, 31 and 49 meters shortwave bands spread on the dial!

TRIO 9R-59 and ER-202
 
I had a summer job in the construction business in 1964 and saved some 100 $ and bought my first communicationsreceiver, a TRIO 9R-59 from Japan. It covered 0,54 - 30 MHz. It had nine tubes, Q-multiplier and SSB!!! It drifted a lot. It was quite sensitive in the AM bands. My next receiver was a Trio ER202, the follower of the 9R-59. The same RF stage but much better oscillators and mixers made it much more stable. Drifted just 2 or 3 kHz in the tropical bands.

My first communicationsreceiver

Top perfomance receiver

Lafayett HE30/Trio 9R-59.

Hammarlund HQ 180A.

Hammarlund

 
Hammarlund had a very good reputation in Sweden and when a small firm in Malmoe had a used HQ-129 for sale I bought it at once. It had a crystal filter at 455 kHz with just one crystal. Selectivity was not as good as expected. I soon swapped it for a HQ145. I still was not very impressed by Hammarlund. Then I found a Hammarlund HQ-180 in a shop in Gothenburg. This was a really good receiver with a productdetector and good filters in the 60 kHz IF. It was a triple heterodyne receiver with 3035, 455 and 60 kHz IF. It had good shapefactor and a nice notchfilter. I really regret I sold it! With a good modern 455 kHz ceramic filters it would have been a very good receiver for the AM band!

Worlds worst receiver Galaxy R530
 
A new receiver was announced! It was 100% solid state, better than 1 kHz readout, very sensitive and had 9 MHz 8 pole crystalfilters. It had a balanced RF amplifier and diode second mixer and PLL 500 kHz bands. It was not cheap but a used my last savings and bought it. The most stupid thing I have ever done. It crossmodulated whenever more than 1 station was within 100 kHz. I lost a lot of money when I sold it and bought a Drake R4B.

 
Time for  Drake R4B
My next receiver was a  Drake R4B with all extra crystals and the AM converter from Drake, soon rebuilt with extra MOSFET preamplifier. My Drake made a good job, even better when I modified it with a Sherwood filter in the first IF and a reciprocating detector (syncronous AM!!!)  Dial accuracy was better than 1 kHz but it was not very sensitive and it had some problems with harmonics from the VFO
  

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Drake R4B
1 Khz marks on the dial

EAC R-390A (similar to Collins)

COLLINS R390A
  
A DX-friend had an extra  Collins R390A. I visited him and made a comparison with my Drake and returned home with two receivers. I had some problems with a ballast tube but after some modifications the R390A turned out to be an exceptional receiver. I modified it with productdetector and phase locked AM + extra 3 kHz ceramic filters both in front of and after the original IF stages. It is still going b and functions very good, but it is too heavy to bring for expeditions so I bought a little less heavy  ICOM R71E with  PLAM, 4 kHz filter and  2,4 kHz FL44 filter.

The ICOM period
 

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ICOM IC-R71E ICOM IC-R75

Do you want to listen to this R75 in Syracuse New York?
 
I made some modifications to the R71. The original 6 kHz filter was of no use, replaced it with a 3,1 kHz CFJ455K4. I also bought a special 1024 kHz memory card from Willco This R71 is a very good receiver. Only drawback is some noisy oscillators and the fact that it drifts when I take it to the cabin where temperature when I arrive might be -25�. The audio via the speaker is not good, I always use the recording outlet.

My latest receiver is an  ICOM IC-R75 with 2,8 and 3,3 kHz extra filters and the DSP. I am very satisfied with this receiver. It is very easy to use and performs very good considering the rather low prize! I have made a comparison with my old R71E on a separate page.