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23 Jun 03 - 01:28 AM (#970751) Subject: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus G'day, What wireless (radio) sets did you older 'Catters listen to as kids? We had a couple. One was a 'Cathedral' Atwater Kent (ca 1934/5) that Dad inherited from his parents. The other was a Gulbransen - I assume ca 1940 - it must have cost a fortune - it had 'push-button' tuning for 6-8 stations! Apart from the house, I reckon it was the biggest purchase Dad ever made - he never owned a car! Don't you miss the old valve radios? I'm still convinced the tonal range was better than now - despite no 'graphic equalisers'. Mumble.. mumble... next I'll be yapping on the tonal quality of wind up gramophones (phonographs) "Take me back to 1950, I'm lost!" - attrib one of the NLCR (or someone) Cheers - Sam |
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23 Jun 03 - 02:10 AM (#970762) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Neighmond My grandfather had an old mahogany Magnavox floor radio that stood up on legs and had doors on the front that folded back against the sides when open, and a large aerial on the roof, and a ground wire that ran along the mopboard to attach to the radiator pipe. It could pull in all manner of broadcast, and as I recall it had 12 tubes inside. It had the old tray for the big batteries (took three different sized ones at one time) but was worked over to plug in to ac when REA came through. It has burled veneer on the front inside the doors and a speaker with a heavy flowered tapestry cover and a wood fretwork over it. As I recall the radio had an on/off knob and a volume knob, and two different tuning knobs, and a selector knob that was labeled: Radio/Police/Ships at Sea. He had an old television add-on that he got later on that had a separate, nearly round picture tube, and the picture tube had a heavy cord on the back that plugged into the tuner, which it sat on, which in turn sat on top of the radio cabinet. The channel selector wasn't like a modern one, which clicks into place, but was rather like an old radio dial in that it had no channel designations but rather frequency numbers, and turned smoothly (so it could get a slightly off-sync channel, I was always told), and had one for the channel and one for fine tune, and an on/off switch, and knobs to regulate the picture tube, which had to be done after it warmed up. There was a sound wire that hooked into the radio through the vents in the back, and you tuned the radio to a blank place on the dial and used the radio's amplifier to play the sound from the television set. When turned on, the picture was tiny and got bigger as it warmed up, and when turned off, concentrated into a dot in center of the picture tube that stayed aglow for many moments afterwards. I recall this rig working as recently as 10 years ago, at which time my cousin got it, and I haven't seen him or it since. |
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23 Jun 03 - 02:34 AM (#970766) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus Neighmond, Wonderful recollections! We used to run the aerial wire off to a tree - the longer the run, the better the reception. Umm... I can see the porcelain insulators at either end. We had an independant 'earth pipe' for the wireless. Wheww... a battery operated 12 tube - I'm impressed! Your TV description brought memories of my first contact with the 'boob tube' - silly thing is I have never lived with a TV set! Cheers - Sam |
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23 Jun 03 - 03:31 PM (#971119) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Mark Clark Besides the old wooden radios (Zenith multi-band) we used to have in the 40s, I used to build crystal sets as a kid. Some were standard Glena crystal radio sets but at least one was a "foxhole" radio using an old Gellette Blue Blade for a rectifier and a bent safety pin for a cat whisker. The coil was magnet wire on a toilet paper tube. It worked great. Spent many nights listening to Gene Autry's Melody Ranch program among others. - Mark |
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23 Jun 03 - 03:41 PM (#971123) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Rapparee We built crystal radios from kits, but for some unknown reason my mother would never let us play with razor blades, even in the name of science (this was the same woman who stopped putting out table knives when she caught her kids "sword fighting" with them). We once (around 1956) inherited a great old radio from somewhere. One tube (valve) didn't light, so I took it down to the store and bought a new one. The radio then worked, but reception stunk. A coat hanger attached by wires to the antenna leads helped some, but we finally got the best reception when we connected the leads to the metal bunk bed set in the room. We improved reception by stringing bare copper wire all over the place, but fearing that we were going to get caught in it like a fly in a spider's web, mom made us take it down. My grandparents had a Crosley, if memory serves rightly, with all sorts of stations to receive, push buttons, dials and all sorts of stuff. It stood on the floor and served them until 1954, when my grandmother moved in with us after my grandfather's death. |
