Old radios
#1
Anyone out there like the old wood RCA radios (vacuum tube era) I have one that has a green "eye" that lights up the channel dial display picks up am, fm, and short wave. I like the old tall floor models from the that era, some like to collect the bakelite small radios but I like the old wood ones myself.

I recently picked up a book on basic theory of making simple am radio circuits including some that can use a pc as a tunner(with streaming audio nowadays why bother? Icon_lol) any ways I will be having fun with this book(I am an ohms and volts person)Now if I can only find an FM radio circuit book Icon_lol
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#2
A friend of mine that passed way about 6 years ago, collected radios. He had a few hundred. Really great to listen to the older radios, they had their own sound.

Here's the ebay search for Sams Photofact manuals (radio). You should be able to find an FM Scematic in here somewhere.. Big Grin Big Grin
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p3984.m570.l1313.TR0.TRC0.Xsams+photofact+radio&_nkw=sams+photofact+radio&_sacat=0&_from=R40">http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid= ... &_from=R40</a><!-- m -->

You may be able to find the "sams" manual for your radio too
But don't blame me if you spend too much money on these things Smile Smile Smile
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#3
Never thought about e-bay for Sams photo facts ,When I was a student at Devry back in 88-90 the campus library had a large collection of them you could look at them for free but could not leave the library with them but they had a copy machine with large paper so making a copy was less then trying to buy one. There is a sams book that I have been trying to find it is called Sams op-amp cook book has tons of applacations for op-amp circuits mostly small signal processing(mostly industrial control apps).
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#4
AF350 Wrote:There is a sams book that I have been trying to find it is called Sams op-amp cook book has tons of applacations for op-amp circuits mostly small signal processing(mostly industrial control apps).

Have you tried Radio Shack for an OP-Amp book?? I thought they used to have them.... But yeah, search for one on e-bay - the sams op-amp book may be there too Big Grin Big Grin
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#5
ngauger Wrote:
AF350 Wrote:There is a sams book that I have been trying to find it is called Sams op-amp cook book has tons of applacations for op-amp circuits mostly small signal processing(mostly industrial control apps).

Have you tried Radio Shack for an OP-Amp book?? I thought they used to have them.... But yeah, search for one on e-bay - the sams op-amp book may be there too Big Grin Big Grin


Yes RS has a hobby book on the 741 op-amps but there are a lot of op-amps out there I have both my text book from Devry and the RS book Icon_lol They are quite a versital IC (op-amps) used to take small signals(usaly in the milivolts and u-amps range) from various sensors and control large voltage and current circuits(fun stuff) the down side to them is RF noise can totaly wipe out the small signals if not properly sheilded. And they also make good pre-amp circuits and signal mixers.

I just might check e-bay for the cook book for op-amps by sams.
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#6
If you a nei search for "magic eye tube" that should bring up some information. As a old time nut, I can remember seeing a few tube sets with that as a tuning indicator. I used to use broadcast band tube receivers to listen to Jean Shepherd on WOR. Better selectivity and it would light up the room at night.

Just be careful if you use an older type tube set-- some of them had one side of the AC power line connected to the chassis.

If you touched a metal part of the radio and another device that was similarly wired - you could get shocked.

I have a Philco cathedral type AM tube set that is just for decoration. The wet capacitors have dried out and rubber parts have disintegrated.

I spent 17 years as an broadcast engineer at a Philly AM FM station.
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#7
6655321 Wrote:If you a nei search for "magic eye tube" that should bring up some information. As a old time nut, I can remember seeing a few tube sets with that as a tuning indicator. I used to use broadcast band tube receivers to listen to Jean Shepherd on WOR. Better selectivity and it would light up the room at night.

Just be careful if you use an older type tube set-- some of them had one side of the AC power line connected to the chassis.

If you touched a metal part of the radio and another device that was similarly wired - you could get shocked.

I have a Philco cathedral type AM tube set that is just for decoration. The wet capacitors have dried out and rubber parts have disintegrated.

I spent 17 years as an broadcast engineer at a Philly AM FM station.


I thought I heard that before about the chassis. I used to work for a company that refurbished cable tv equipment both set top boxes and the "line" equipment that went up on the pole. Anyway with the set top boxes we repalced all the electorlitic caps because of the drying up and the replacement caps had a higher tempature rating.

Will post a pic of the radio sometime today, all original parts except for the power cord.
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#8
Well here is a pic of the radio in its temporary storage spot along with some other electronic equipment(parents basement) when I move the radio over to my house it will be in the living room. That is an old desoldering station sitting on top the radio and an old plastic radio too. the other pic is my vacuum tube O'scope works as well.


