Anyone else like Vacuum Tubes

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^^If the OP knows nothing about vacuum-tube designs and how to restore them successfully, he shouldn't attempt it unless he plans to learn as much as he can beforehand.

These designs involve high voltages, and older sets often had no isolation from the mains ("live chassis"). I don't encourage amateurs to attempt restoration without a good deal of foreknowledge.

Umm I dont mean to be perverted but lol nevermind lol

Agreed, I also recommend that after spending much time reading up, I would find a cheap post-War AC-DC set to practice and build confidence on. You'll be glad that you did.

Also, I just noticed, but one complicating matter on your set is that that chassis appears to me to be from a a 32 VDC 'farm' set. There is no power transformer and it includes a box that likely held a vibrator, used to 'pulse' the DC so that it will work with other transformers in the set. They were used in places where 110 VAC line power had not yet been extended where the farmer instead used a (now called) 'wind turbine' to charge a 32 volt battery. Unfortunately, these power systems used the same plug design as used on regular North American AC mains and MANY of these sets had one or more of their tube filaments blown when clueless people plugged them into regular outlets to 'try them out'.

OTOH, when restored and with a proper 32 VDC power supply, these sets are especially sensitive, good performing radios due to their intended use in places far from built-up areas - needing extra ability to pull in fainter signals.

Good luck!

Mike

Actually what you are referring to is the line-bypass capacitor(s), which are there to 'bypass' spurious signals from the hot wire from the power line to either the ground (on a transformer set) or to the neutral line wire (on an AC-DC set). They are one of the many capacitors in old radios that should be REPLACED as part of a normal course of restoration. The normal replacements are modern 'Y-2' rated safety caps for 'line to ground' use and 'X-2' rated safety caps for 'across the line' use. They are called 'safety' caps because they are designed to fail 'OPEN' and not 'short', thus offering a level of safety to either the user (as in the Y-2 caps) or to other equipment (as in the X-2 caps). They are not expensive.

For transformer-based set, I normally do install a new three-wire cord with the ground wire providing the important antenna ground that was originally done with a separate wire that was tied to something like a plumbing pipe. It also does that double-duty as a safety ground. These cords are about $8 each at any building supply or other similar store as brown extension cords, just cut the 'female' ends off and solder them in - they look and work great. I also add line fuses if they were not originally installed by the manufacturers.

For an AC-DC set, there is no way to wire a three-wire cord in to those, so I normally just use a new polarized two-wire cord and rewire the power-supply end of the set for maximum safety.

Mike

Hey, Wisguy,

Regarding caps (X2, Y2--whatever it takes ), did you ever fix TVs? Remember this little bit of nastiness?

http://www.electronicskb.com/Uwe/Forum. ... afety-caps

But from what I recall, it wasn't excessive yoke current, but rather excessive 2nd anode voltage (which would skyrocket to nearly 50kV when the "safety" cap failed--should have been only about 25kV nominally), causing internal arcing and mechanical failure of the CRT at the neck due to thermal stress of the glass.

I do recall replacing a few of the faulty caps, and applying the stickers to the rear of the sets.

I would love to see that 16mm film referenced therein...

I never touched TVs, only radios (I am only a mild hobbyist, not a professional technician). Thankfully, the highest voltage a tube radio line bypass cap will face (at least in North America) is about 125 VAC, not the multi-kV range of a CRT.

Mike