Brand

Used Drake radios

Robert L. Drake, W8CYE, left Learavia in 1943 to start his own company in Dayton, Ohio, building low-pass and high-pass filters for hams and the military. Ten years later it moved to Miamisburg. Drake's first ham receiver, the 1-A of 1957, was designed for single sideband from the start, and after National, Hammarlund and Hallicrafters couldn't agree terms for the design, Drake built it himself. The TR-3 transceiver followed in 1963, then the 4-Line, with the R-4 receiver and T-4X transmitter twins, plus the L-4 amplifier and MN-2000 matching network that Drake's own history calls two of its most sought-after products. The B-line arrived in late 1967 and the C-line in 1973, still mostly tubes, before the solid-state TR-7. Drake's last receiver for hobbyists, the R-8 series, ran from 1991 to 2005, and Blonder Tongue bought the company in 2012.

6 models we cover.