   

   
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#9
Nice Pics!! Smile That radio looks great!!!
~~ Mikey KB3VBR (Admin)
~~ NARA Member # 75    
~~ Baldwin Eddystone Unofficial Website

~~ I wonder what that would look like in 1:20.3???
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#10
Love that scope, brings back memories of days of yore.. The first one I had was a borrowed one that weighted in at around 100 pounds and took at least two people to carry. Eek Then I bought a Textronics 635, still big, but probably only 50 pounds. It needed calibration, but they wanted to retube the thing first and there had to be at least 100 vacuum tubes in the thing so I passed on that. Nowadays, they're almost small enough to carry in your pocket.
Don (ezdays) Day
Board administrator and
founder of the CANYON STATE RAILROAD
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#11
EZ Days,

Mom found that scope for me at an estate sale in 88 was labeled as a fish finder Icon_lol she paid like $5.00 for it. When I got home from school I knew what is was right away being olive drab I am guessing it may have been military from 40's - 50's???? The saw tooth wave generator works great, the display is kinda touchy but does display wave forms. I also have a tube tester that was my dads, he was a baker by trade but also went to RETS to be trained on tv repair which he did on the side, I fixed an old tv or two myself but with all the changes in technology it is getting to be a throw away society Nope I miss the Heathkit company lots of great memories of kits including tvs for the hobbyists. Most of my electronics are still at mom and dads basement including my old work bench Icon_lol
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#12
AF350 Wrote:EZ Days,

Mom found that scope for me at an estate sale in 88 was labeled as a fish finder Icon_lol she paid like $5.00 for it. When I got home from school I knew what is was right away being olive drab I am guessing it may have been military from 40's - 50's???? The saw tooth wave generator works great, the display is kinda touchy but does display wave forms. I also have a tube tester that was my dads, he was a baker by trade but also went to RETS to be trained on tv repair which he did on the side, I fixed an old tv or two myself but with all the changes in technology it is getting to be a throw away society Nope I miss the Heathkit company lots of great memories of kits including tvs for the hobbyists. Most of my electronics are still at mom and dads basement including my old work bench Icon_lol

I still have a number of Heathkits, including a signal generator, frequency meter and a push-button multimeter. I tried to sell them at a recent yard sale but the right person didn't show up. I do use my scope and other meters a lot, I just don't have a use for the other things. That being said, I think that any Heathkit can stand up to most commercial test equipment. With everything now days on a chip, people will never know the joys of building a kit from scratch. I've built Heathkits back as far as in the late 50"s including stereo amps and test equipment. My workbench is split in half, one side for trains, the other for electronics.
Don (ezdays) Day
Board administrator and
founder of the CANYON STATE RAILROAD
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#13
I knew a couple people from Michigan that worked for Heathkit shortly before they went out of business Nope But if they did what they did to me the needed to go out business wise, I ordered 1 power supply kit and they sent me 2 of them Icon_lol I think I called them up and they said don't worry about it. They had good kits and had a good reputation but something had changed there at the end maybe not as many hobbyists as there were. I have seen a lot of electronic magazines disappear as well. Nuts and Volts is still standing, Make magazine is cool and covers all kinds of technology but I miss Radio Electronics that was my favorite magazine.

On my list of things to do is rebuild a test bench with upgraded equipment even if I have to build some of it from scratch Icon_lol

Trains have always been my 1st hobby, then came computers and electronics and then art and somehow they all feed back into the trains. The only hobbies I had that were not relatable to trains are raising fish and collecting Baseball cards, completely done with fish but occasionally pick up some cards of the Columbus Clippers(home town team) once owned by the yankees now I think they are owned by White sox.

We had(my late brother) had an old RCA wood radio that had push buttons but that radio got wrecked by the family cat the cat scratched the wood all to heck. Believe it or not you can still get vacuum tubes(newly made) that will replace just about any tube you can think of.
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#14
All though I got my degree in the post transistor era of electronics. Devry did teach a little bit on the theory of vacuum tubes as in some areas of electronics equipment still used tubes. So I know about screens, control grids, anodes and cathodes all internal parts of a tube also used to be able to read schematics for tube circuits the one people usually miss is the dot inside of a vacuum symbol tells you that the tube is actually a gas filled tube.

I had electronics in high school for 2 years at a vocational school, went to Devry for an associates degree right out of high school, worked a bunch of jobs from circuit assembly(boring), custom circuitry and industrial control applications and some TENS(muscle stimulators) and last electronic job was working on copiers. Other jobs I have had are printshop/bindery, Microfilm camera operator and entry level IT assistant(took a bunch of discombobulated pc's and built some working systems out of them) also ghosted a network of computers(that was fun)

I still have fun with electronics but as a job I did not want to even see a soldering Iron when I was at home Icon_lol


Will take a pic of the backside of radio as the old loop style antennas are kinda neat and there is not much circuitry compared to the total size of cabinet that it occupies.
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#15
Here are 2 pics of inside the old radio


   

   
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