The Aircraft-Radio Service Man
October 1937 Radio-Craft

October 1937 Radio-Craft [Table of Contents] Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Radio-Craft, published 1929 - 1953. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.

As a life-long aircraft enthusiast, my attention is always drawn to photos, drawings, and titles in articles dealing with any aspect - but particularly a historical aspect - of aviation. This 1937 edition of Radio-Craft magazine reported on the fledgling field of aircraft radio maintenance, and in particular the opportunities presented to radio repairmen. Aircraft electronics (aka avionics) have of course changed significantly over the last 80 years. Accordingly, maintenance has become such a highly specialized skill that other than swapping out entire pieces of equipment, relatively few facilities exist that are qualified for the task. According to the article, at the time there were a mere 5k privately owned airplanes. As of 2019, the AOPA estimated a total of around 220k private aircraft (down from 224k in 2011), with 720k currently licensed pilots (all categories) per the FAA.

The Aircraft-Radio Service Man

N. H. Lessem

Most radio Service Men fail to realize the excellent business prospects that lie in "private" aviation - per the author's Table I.

Millions of dollars have been spent and are being spent in developing aviation; radio facilities constitute one of the major factors in dependable aircraft operation that has received more than its share of financial backing.

As a result, intensive work by "flying laboratories" and land crews connected with the larger transport companies has produced discoveries and equipment of great importance. Radio has greatly increased the dependability of commercial air travel, and the basic new developments of the large aviation companies are gradually being adapted to the needs of the private flyer.

At left is reproduced a suggestion, by Radio-Craft, that appears in colors on the cover of this month's issue, which portrays only one activity of the aircraft-radio Service Man. (See Table I - "Sources of Revenue for the Aviation-Radio Service Man" - for a more representative, visualization of the subject.)

We wish to point out at this time that, merely because the number of aviation-radio receivers in use is small compared with the number of home-radio sets, it should not be pre-supposed an excellent living cannot be made servicing aviation-radio equipment. In the first place it is almost a matter of life and death to maintain the radio equipment in perfect operation; regardless of the cost, within reasonable limits, this apparatus must be kept in perfect shape, and therefore since the servicing demands are relatively limited it becomes evident that this type of radio servicing commands considerably better prices.

Equipment Requiring Service

The itinerant flyer may have in his plane only the simplest of radio equipment - perhaps only an aviation weather broadcast receiver and not even a transmitter. On the other hand, his equipment may be so comprehensive as to include a beacon receiver, aviation weather receiver, and a so-called auxiliary beacon receiver capable of all-wave reception and thus permitting reception of broadcast programs; and, a directional-loop antenna that in conjunction with one or another receiving sets permits taking cross-bearings from either beacons or broadcast-station signals. This receiving equipment plus a 1- or 2-way transmitter for both code and telephone operation may comprise the more inclusive radio set-up.

The Department of Commerce reports that there are approximately 1,000 private and public landing fields (soon, many more - including emergency landing fields - will dot the land); and approximately 4,750 privately-operated airplanes. Since all the commercial airplanes have their own radio service crews it is unlikely that the average aviation-radio Service Man will have much opportunity to make repairs to the radio equipment of such installations - except, perhaps, in a case of extreme emergency.

Space does not permit the lengthy discussion that would be necessary to completely analyze the faults and remedial measures connected with private-aviation radio servicing - books have been written on this subject alone - suffice it to say that antenna and counterpoise systems, battery - and generator-operated radio transmitters and receivers and their respective types of current-supply systems; and even in the more modern installations, private communication systems between pilot and co-pilot or passenger, all come within the range of equipment that must be kept in top-notch condition, regardless of (reasonable) expense, by competent radio Service Men.

Posted September 19, 2023
(updated from original post on 9/15/2016)