Tube Radio Forum & Restoration

[winkydink]

I know that many of the phone enthusist on this forum are also radio enthusist.

Can you direct me to a similar forum for Tube Radios.

I have several tube radios sets and for a while toyed with the idea of trying to learn how to repair old tube sets.  My problem is that I have no electronics background and quite frankly electrocuting myself is NOT one of my New Years resolutions.  I respect electricity quite a bit, and that healthy fear lead me to vintage phone restoration.

Still, I have thought about acquiring and repairing and restoring some old radios, and would like to get some more info about it.

btw - I have a 1942 Philco (Model 42-PT94) electronically restored several years ago and I use it everyday at work to listen to various AM broadcasts throughout the day.

[LarryInMichigan]

That's a beautiful radio.  Working with radios can be somewhat more dangerous than phones because of the much higher voltages and currents.  Many if not most 1930s and newer radios can be made to work with capacitor replacement.  Capacitors are cheap.  There are some forums at: http://antiqueradios.com.  I have not yet had a chance to check them out.

Larry

[Bill]

There is a newsgroup at
rec.antiques.radio+phono.
The best folks in the hobby congregate there, but most ISPs are eliminating newsgroups. If yours is doing so, antiqueradios.com/forums is a good place too.

You might consider joining one of the regional clubs, such as NEARC, even if you are not living in the area. A lot of good people, and a lot of good advice, for a very few bucks. There is another one in southern Californaia - SCARS?

Bill

[jsowers]

I've been reading rec.antiques.radio+phono for 15 years. The traffic is rather sparse lately, but there is still some interesting discussion. I use eternal-september.org as my news feed (it's free once you register online) and Xnews as a newsreader program and it works beautifully. I read it every day.

I collected old console and table radios, starting when I was 12, and switched to phones because they were easier to repair and store. Radios do require a lot of parts and they suffer from age much more than phones. They were not made to last nearly as long as our phones, but were much more serviceable than anything made today. It still makes me feel old to realize I've had many of my radios longer than their original owners, since I started collecting them in 1970.

I've had two years of electronics servicing at the local community college (30 years ago--they probably don't offer that now) and still don't feel well qualified to repair old radios. I took many radios to the college as repair projects and learned quite a bit at the time. But I've been repairing computers so long that my radio skills are rusty.

Winkydink, I have a 1941 Philco very similar to yours, but it has two bands. It's very similar to the one my grandparents had, bought new in 1941 and still working when I was a child. It's pictured below and still sits in my kitchen next to that toaster. I got it for $5 at an auction sale and it has always worked fine and even has the back on it. I think Dan/Panther also has one. They were very popular in the 1940s.

The 1942s are probably rarer than most because the model year was cut short by WWII. I have a 1942 console Philco that I like a lot. It has the Music on a Beam of Light record changer, which was more of a gimmick than anything else.

[Greg G.]

I have a T-9 toaster like that too!  I was actually using it up until recently.

[Doug Rose]

Beautiful radio and desk.

Seeing Willie Mays in a Mets uniform is almost as sad as seeing Babe Ruth in a Boston Braves uniform. Both were just shadows of their former greatness. Say Hey!