Full Set of Heathkit Books by Chuck Penson WA7ZZE
I certainly am the last one to the party when it comes down to this great set of books.
First of all, I love Heathkit, If I was asked for any single company to wonderfully come back to life and start trading again, then top of the list would be ‘Heathkit’, sadly I missed out on the good times, we had ‘Maplin’s’, a now a long dead company as well as others like ‘Cirkit’, and ‘Radio Shack’, or as we called it ‘Tandy’, all very tame when compared to the monster that was Heathkit.
Now living in the UK and especially living in the back end of nowhere, i.e., a remote island in the middle of the Irish sea, my chance of coming over any Heathkit bits and bobs is less than 0%, basically I do not see enough kit for restorations, let alone something that would have come out of a factory in the USA, all I will say is thank god for eBay and overpriced auctions.

I have been lucky to pick up a few small items, but most of these have been tinkered with and even butchered, I even had the Outer Case with no innards at all or the opposite, But as I love a Restoration and most of my humble collections have been fully restored now, but the really good stuff still alludes me. What I would do to have a Capacitance Tester, Audio Class C Amplifier, or any of the great but kind of deadly Linear Amplifiers, to think that all of these items were sold as kits, and they made so much Test Equipment as well, I really wish we had a company such as Heathkit now.
So I always tried to find documents such as Schematics, manuals and all the other goodies and for me I found tracing out the schematic in a new software package would give me a better understanding of the circuit that I was restoring and every time I came across a part that I did not understand, I would have to hit the research button to find out what and why the part was used for. I have forgotten most of my CGLI Electronic Servicing Parts 1,2 and 3, and the repair work that I used to get up to in the Signals but most of this I have forgotten, and it is only in the last 10 years that I have come back to the hobby that I really enjoyed, I use to think it was Amateur Radio, but it was more the restoration of Amateur Radio equipment and especially Linear Amplifiers that I seem to really enjoy.
But I wish I had more books like these, quite a few books got jettisoned from my favourite bookshelf for these to take their well-earned place.
Download and look over the samples above, and PLEASE, check out Chucks Website, just do a Google search for ‘WA7ZZE’ or click on the button below to get your own set of these great books.
At the end of the days I have always liked a Book in my hand as opposed to a downloaded dopy on the screen, it just feels right and I find them easier to read, that is half the reason that I love to back engineer old equipment when I get something in to restore, I will redo the schematic and then print it out complete with the odd Bridge Rectifier that is the wrong way round, kind of an in joke here that I really should sort out one day, but I am kind of drifting off my thoughts here, what I was trying to get at here is that if anyone remotely reading my dribble who is interested in restoring anything like Heathkit gear, then you really need to get hold of these books, you really would not regret it, Chuck has done a grand job and you will not find anything better out there…
Last Updated : 17th October 2024