Brunswick 5KR restoration

[bandersen]

Thanks for the tip. I found the fault at the grid of the 2nd stage. That bare wire should be soldered to the coil lug next to it


I made the repair and fired it up again. It's much louder now and the volume control definitely has an effect.
I can't cut the volume down to zero for strong local stations though.
Also if I turn the volume up loud, the set starts oscillating then cuts out altogether.

I've never operated a set like this before so I'm not sure if that's normal or I should keep tinkering.
There's an RF compensating I can fiddle with and I could replace the original caps on the RF coils and detector with modern micas

[holmesuser01]

My radio volume won't reduce to zero, either. But, it needs to be restored, so I dont go by anything mine does.

[Reece]

That was often a problem on sets of this era, no AVC, so some had a local/distance switch on them to introduce more resistance or by some other way attenuate the signal coming in.

Edit: also, I recall that a good ground is essential on a radio of this type: the volume control can't "short to ground" at the bottom if there is no ground connection. Also, do you have this file? good info on how to stop the squealing, etc. and it says the set doesn't like a long antenna.

http://www.fyrbotlz.com/files/Radiola_18.pdf

And another (you probably already have)

http://www.nostalgiaair.org/referenc...adiola18-2.htm

[bandersen]

Thanks for the info. Adjusting the compensator capacitor and using a ground made a big difference.
I'm just using the ground in an AC outlet and I bet a "real" ground would work even better. The antenna is only 3' long and pulling in all the local stations well.

[Reece]

That's great. See how it does late night picking up DX. Might need another 10 ft. of wire. Folks used to hook onto the window screen for an antenna.

[holmesuser01]

I installed a single wire antenna that stretches east to west across the interior of my attic. I also have a TV antenna, and rotor up there. Cant use it for much else. Roof is rather low.

My Fairbanks Morse will pick up alot of stations when I use this wire as the antenna.

[Reece]

As a kid I had a workshop in the back yard back home and wires up in the air stretching from tree to tree. Now over the past dozen years or so I was collecting antique antenna insulators so a few years back decided to put up a long wire as in days of yore. Used two ribbed glass insulators and #12 black plastic insulated stranded copper. Stretches from the top of the chimney which is about 30 ft. high and runs 60 ft. out to a 20 ft. high pole at the back of the garage/shop. I have lead ins at both ends for use in shop or house. It yanks a lot of juice out of the ether.

[bandersen]

I found this stuff called "Liver of Sulphur" at a local Dick Blick art supply store. It's formulated to darken copper.
I first gave it a try on some pennies. The first attempt with a dirty penny came out splotchy. The second was polished with Noxon first and it came out great. I'll polish up that trim piece next and try it for real.

[Reece]

I never thought to look in an art supply store for liver of sulfur, which is why I went the boiled egg route. Making a note to check at Michaels locally. Another way is to hang the piece on a tree branch and wait for pollution to do it, if you've got lots of time.

[bandersen]

It's just a few dollars and you mix it one tablespoon to one cup of water so a little bottle will darken a whole lot of copper.

I discovered a few things while experimenting last night.

First, it works great on very clean copper. Any contaminants make it splotchy.

Second, liver of sulphur doesn't work on brass - only copper.

Third, I was wrong about my trim pieces. They're not brass plated copper - they're copper plated brass! I don't doubt they did this to get the nice dark brown surface possible with liver of sulphur.

Unfortunately, some of that copper plating is gone do to over polishing so I can't get a nice even dark surface. So I'm just going to clean up the original trim the radio came with for now.
I'm considering getting some copper sulfate (Zep root killer) and re-copper plating the new trim I picked up so I can darken it properly.

Finally, boy does this stuff stink!

[bandersen]

While I ponder what to do with the trim, I finished off the electrical restoration.

[Reece]

I used to copper plate with copper sulfate and it's pretty easy.

[Phototone]

As a side note, if you are stringing an outside long wire antenna from your house to a pole, or a tree, on one end between the insulator and the pole (or tree) you should have a rather stiff spring, so that when the pole (or tree) sways in the wind, it won't snap the antenna wire.

[Reece]

I have the insulator at the pole end of my antenna hooked to a flexible wire that goes through a brass pulley and then down and wrapped around a cleat. I can untie this wire from the cleat and lower the antenna to the ground if I ever need to. The pole (and obviously the chimney) don't sway at all in wind and the antenna has survived some ugly ice storms. Trees are another story: some use the pulley arrangement and a spring, others a sash weight on the down rope to allow for the trees swaying.

[bandersen]

Good tips. I have an attic directly above me where I could try running a long antenna - probably about 50'.

I picked up a reproduction dial scale and speaker wire from "The Radiola Guy".
The speaker wire is very flexible. Just like the remnants I found in this Brunswick model "A" and an RCA 101 speaker. Nice stuff