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23 Jun 03 - 10:21 PM (#971316) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus Hey, Rapaire, I'd forgotten the old bed-wire aerial trick. No bus tour today, so I can listen to an hour of music from the '40's on the wireless - it's on every day this week - great stuff! Ious in nostalgia - Sam |
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24 Jun 03 - 08:23 AM (#971489) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Jim Dixon I think ours was a Zenith. It was given away sometime after we got our first TV set. I bought a broken Zenith console once, maybe 20 years ago, thinking someday I would learn how to fix it. Today, it sits in the attic. I never got around to fixing it, but I recently discovered a guy in Stillwater, MN who restores old radios for around $100. I think I'll take it to him one of these days. |
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24 Jun 03 - 09:50 AM (#971536) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Bert We had an old Pilot. Battery operated. It had a high tension battery the size of a large book which consisted of a load of dry cells in series. The last few cells had connectors on them so that you could adjust the voltage. there was a small grid bias battery and a glass two volt accumulator which we used to take to the local garage (mechanic's shop) every week to get recharged. We used to listen to such shows as "Twenty Questions" and "Much Binding in the Marsh" Before that we had a big old wooden thingie with a gramaphone in the top. That was when I was about three and was going to marry Vera Lynn when I grew up. |
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24 Jun 03 - 06:54 PM (#971829) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Tweed Here's a great site with access to all things old and electronic. They have vintage and after market tubes and even authentic Tweed suitcase coverings for your old Fender amps. Radio kits too! Antique Electronic Supply,Tempe, Arizona Yerz, Tweed We had a Zenith up on Lake of the Woods Ontario and it was on that thing that I first heard Little Stevie Wonder play "Fingertips" on WLS in Chicago. Ya man. The old radios had good songs that came out of them. |
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24 Jun 03 - 09:48 PM (#971894) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Deckman Good Grief Mark ... I KNOW I'm a heck of a lot older than you. Geeze, my brother and I built crystal sets in the fourties ... that's NINETEEN fourties, not eighteen fourties! I still remember using the little 'lever' to pick up the contact and place it manualy at another location on the crystal. And yes, the crystal was just a slab of real rock crystal. As I recall, the 'lever' was called a "whisker wire." Does that sound correct? CHEERS, Bob |
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24 Jun 03 - 11:48 PM (#971925) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Mark Clark That sounds right, Bob. I found a drawing of a foxhole radio. Mine looked a lot like the drawing but the razor blade was the double-edged Blue Blade type. I think the blue oxide was necessary and provided the crystaline structure alowing the blade to act as the rectifier. - Mark |
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25 Jun 03 - 01:12 AM (#971951) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus You guys have given me a few blasts from the past. I never did work out how POW's got the 'electronic' parts for a radio. "Foxhole Radio" explains all. Thanks Mark. Bob, we called the 'lever' the "act's whisker". Hmm... wonder if that's where the ex[ression "That's the cat's whiskers" (really good) came from? BYW, there was also the green "cat's eye" tuning indiator valve too. Bert, 'Much Binding..' was one of my favourites too - "Another brandy, lime & soda, waiter, please". Found some 300 odd sites mentionedthe programme. Best was 1950s British Radio Nostalgia. It had the history of heaps of other shows of the time. Tweed, you are dead right. Hot music came out of those old radios!It must have been the temperature of the valves .. ;) Cheers - Sam |
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25 Jun 03 - 07:48 AM (#972068) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Keith A of Hertford I was trying to remember the exotic place names on the dial. Hilversum was one. |
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25 Jun 03 - 08:17 AM (#972083) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus Ah, Hilversum of Holland, home of Phillips radios. Dad finally bought one of their radiograms in the 60's, when he couldn't get valves for the Gulbransen. Both our old radios had NZ station names listed on the MW dials. Guess they were customised for export here. The exotic places on the Atwater Kent SW band were fantastic. It's amazing how many I managed to hear fromhalf a world away. Hmm... must hook up a decent aerial and earth sometime. Sam Cheers - Sam |
