Atwater Kent 55C - she's singing again - Printable Version
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+--- Thread: Atwater Kent 55C - she's singing again (/showthread.php?tid=11032)
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Atwater Kent 55C - she's singing again - klondike98 - 11-25-2014
A while back my wife and I visited Phlogiston and his museum and she fell in love with Russ' Kiel Table with an Atwater Kent 60. I started looking for one to work on and found a 55C in a Kiel Table up in New York. We took a drive up, managed to just get it into the SUV and brought it home. At some point a previous owner had started to strip the table but had only partially done the job; so there was still plenty of work to do. Here are some as received photos.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/a014kbfhuz4jzsc/Kiel_01.jpg?raw=1][Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/kt80yyu9mnkjauq/Kiel_02.jpg?raw=1][Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/use9j1y0jgs69p6/Kiel_03.jpg?raw=1]
The cabinet was in pretty good shape although there were some drink glass rings; someone had previously sanded one edge through the veneer, and the table top had some issues.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/wwu1ztflpz5a0du/Kiel_04.jpg?raw=1][Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6rp4jxbufymb1y7/Kiel_05.jpg?raw=1]
The stripping and sanding began:
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ylydrtzqu47o6m9/Kiel_06.jpg?raw=1][Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/p7ovc6b80fexl43/Kiel_07.jpg?raw=1][Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/rv96vs3tgxc03kr/Kiel_08.jpg?raw=1]
Then toners and lacquers. This is my makeshift spray arrangement so I could get at all the legs, corners etc. by just walking around the table.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/f309jt3jo1uf220/Kiel_09.jpg?raw=1]
Someone surely polished the cabinet with some type of silicone polish in the past as fish eye was a bit of a problem.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/syf7u8uhs33gu8b/Kiel_10.jpg?raw=1]
It all finally came together. No claim that it is as nicely done as Russ would do but my wife likes it and I think it came out well.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/a92xhfxysczo5bo/Kiel_finished.jpg?raw=1]
Now its time to work on the radio....
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - sam - 11-25-2014
bob
nice find, looks great
sam
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - Ron Ramirez - 11-25-2014
Bob
Excellent job!
The AK Kiel table is, I think, a fine piece of furniture and worthy of any radio collection as long as you have room for it. Congratulations!
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - KCMike - 11-25-2014
Really nice work. Let us know how the radio turns out also.
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - Phlogiston - 11-25-2014
Good Job Bob. BUT, take that stuff off of the top it will dent your finish. Wait a year or so before you put anything heavy on it. And then you'll have room for another radio(:
Let me know if you need any help with the chassis. Use the Poly caps from AES in the filter can, cost more but you won't have to mess with it again. Don't trust any of the resistors except the wire-wound.
https://www.tubesandmore.com/products/capacitors?filters=Brand%3DSolen
Russ
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - klondike98 - 11-26-2014
Thanks guys, appreciate the comments.
Russ, yep the vases were only for the photo. You warned someone else in a previous thread and I did remember that
Thanks for the offer of help on the chassis, I will probably need it. I've gathered all the data from Leigh's atwaterkent.info site and am not looking forward to heating the tar out of those cans.
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - Jayce - 11-26-2014
Looks rather nice! I have a Kiel with the 60C chassis in it, but it has cat damage to the legs and the chassis board is sort of jury-rigged to stay put as it is cracked in half!
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - radioalfa - 11-26-2014
Very, very nice! I have one that also has a 55C, I have restored the radio, but holding off on the table itself until I find a replacement top. I think you will find that the tar is only in one can, IIRC, the can that had the majority of caps in it was all wax. Good luck with it.
Russ
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - klondike98 - 11-27-2014
Thanks! I thought they were all tar filled. I was thinking of the can with the output transformer and the "quality condenser" that is embedded in tar.
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8d7mk5gdcl77d87/AK55C_qualitycap.jpg?raw=1]
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - Phlogiston - 11-28-2014
You do need to change out that "quality condenser". I think a lot of people miss it.
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - klondike98 - 11-28-2014
Any tips on how best to get at it and change it out?
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - Phlogiston - 11-28-2014
Well, don't start digging.
You can heat the thing up just till it gets soft. As I recall the cap is fairly large. That is about all I remember except that it would be easy to miss and bad to do so since it is across the OP primary. The last one, I think I did with a heat gun. It was about 6 months ago or about 5 months 3 weeks and 5 days too long.
You know it would probably work just as well if you were able to disconnect 1 leg of the old cap - if all else seems impossible.
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - klondike98 - 11-28-2014
Thanks Russ. It'll be awhile before I heat it since I'll want to do that outside. I've read that the tar smell permeates through out the house if you do it indoors
RE: Atwater Kent 55C in Kiel Table - klondike98 - 01-20-2015
Recapping has gone smoothly although as the Pa Dutch would say the "quality condenser" is yet. (as in not yet done)
Unfortunately it turns out that 3 of the wire wound resistors are faulty (not uncommon I understand) since they are wound on cardboard or fiber board and are rather fragile. They are the Bleeder Resistors #1 (4000 ohms) and #2 (850 ohms) and the RF Bias Resistor (160 ohms).
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/xg0qyxpgow3tw31/55C-Late2.jpg?raw=1]
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/5u8h70k96ett7bt/55C_Late.jpg?raw=1]
So unless I get really lucky and find some replacements I'm going to have to use modern replacements. So here's the question:
Am I correct in figuring that 2 or 3 watt replacements would work OK?
My thinking:
175 v (present @ plates of 1R and 2R) across 11,000 ohms (4000+6000+850+160) yields 0.016 amps.
(4000/11000)175 x 0.016 = 1.02 watts for the 4000 ohm resistor
double or triple that = 2 to 3 watts. Similarly the other 2 resistors would be less wattage.
If I'm doing this calc wrong please let me know.... thanks for the help!!
(images are from Leigh's atwaterkent.info site )
RE: Atwater Kent 55C - resistor question - klondike98 - 01-30-2015
The AK55C is once again playing and sounding pretty good. I used a couple of 2 watt resistors in parallel to create 4 watt resistors and hid them behind the existing wirewound fiber board, not perfect, but good enough. Replaced all but one of the old resistors using a molding technique to reproduce them (again not perfect but...) and got rid of the tacked in power resistors and electrolytic cap mess from a previous repair. Also had to take some of the rubber coated wires and re-sleeve them (actually easier than doing it in the '39-'42 Philcos).
As received:
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/w3haslq3thenm29/AtwaterKent55C_before.jpg?raw=1]
Restored:
[Image: https://www.dropbox.com/s/13aakg65a4n45nh/AtwaterKent55C_after.jpg?raw=1]
Still some cosmetic work to do to clean up the chassis some more and repaint the tops of the large cans, then install it back into the table.
I was puzzled for awhile. Had all the right voltages on the tube plates, screens and grid caps but was not getting any stations. After rechecking all the coils I realized I had forgotten to reconnect the antenna coil to the tuning cap after having taking it out....
Bingo...talk radio started coming in loud and clear.... 