Ralph Mowery wrote:

"MJC" wrote in message
...
In article , elson@pico-
systems.com says...
The problem is not the cost of ONE connector, but the distributors
make you buy 160 pieces minimum order! That does get expensive.


As a private individual repairing my own kit I have met that problem
too. If you can find a sympathetic salesperson you could try asking for
a "sample"...

Some of that has aslways been a sore spot with me. The companies should be
required to sell any parts to an individual to do their own repair.
I went with a man to help him pick up some boat motor parts. A man off the
street wanted to buy some small part of about $ 20. They would not sell it
to him. So we bought the part and then sold it to him. If not for us, he
would have had a hard time getting that part.

I have called some companies and received small parts with no problem.
Needed a special transistor for a $ 1500 radio. Called Icom and ordered two
of them and the postage and parts was about $ 5. No rip off at all from
them.

I once needed some microwave transistors from Rockwell-Collins. They
wanted $1500 each, and I had to buy 15 of them. The deliver date was
almost a year away. Needless to say, I scrapped a lot of their $4,000
radios. I replaced them with new Microdyne 1100LPR receivers for under
$1200 each. The new units were agile, with a digital tuner. The older
$4,000 units were tunable, but they needed an input filter for whatever
frequency you needed. We had a lot higher quality signal from the new
equipment, and it ran a lot cooler.