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26 Jun 03 - 02:26 AM (#972496) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Joe Offer I think I had about ten radios from the 30's and 40's when I was in grammar school in the late 1950's. I had problems replacing spekers - I think most had "dynamic" speakers that worked only with certain circuits, not the more versatile permanent magnet speakers we see today. the other problem I had was trying to filter out the 60-cycle hum that seemed to develop so easily in those old monsters. Changing tubes was a cinch. People would give me broken radios, and I'd take out all the tubes and take them down to the drugstore. Most of the time, I could get the radio working. I had a long antenna in the yard, and I liked to stay up late at night and log all the faraway stations I could find. I got Radio Moscow and Radio Havana on the shortwave band. I liked the smell of those hot, dusty tubes and transformers - and the tube glow was way cool. -Joe Offer- |
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26 Jun 03 - 10:42 AM (#972722) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: mack/misophist What Joe Offer said. We had a Zenith Broad Band that also picked up Radio Moscow and Radio Havana. Those were my favourites; better than science fiction. |
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26 Jun 03 - 11:02 AM (#972737) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Giac Ditto, Joe and misophist. I had my Dad's old Sky Buddy shortwave receiver. It had five bands, so I could pick up up foreign signals, a lot of code, planes and ships at sea. It was way cool. I was mesmerized by the "official time" "This is WWV, at the sound of the tone, the time will be ... " It ticked off the seconds and at one point there was a sort of stutter "tock, tock, t-tock, tock..." When my dad (a ham operator [W5AAJ]) helped me build a small crystal set, he told me the cat's whisker was so-called because real cat whiskers had been used instead of the tiny wire. I tried that. Our cat was not amused. But, by the way, it worked. Mary |
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26 Jun 03 - 12:20 PM (#972784) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Deckman Hey Joe, I well remember those big old floor model tube testers at the drug store. All you had to do was find a socket that would accomodate whatever tube you were checking. It was also about that time that I learned that the old tubes made great BB gun targets cause the really blew up swell! Bob |
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27 Jun 03 - 03:13 AM (#973131) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: JohnInKansas Giac - I'm sure you're aware that WWV is still out there ticking. I keep an old portable more or less permanently tuned there, just so I can adjust all the clocks for the little bit of "creep" they accumulate between DST jumps back and forth. Unfortunately, the EM pollution has gotten so bad that even "modern" radios with sensitivity and selectivity much better than the old ones we listened to can't sort out those distant stations like we could with the crude stuff we had "back then." In the late 50s, I'd frequently pick up late night (or early morning) jazz and big band stuff from Chicago (about 750? miles away) on my car radio (AM). I also remember pulling off to sit and listen, and having trouble picking out the major constellations in the night sky because there were so many stars that the patterns didn't stand out that much. Now there's so much light pollution - and ground level smog/haze - that you're lucky if you can see the "major" stars on a "good" night. John |
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27 Jun 03 - 04:09 AM (#973148) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: Billy the Bus John, I agree, EM pollution is horrendous now! As to light pollution? I recall seeing a satelite photo in 'Scientific American' in the 70s. It was a night-time shot of Europe - damned near as good as a map! You could see the cities, and even the major autobhans (sp?)in Germany from the lights! A couple of years back, I found a similar 'snapshot from space' of the whole world, on the Net. Wheww... you could certainly see where all the folk (with $$$s) live. New Zealand was represented by a blob (Auckland) and two dots (Wellington, Christchurch). I could still show you a sky-full of stars like you saw in the 50's here on Stewart Island. Well, a different perspective from here in the southern hemisphere - and you may have to stay a few weeks to get a clear night without blasted overcast ... ;) Cheers - Sam |
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27 Jun 03 - 05:26 PM (#973517) Subject: RE: BS: 1940's Wireless Sets From: JohnInKansas BtheB Those crystal clear satellite views are largely the result of "technology at work." In order to penetrate the "fog" the sensors generally use multiple frequencies, both ir and uv, that are relatively "immune" to the absorbtion by the major pollutants, and then they're "translated" back to a "normal color" set. There are very few places on earth where the air is really that clear. Ain't technology wunnaful? It's still possible to get a fairly clear view of the night sky in a few places where there aren't too many lights, if the weather is good. It used to be fairly common on almost any overnight fishing trip. Unfortunately, the F&G guys have "yuppified" most of the public fishing areas in my area with all-night lighting so the little puppies won't fall off the boat ramp; and it's getting very difficult to find a public fishing place in my area where the stars are really visible. Awesome when you do. John |