Gorleston Vintage Wireless

Phew!

Phew! After Christmas and a few hectic weeks I finally had a chance to get on the computer and add my latest sets!!

Firstly, a 1925 Dousona record player (Needs new bearings) This was a christmas present

Secondly an Ultra Coronation which Chris kindly purchased for me as a christmas present!

And lastly I bought a Pye P76, Pye P75 and Murphy U168 for £10 each!

One word… Rubbish!
I had an old £99 shed bought from Focus around about 10 years ago. It was dry but not very solid, and the floor was rotten. I thought, I would go for another cheap shed thinking it sohuld last until I get my own house.

How wrong I was!

It arrived, my dad picking it up. Instantly, we saw the flimsy plastic roof and how warped and thin the panels were, but they wern’t all that thinner than the older shed so I didn’t take any notice.
After assembly, it was clear.. The panels were warped with 2 inch gaps between them and large holes everywhere. I used two tubes of sealant just to get the holes bunged up!

It started off ok, Electricity fitted. But a few weeks after, Water started coming in on the corners around the supports. It was physcially wet to the touch.

In more recent weeks the floor has buckled and is now at a noticeable angle and every single panel is completley soaked on the inside to touch. The rain has obviously seeped through the panels.

We haven’t even had snow yet, this wasn’t really heavy rain either but every panel is soaked. The roof support is very warped and I doubt that will support the snow, Not to mention what else will get soaked when snow hits.

Most screws I put into the wood, snapped the WHOLE PANEL!

Below are some pictures and various attempts to sort the problems, As you can see… B&Q’s ‘Easy Fit Shed’ has now become an ‘Easy Sh** Shed’
Things inside would be better OUTSIDE. Only time will tell what else will materialise over winter.

This is what my poster looks like now

Valve Boxes

I have just finished designing a valve box net from scratch as I have 300+ unboxed valves and there isn;t anyone that does boxes the right dimensions for valves.

Final Design

So I designed my own, I first opened up an existing box and scanned it. I then re-printed it and made my first prototype out of paper.

I did the same with card and finally took to 2D Design V2 and re-drawed the net on 2D Design. I then added some text and printed, followed by folding, cutting and sticking and wallah!

I will soon be selling blank boxes like this on eBay by the dozen.

The final design open

Ferguson ‘Futura’ 388A

Another great eBay Bargain! £5 local pickup from Lowestoft. It was listed as working and it does on all bands! Even FM which is a first for what is a pretty early FM Radio (1958).
The FM is very quiet but it’s probably a high resistor. The Tuning Indicator sort of works?

This will make a nice winter project, there was another one of this model on eBay for Buy It Now £20, with a missing knob and it was missing the metal stand/handles.

The speaker cloth is not torn, it has been dyed at some point and the dye has worn off, so it has no damage.

GEC BC 3248L

Well, I got it in the workshop the other day (After finally finding time!) and first powered it up via the Lamp Limiter, Everything looked sound enough though someone had obviously ‘got at’ the cabinet.

It sort of worked, there was a click from the speaker every few seconds but no audible stations, Applying full mains made no difference. So I know the amp stage works but it seems something is up in the I.F stages so it requires further investigation.

GEC, Stella & McMichael

I purchased a Stella ST112U on eBay for £8.50 and a GEC BC 3248L for £4.99.. They were in Norwich, so we got a friend to pick them up (which saved on nearly £30 postage!)

The man also decided to chuck in a McMichael 855!! (Which many have commented on as ‘the best of the bunch’ etc.) The eBay user Donnie-Yen is highly recommended and seems to sell a lot of radio’s!

I have powered up the Stella (Which is actually a Philips in disguise!) via the lamp limiter and it worked well, though it seems to pick up interefence from everything! Including my TV Remote and my Laptop hard drive???

I have found all the valves for the GEC as it was missing them (Thanks to Malcolm Scott for the final two) So I will pick the last valve up from the sorting office and power it up tomorrow.

I haven’t tried the McMichael yet, At first I thought that it had a transformer originally and it was replaced by a dropper, but it would seem this chassis was used on other AC Only sets.

