Recapped the Admiral! - Still having issues...

[Reece]

You'll hear a lot of good opinions about control cleaners and there are fancier cleaners for sure, I've got some of them. But I have also used a few drops of WD-40 on controls for years and so have a lot of other people, and it works for me. You don't want to soak a control with any product, though. I usually use CRC Electronic Cleaner available from auto parts, and then a drop or two of WD.

You may have an intermittent resistor or control causing the set to jump from static to quiet. The heat/freeze method should show up a fixed resistor. Turning the control slowly to all of its positions while wiggling the shaft might show up an intermittent. With set off, connecting your ohmmeter between center lug of the control and to either end and then slowly rotating it should show a smooth progression on the meter, not jumping around.

[VintagePC]

Keep in mind that the problem with pots is build-up of fluff... and some of that cruft comes from wear and tear of the control itself; which means you get carbon dust building up inside, on the wiper and track, affecting the resistance.

The idea is thus that a small amount of WD40 will get to this and remove it from the wiper path and wiper contact, while leaving the track generally unharmed- it's easier/faster to dissolve a powder than it is a solid block of something!

Yes, drenching things in WD40 won't do them any good, but a little bit probably won't hurt.

[RitchieMars]

I'm not sure what to make of my pots... I get a pretty smooth movement on my analog meter when I turn the volume control up and down, but I get so much weird static and pops out of my speaker regardless. I replaced that resistor I thought was acting up, but when I powered it up, I got this repeating tapping noise... the tap,tap,tap I've been getting lately as if someone where tapping the stylus on a record player. It taps more slowly on broadcast, and speeds up to machine gun speed on shortwave and phono.

I was getting some microphonics by tapping the chassis and I thought it might be a tube. I tapped the 2nd Audio Det A.V.C. tube ( 6SQ7 ) and got the static to pop in and out and make weird noises. Swapping this tube with the other 6SQ7 created a constant buzz. And when I turned up the volume, it's dead until halfway and then I got loud static, unchanging in volume. I turn a little louder, it goes quiet. Yet the pot seems to read fine on the ohmeter.

Lastly, something weird happened. After I powered up the radio and powered it back down a few times, trying these tubes. I put everything back in place once more and turned it back on. Nothing happened... no dial lamps, no heaters glowing, nothing. I flipped the switch back off, tried it again. Nothing. Finally I unplugged it, plugged it back up, and tried again, and still nothing. I turn the switch off, then on again... and it seems to turn on but I start hearing this "plink" sound near my transformer so I kill the power.

I feared it was either my transformer, or my 6X5 blowing and popping from the arching inside the tube. So I turn the chassis back over and power it up again just to make sure, and it powers up fine. The 6X5 is fine.

What in the world...?