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  #1  
Old 06-03-2005, 10:54 AM
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Telecolor 3007 Telecolor 3007 is offline
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Lightbulb Do you still use your old radios

Do you still use your old radios? Since I don't have money for an new good F.M. radio I still use my '50's "Grunding" Stereo 5107 U (no stereo decoder on) The bad thing about it is that is stereo 3D (it haves one big speaker in the front for the bass, one small round tweeter (in the front, too) and 2 medium speakers (one in the left, the other in the rigt)). No A.F.C. avalaible
I use the other one which haves A.F.C. and is normal stereo only as amplafaier, because it haves F.M. only on 66-73 MHz (I must get my hands on an F.M. C.C.I.R.-F.M. O.I.R.T. convertor)
Of course, bogts are tube radios.
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Last edited by Telecolor 3007; 06-03-2005 at 11:06 AM.
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Old 06-03-2005, 11:21 AM
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I don't use mine much they are more or less for display.
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  #3  
Old 06-03-2005, 11:41 AM
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RuSsMaN RuSsMaN is offline
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I use a couple of them. Not a 'radio' guy, per se, so I forget the models - but I've got a good size all wood Tube RCA in the kitchen that sees a lot of use.

I've got a small GE Tube (plastic) AM only job in the bedroom I get my weather / traffic / news off every morning.

Cheers,
Russ
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Old 06-03-2005, 11:51 AM
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The ones I use most often are older but solid state: an Arvin stereo from about 1969 & a Nordemende Transita portable from the late 60s. The Nordemende, in particular, really impresses me. I really don't use any of the other 300 radios piled up around here on any regular basis. Most of the good stuff is upstairs & I just haven't been spending much time up there lately. Not enough good stuff on AM, anyway. I plan on eventually fixing up a small console to put in my office. Recently I have had an RCA am/fm set in here that I fixed for a friend & it got lots of positive comments & performed great. I was leaving it on almost all day, on the oldies station, to drown out the awful top 40 junk they play in the shop!
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Old 06-03-2005, 05:32 PM
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I'm listening to the '80s station on my newly-repaired mid '50s Zenith right now, whilst working on building a battery eliminator so I can try out my Atwater Kent 30.
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Old 06-03-2005, 06:36 PM
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Do I use my Boatanchors? Oh, absolutely!! Rick Mish, the R-390A guru, recommends that R-390As be run as much as possible. They tend to get out of alignment if you DON'T run them. i've got a Grundig 2066 from the late '50s that gets run about every day. Running them is basically the point of having them, to me at least.-Sandy G
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Old 06-03-2005, 11:07 PM
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I have one I use a LOT.

It is my Philco 48-482, which is a large table model radio, am-fm, from'48. It has a 6v6 amp, and mostly loctal tubes(except the 6v6 and 5y3). I use it to listen to electronic music mainly, when I am at the computer, it probably sees an average of an hour or so a day.

However, even though this philco is BIG, and has a 6v6,(but only a 5x7" FC speaker), my little '68 model Sylvania SS radio, with 14 transistors, push-pull TO-3 outputs, and an accoustic suspension 4" speaker, can blow it out of the water, in sound(especially bass), and power.
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Old 06-05-2005, 03:53 PM
peverett peverett is offline
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I use some of mine at least once a week. I use both AM and FM tube type radios on a regular basis.

In fact, the only radio that I use more is in my truck(of course, it is solid state).
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Old 06-05-2005, 11:01 PM
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Most of my tube radios are used on a regular basis. Unfortunately, AM stations don't have that much of a variety to offer in my area in regards to music. AM here is mainly news, talk radio, spiritual programming... everything but music. Occasionally, I will find a distant station at night that will have "classic country" music on... that's about it. On Sunday mornings, one of the local AM stations plays Cajun music from 6 to 11 in the morning. If I get up early enough, I will listen to that.

I also play my tube consoles on FM on a regular basis. I have a CD player plugged in to one and use it all the time.

Actually, I don't have too much solid state equipment other than my stereo system in the main room. However, by today's standards, it all vintage gear as well.
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Old 06-06-2005, 12:45 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Telecolor 3007
I use the other one which haves A.F.C. and is normal stereo only as amplafaier, because it haves F.M. only on 66-73 MHz (I must get my hands on an F.M. C.C.I.R.-F.M. O.I.R.T. convertor)
I have a very old pre WW2 AM-FM radio. Emerson 460. The FM is on 41 to 50 MHz. This was the original American FM broadcast band, but this was changed to the modern 88 to 108MHz FM band in 1945. Something about making room for TV channels, but in reality RCA wanted FM to die to avoid competition for its new product: television. More details at my web page http://www.geocities.com/wa2ise/radios/fm45.html