More as it comes!

Perdio 1962 Transistor Radio

This is in interesting set, It was found in my grandads garage after he decided it was time to gut it.. I bought home loads of rubbish (fans, clocks, a pillar drill etc).

It is also interesting in that it says ‘Perdi’ on the front but is clearly marked ‘Perdio’ inside? I’m also sure it was my nans who lost her battle with MS a few years back therefore it stays close to the heart and will not be sold.

Anyway I opened it up.. a PP9 Vidor Battery was more a pile of rust than a battery, I managed to force it out with a screwdriver. The case of this set is FibreGlass so was not damaged neither luckily was the PCB. I fitted a connector and plugged in a PP3. It was dead.. The first thing I ‘went at’ was the obvious, checking if anything was shorting. Which it wasn’t. Second point of call was the volume/ power switch. These are known to build up dirt over time which causes them not to make good contact. I squirted in a dab of contact cleaner and clicked the switch on and off a few times to spread it about.

I managed to get a sound (so it wasn’t dead!) but turning the volume up it died and I got 0V on the meter. So I squirted some more in and left it to soak properly. Came back 15 minutes later and hurrah! It was now working lovely. However I appeared to get a ‘bleep’ sound interference. It was probably something in my workshop but I cleaned the wavechanger anyway and when I used it upstairs I got all stations nice and clear.

I checked all the Electrolytic caps with my ESR Meter (Cheers David!) they all turned out ok.

I have yet to clean the knobs and tart it up generally but at least I know have a working Perdio. Little is known about the company which started in the 60′s in Japan as by 66′ they had vanished?

As I said, lots more to do but it feels nice to keep it going after such a long time (nearly 35 years) in a cold garage.

Rob Howard added:
‘Oh yes, meant to mention: Perdio radio was formed in the UK in 1955 by Derek Willmott and J D Heslop. It stands for PERsonal raDIO. The company went into liquidation in October 1965 due to influx of cheap Japanese sets.’

Welcome!

Welcome! This is my site where you get to read my ramblings about Vintage Radio.

I started restoring and repairing in October and love it! Learning new things everyday! Most of the sets I receive are from eBay and in generally good condition with a few exceptions!

EKCO U245

Well this was sent by a friend who was packing up radio’s. It already had a chunk missing (This set runs hot, hence the cracks and hole above the dropper). Some filler and epoxy will sort this then a smarten-up with some Vauxhall Brazil Brown paint. It’s a pitty to paint it as most of the bakelite is in good condition but there we go.

There is another small crack near the dial.
The first thing I did was open it up, it seems the volume pot had been replaced with a suitable replacement, also the mains filter cap had been replaced with a plastic RS therefore I felt I didn’t need to replace it. Also the dial cord has snapped, but this is a job for a winter day. I tuned it to Absolute and left it for the time being.

I checked some things and made sure nothing had gone pop the top of the chassis was covered in wax where the mains filter cap was so it had obviously gone bang previously and been replaced, they forgot to clear up the mess!

The set went on the Lamp Limiter first for around 30 mins with decent results, it seems that the volume control was not functioning. I then realised the two wires for the volume had been disconnected. I re-conected them and while the volume pot was out replaced the mains lead.

Hurrah! Full volume on both bands and it pulls in lots of stations! There is a small amount of distorting at the high-end of volume. This set had about 5 waxies inside, I forgot to stock-up so I cannot go forth any further at the moment.

I turned my attention to the cabinet. I knew I would need to fill and spray it (as I said earlier) but will leave this to my dad.
I secured the cracks inside using some Gaffer Tape. The back cover had a few holes but was in decent condition so I left it for now. I stripped the cabinet and realised how much nicotine it had collected since 1955. The speaker cloth was filthy but will be replaced in due course, The knobs were dunked in warm water with Washing Power in and left to soak for an hour. The cabinet was scrubbed and then polished with Brasso.

The knobs were retrieved and then scrubbed with a tooth brush and look good now!

The set was put back together and sits next to it’s younger brother the U353 on my RadioGram. It needs nothing really except a cap change and the hole addressing.

More soon!