I guess I am selling radios now...

[brandon7861]

My better half got mad last week because I always work on radios for friends, but I never make any real money doing it. So trying to settle her down, I said (and I shouldn't have), I'll just try to fix all the broken ones I've been given over the years and try to sell them on ebay. She took me too seriously and now thats exactly what she expects me to do. So first up is a lafayette hb-700. Its a bit rusty and not much to look at, but after looking inside and seeing that board, I like it! It even has two crystal sockets and I wish I had beter DDS skills because this thing could really be something with one of those plugged into the socket! (edit, i think its vhf only there). I almost want to nickel electroplate the covers, not sure how far to go with it or if its even worth it.

Heres the before. Whether or not theres an after is still uncertain.

 

[brandon7861]

This thing has an adjustment on the back for the 54MHz trap and for antenna matching. I've never seen a transistor radio with that before, I'm too young I guess. I bet that ant adjustment would make getting a good SWR into an amp a lot easier.

 

[brandon7861]

There must be some serious chemicals in our atmosphere. I recapped the radio last night and decided today I would sand down the covers and bezel and repaint them. I am 45 miles from the nearest large town, nearest neighbor is 2 miles away, and there is only a slight breeze. The last time I saw that many fish eye's in paint was when someone used silicone spray on the door hinges in my old neighboors paint shop. Something is definitely in the air today. Anyone else having problems painting outside? This was never an issue for me 10 years ago.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

There must be some serious chemicals in our atmosphere. I recapped the radio last night and decided today I would sand down the covers and bezel and repaint them. I am 45 miles from the nearest large town, nearest neighbor is 2 miles away, and there is only a slight breeze. The last time I saw that many fish eye's in paint was when someone used silicone spray on the door hinges in my old neighboors paint shop. Something is definitely in the air today. Anyone else having problems painting outside? This was never an issue for me 10 years ago.

Do you live near Ohio?

 

[brandon7861]

No, I'm in northern MN. I was thinking about that train wreck though. Wind patterns have been really messed up with the collapse of the polar vortex. We had east wind the other day and now a storm warning. 12 inches of snow coming. Had enough snow for the year...

Going to sand it down and give it another coat tomorrow in the shed.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

No, I'm in northern MN. I was thinking about that train wreck though. Wind patterns have been really messed up with the collapse of the polar vortex. We had east wind the other day and now a storm warning. 12 inches of snow coming. Had enough snow for the year...

Going to sand it down and give it another coat tomorrow in the shed.

You are going to fix it up so nice, you won't want to sell it. If my wife made me do this, I would list them with my best "go away" price.

 

[brandon7861]

Yea its getting WAY more time than Ill ever be able to charge for it. After cleaning it up and recapping it, it still does not work. So now, I am going to print off a 3' wide schematic and get the crayons out so I know what signals/voltages go where and what to poke at. I'm having fun doing it, thats what counts. I expect the next one to be easier as this Lafayette was the ugliest in the bunch. Still not sure what to do with the damaged aluminum by the meter and vol pot.. Ill probably have to leave it alone.

Still going to sell it whenever I get it finished. It will be far from "restored" but it will be clean and working right.

 

[Handy Andy]

I expect the next one to be easier as this Lafayette was the ugliest in the bunch.

No, it will never get easier...

I used to get pissed when radios kept coming back with same damage the owner did - got to a point where I had to remove variable pots and replace them with fixed resistance arrays to keep the customer from blowing finals.

Caught the issue you had with "Fish eyes" - that brings up a issue I've been seeing about that polar high you are talking about.

This is part of a much bigger picture of a long term cycle dealing the solar cycles - seems that in some cycles, the solar winds that bombards the earths outer atmosphere is heated up and blown/pushed back - then as the cycles settle down - that "air" is recaptured and thru the process of vortices (think cyclonic flow and Coriolis effect) is gathered by earths gravity and it's weight pushes down - that air is extremely dry and not acclimated to our atmosphere so it has a vastly different dewpoint (lower) and affects how paint exposed to such dry air, cures.

Only possible solutions I've found, and since most of the stuff we depend on is made now in china and not sourced locally, you may have to find Isopropyl alcohol and Coleman "White gas" to wipe down and remove their original base primer "fish oil" (Rustoleum) carrier and wetting agent that they used for many of todays paints are lacking the surfactants that older lead-based relied on to find those grooves and imperfections in the metal surface to fixate and have the paint adhere to. The older base paints and oils they used were of the 70's era and nowadays the new stuff is like giving a kid a stick of chalk and telling them to draw on the sidewalk - lasts until it rains...

It doesn't help, with the long-term effects of chemtrails still yet not fully understood - we as a planet become the guinea pig "test subjects" to experience these extreme events.

 

[brandon7861]

I got that Lafayette aligned today and everything sounding great, but I could only get the 2nd harmonic down 42dB. Is that typical for an old radio like this? Should I add a trap and try to lower it?