Nice read and well put together article. I loved my RCI-2970 and have had the whole series and still have the rare first of them RCI-2900 also sold as Galaxy Uranus. I ran a 2970 and Antron 99 for years 30ft up on Tempe Arizona and worked skip all over in 2008-2012. I used to live in Black Diamond , Washington with an RCI 2990 and I had my A99 up 60ft and I was literally on top of the hill nothing but tree's between me and Mt. Rainer for miles ( actually the mt. rainer windows desktop image was taken from the street infront of my house on poplar street ) and I had an operator I have known since I was 15 whom I just really upset. He ran AM channel 6 the superbowl and I worked skip on 38 LSB ( 27.385 ) and triple nickel 27.555 USB ( yes freeband ) and we would go back and forth. Thus apparently ended his radio days , my neighbor was Prime Minister and I knew him from the past as Anthony Ray or Big Mike away from CH 6 and some know him as Sir Mix Alot. He ended up going with a Henry 7k to mate with his Cobra 2000. Not many people know he is a CB operator , look at Tim Allen too whom is a ham. I am much older now with a Yeasu FT-897 and Uniden 2020 with that RCI-2900 and a plethora of CB's and I spend most of my time on 20 meter listening to CW with the help of a laptop or android device along with RTTY typically RTTY 45. We need to get radio as popular here on steemit as crypto currency as its more important. I constantly am telling my medical drivers as I am 40 and disabled stuck in bed unless going to the doctor and if i can sit up I try to use the radio for an hour or so if possible with tubes coming out my body. If it wasn't for my love of radio I may have given up on life already , it gives me something to push to get up and enjoy and it sometimes takes me 2-3 days to be well enough and I watch the DX live map's wishing I could get up when its really active but usually miss the really fun times so honestly don't take DX and opportunities for radio and skip and DX and working on components and mods and repair etc for granted. I thought I would get on SSDI and relax and then with my lupus kicking my butt and botched surgeries and mal practice law suites along with shingles in my eyes and going blind I cherish every static burst and every dot and dash and chasing those signals in the back of the radio at my static line...