There has been some hopeful enthusiasm surrounding TenTec’s possible return to the market.
Background – TenTec appears to have been purchased by a holding group of hams who never identified themselves very much to the ham community before ending up in the portfolio of Dishtronixs. Mike N8WFF has been in control for some eight years, and outside of some rumored old-stock units finished and sold, the hasn’t been any volume of TenTec product available.
It is a testament to the brand recognition that hams recognize and have a favorable disposition about the brand, after a near decade of absence.
I wrote on QRZ.com:
While it would be wonderful to see a new TenTec product line, the “almost there..” hopeful claims are pretty long in the tooth.
Dishtronix’s TenTec has an upward road to introduce products:
- The former designs are long in the tooth
- The old designs are built around certain components which are past their End of Life, requiring new versions to be developed before re-release
- The communicated demand for a nostalgic re-release might not produce enough dollars to sustain a continued availability of new products
- The former brand infrastructure (support, repair, sales/distribution….) is gone and would need to be rebuilt
- The company appears to be a one-man band organization, which puts a risk/concern of succession into the mix
- The brand has been out of commission long enough that favorable recognition among newere hams is in question
On the plus side the brand left the market on favorable terms. No disaster product that took TenTec down like what happened to Heath.
But the big issue is if the pre-Dishtronixs, pre-Two Letter Named Holding Company, TenTec was not profitable enough to carry on, why would any relaunch suddenly be any better?
While I have a Jupiter in my shack, and my original Pegasus is in my storage space, my ham existence wasn’t damaged when TenTec rolled over.
The TenTecs gave way to a variety of radios, settling on Flex-6700s and classic vintage (Collins) for the most part. Elecrafts handle field work in my case.
YMMV but is it possible to make a five-star meal out of roadkill, no matter how fine the animal was before fate ran it over?
Thinking not, and thinking that TenTec falls right in there.
73
Steve
K9ZW
With Varying Frequency - Amateur Radio Ponderings 
For the current influx of younger hams (50 or younger), TenTec is just a word we might know. The 70-ish crew might talk about TenTec occasionally, but in the same vein as someone who talks about how the K3 was an amazing radio. There really does seem to be a pre- and post-COVID world in ham radio, and manufacturers that are struggling after COVID just aren’t on the radar. I don’t know a single person who takes the K4 seriously. People barely take Kenwood seriously. TenTec just isn’t in the discussion and I don’t see a path for that happening.
What is the goal of this reincarnated New Ten-Tec?
To support ‘legacy’ Ten-Tec’s, good luck, in trying to reverse-engineer to create solid schematics and alignment procedures (as old Ten-Tec promised and never delivered). EOL parts (redesign) and firmware source code will be a tall mountain to scale.
Create a new radio, again good luck, as what ever new TT creates needs to be a throw-away to compete against the Chinese. With new PCA’s likely being outsourced to China for MFG. Then add the man-hours of new firmware and PC program/APP creation. How will TT top the SDR or QRP world to give ‘cheap’ HAMs a reason to buy?
Is Made-in-America really true or is it Assembled-in-America?
My Pegasus is sitting on the shelf waiting for new life (that I know will never come). If the new TT is like the old TT I’d never buy another due to the old TT’s lame or NO support. Old TT never created a full set of schematics/BOM/Alignment procedure for their Pegasus/Jupiter. Suckers are born every day.
I have three Flex’s 1500/3000/6300 sitting on the same shelf as I’ve found my IC9100 & FT991 DSP-NR is far superior to anything the three Flex NR adjustable filters can do.