Next weekend, as FM will have its 75th annerversary, there will be a special broadcast on 42.8MHz in the New York City area to celebrate. Using Major Armstrong's tower in Alpine NJ. Edwin Armstrong invented/developed FM.
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Old 06-06-2005, 11:07 AM
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Wow, for once I wish I was close enough to NYC to hear that! I have a couple prewar FM sets, though neither is working. (well, they might be, I never try the old ones like that without recapping)
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Old 06-06-2005, 12:58 PM
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My five Zenith radios don't see a lot of use, as there isn't that much to listen to on AM or FM radio in my area. Plenty of stations (the AM is full of stations at night; I like listening to an all-news station in Philadelphia [KYW 1060] for national news), but the FMs are mostly rock, country and one talk station (the last is one I don't get where I live now, though I did hear it very well at my former home); I listened quite a bit to NPR when the war in Iraq first started and was beginning to heat up, but lately I don't have much to do with anything below 92 MHz. I mostly listen to my own cassettes and CDs, in addition to two Internet radio stations (Radio365 and RealOldies 1690, the latter being the Internet webcast of an oldies station in suburban Chicago) and several digital cable music channels. I'd use my Zenith TransOceanic Royal 1000-1 more than I do if it were not for the facts that 1) I only have two places in my apartment I can plug the wall-wart adapter into (an outlet in my kitchen and one behind the desk with my amateur radio gear). The former isn't really the best place in the world to be using anything powered by electricity even though the outlets are protected by GFCIs; the latter is in my bedroom, and since I can't have my radios on very loud here it is very difficult to hear it anyplace else in the apartment when on, 2) I haven't gotten around to getting new batteries for it yet. When I do use that radio or my smaller Zenith R-70, or even my Zenith K-731 or my 1951 H-511Y, I listen to a big-band/standards station from Toronto. I also have a Zenith H-480W AM/FM stereo clock radio which I bought new in 1980; it works on AM but is very weak on FM ever since I cleaned the slide controls (volume, tone, balance) with contact cleaner (RadioShack brand, not Deoxit--I don't really know where to find the latter; I live in a small town with nothing in the way of electronics stores except a Radio Shack in the next town, five miles from here--there are no large cities, only small towns for the most part, in my area). Some of the spray must have gotten into the FM RF amp or some early signal stage and shorted a transistor or worse, as the FM is extremely weak (can barely hear it with the volume full on, though the stations are there).
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Last edited by Jeffhs; 06-06-2005 at 01:02 PM.
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  #13  
Old 06-06-2005, 09:17 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by wa2ise
I have a very old pre WW2 AM-FM radio. Emerson 460. The FM is on 41 to 50 MHz. This was the original American FM broadcast band, but this was changed to the modern 88 to 108MHz FM band in 1945. Something about making room for TV channels, but in reality RCA wanted FM to die to avoid competition for its new product: television. More details at my web page http://www.geocities.com/wa2ise/radios/fm45.html

Next weekend, as FM will have its 75th annerversary, there will be a special broadcast on 42.8MHz in the New York City area to celebrate. Using Major Armstrong's tower in Alpine NJ. Edwin Armstrong invented/developed FM.
You can still hear things like baby monitors and the like on the 41-50 MHz range of your Emerson 460, and all other prewar FM radios which had this band. The tuning range of most of these radios goes a little above and below what the tuning dial would have you believe (the actual tuning range is maybe 39-51 MHz or something like that), so you could probably even hear ham radio activity at the low end of the six-meter band if there is any in your area. If you can fudge the high end of the dial on your set so that it will tune to 52-54 MHz you might be able to hear 6m FM repeaters, again if there are such near you (6 meter FM was pretty much overshadowed by similar repeaters on 2m in the late '60s and beyond; now, 6m FM is likely all but dead).

I certainly hope you were kidding when you said that RCA was trying to kill off FM radio, or at least wished it were dead. I do know that the 44-50 MHz range, once assigned to television as channel 1 (many early postwar sets had this channel on a 13-position tuner), was eventually reassigned and is now the hams' 6-meter band (after a bit of realignment of frequency bands after the war). But I never dreamed that RCA was actually hoping the idea of FM radio broadcasting would be a passing fancy and would fade away eventually. If so, they were in for one heck of a surprise (and disappointment, no doubt) when FM on the then-new 88-108 MHz band became the huge success it is today. Stereo FM (no one ever calls it multiplex anymore, although that is the technical term for the standard), SCA, and now a new thing called high-definition digital FM (there is exactly one[!] such station in Cleveland)--the medium is nothing like it was when Armstrong pioneered the system in 1947. Now, if FM broadcasters would start carrying something other than noise on their stations (which is what a lot of modern rock music is these days), the medium could again be a vehicle for good-music broadcasting, which is probably what Armstrong envisioned FM radio to be in the first place. It is too bad, IMO, that FM stations use easy listening only as a way to get the station on the air initially; this automated format lasts maybe a few weeks or months, then another broadcasting company buys the station and boom--out goes the automated beautiful music and in come loudmouth DJs and so-called "music" by rock groups no one under the age of 18 has ever heard of. Cleveland lost three of its best FM easy-listening stations this way in the last twenty-five years or so (with the last one going rock just 15 years ago), so now almost every station in the city is rock or some variation of it. Hardly what Mr. Armstrong had in mind.
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Old 06-06-2005, 11:18 PM
peverett peverett is offline
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According to a PBS show that I watched, RCA was not trying to kill off FM, just Armstrong's FM business.

They even designed the ratio detector to get around Armstrong patents. However, this did not work forever as the US Supreme court ruled that they and most other companys violated his patents and had to pay his widow (he had committed suicide-partly because of his fight with RCA) quite a sum of money.

The only major manufacturer that I am aware of that did not violate his patents was Zenith. I have great respect for the leaders of that corporation at that time. I have only disgust for the leaders of the other electronic companies, especially RCA. Sarnoff was truly what FDR had in mind when he said that most business leaders were "Atilla the Huns in suits".
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  #15  
Old 06-07-2005, 12:33 AM
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Jeffhs Jeffhs is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Sandy G
Do I use my Boatanchors? Oh, absolutely!! Rick Mish, the R-390A guru, recommends that R-390As be run as much as possible. They tend to get out of alignment if you DON'T run them. i've got a Grundig 2066 from the late '50s that gets run about every day. Running them is basically the point of having them, to me at least.-Sandy G
Gee whiz, I learn something new every time I visit these AK forums. I didn't realize that the R-390A receivers will actually go out of alignment if they are not used on a regular basis. What causes that? I was always under the impression that, once a radio was properly aligned, the adjustments would hold indefinitely, whether or not the set was used.
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