06/19/2025
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1C7cAMML8G/?mibextid=wwXIfr
Life is full of surprises.
I got a recap kit from https://hayseedhamfest.com/ for a Hallicrafters S-38C. The complete kit, with electrolytics and connector caps, with shipping, was in the neighborhood of thirty bucks.
Everything was going great, until I encountered a .03 mfd cap that shouldn't be there. It's obviously factory installed, but the schematic says it shouldn't be there, and the kit has nothing close to it, because HH didn't expect it to be there, either.
An email to HH got an almost immediate answer from Tom, who said, in short, " Well, Hallicrafters did curious stuff like that. I'll send you a .03 cap today."
If you've ever owned a small business, you know profits are always thin, and sending a second mailing gratis knocks out whatever little bit HH cleared on the kit.
I offered to pay for the extra cap and postage, and Tom literally said "Nah, it's okay.". The cap was already in an envelope headed my way. Within five minutes I had an emailed invoice for zero.
I've dealt with HH before, and they have always been above and beyond in customer service and response time. But this? In today's arena of often unresponsive customer service, HH is a shining beacon. That sounds like an exaggeration, but it's really not.
If you fool with older radios, at some point you're going to need new caps. It would be a good idea to visit the HH website, and bookmark it. (May as well bookmark .Parts while you're at it.)
When one business recommends a related business, it means something, and I recommend Hayseed Hamfest.
