I looked for about 6 years before I found a restored 680X and lately its been a daily player here. It sounds very nice and almost on a level with my former 690's.
Does anyone else have one of the early ones with the door on top ? It seems like almost as many 680X's were sold as 690's but I see lots of 690's but never the 680X's for some reason.
I have seen 2 of these at the Goller's and bought mine from a known Philco collector who gave me 1st dibs on his 2nd one.
I've seen one other besides yours, Bruce, and am aware of a third owned by the gentleman who furnished a photo of it for this site's Gallery. Plus a fourth, the chassis of which I restored a year or two ago. That one had to have a new Heyboer power transformer made for it.
There are some others out there, but just how many, I do not know.
Incidentally, I've never owned a 680. But since I did get to work on one once, I can appreciate what really great sets they are.
I have had three elude me in the last 15 or so years....
Two were the variety with the controls under the door, one had the exposed controls.
About 3 yrs. back at Lansing's Extravaganza a guy had one sitting on back of his truck all day Friday not getting much attention at all. I was told the cabinet & veneer was going to need a lot of repair.
Next day, Saturday, went through the "Estes" auction & sold for $20!!!
The new owner who got *stuck* with it flipped it up on the 'bay & IIRC went for approx. $750 w/s&h on top of that.
Cabinet didn't look that bad "at first glance" to me going thru Estes, but then again I was a Noob on Philcos back then & JUST got my 38-690 the day before (Friday)
but didn't think this 680X would ...
I even helped the buyer & his good friend with the hotel doors so they could load it up in their van.
The on-line buyer must of knew what they were getting into I'm sure, spending that much $$$ on one that still needed a Full Restoration.
My undies get wet just thinking about that particular meet & weekend knowing I coulda-shoulda-woulda got home with a 680X & 690.
Lloyd
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Good Judgment Comes From- EXPERIENCE -Which Comes From Bad Judgment
Last year, I had four of these in my house! Two of each model; the top early version and the later front control model. First I completed the restoration of the early lid model, then sold the remaining one to a friend here locally. I still have the other two front control models. One chassis is completely restored, and I should pick and complete one of the cabinets this spring. Then decide what to do with the other.
I have to comment on how well these 680 Philcos perform. I've come to the conclusion that if I had to keep just one Philco radio, it would be the 680. Even over the 690 models. I have a 38-690 that I've restored, and recently was made a strong offer on my 37-690, and sold it with no remorse. While the 690 radios currently are in demand, and bring a fair amount of money, they really do not perform that much better. Of all, the 37-690 benefits from the bigger speaker vs the 680, but there are other considerations too. I think when the 680's and 690's were designed, there were different parameters in play. The 680 offers more of a pure radio design, without some of the features of the day like the mechanical tuning which required AFC to lock in. The 680 has the four gang capacitor where as the 690s utilize a common three gang tuning capacitor. The 690s have two small, parts packed chassis along with the RF deck requiring removal for complete service. The 680 uses one large chassis that in general, has ample room in which to work. The 680 has triode output as does the 37-690. (38-690 uses 6L6 beam power). The audio in a 680 is very clear to my ears, and I can listen to one all day without fatigue, where as I could notice a different type of sound with the 690 sets. Then there are the cuts made to the 38-690 vs 37 where the trimmers were removed from the RF deck.
All of this is simply my observation and opinion, and of course, I'm sure an opposing view can be made. We all have our preferences.
In the Philco brochure for the 680, they discuss some of the effort put into designing this radio. Hazeltine labs were utilized in the process of its design. They provide various graphs of it's RF and audio performance. And even discuss the function of each of its tubes. They were sure proud of this radio.
I never understood why they changed cabinet designs with such a low volume model, and why it happened within the same model year.
I see more early lid models than later front control models. These radios are very much under the radar screen for most radio collectors. Many don't know what to pay for one when they find one. But of the high fidelity Philco sets, 201's, 680, and 690's, this one is my preference.
Frank
KD0RUC
Count me in for an early one with the lid. Also have a 37-690 and 38-690. I changed jobs a couple of years back and don't have time to play radio much these days or hang out on the forum.
I found the vertical chassis in the early 680 to be a pain to remove. They should have put rails to hold up the chassis up while the hardware is installed or removed. The chassis is heavy and hard to hold while using a nutdriver. I ended up laying the cabinet face down on carpeting and taking my shoes off and getting in the cabinet. No damage done to the cabinet and the chassis was easy to remove and later reinstall. Unfortunately it stopped playing last year (after 20 years having recapped it). I just need the time now to pull the chassis again and see what's wrong.
Fred
That's quite a collection! Good to see you are back!