Tropic 3104 identification
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Joined: Apr 2017
City: Budapest, Hungary

Hallo Forum Members,
I live in Hungary, and have a Philco Tropic 3104. I renovated this nice receiver, and now works fine, but I like to know how when it was manufactured? I found very similar pieces, for example 53-960 or 55T_1942. My model number not set into Philco number system. I know this is manufactured for export, and near the II. WW ( or after II. WW) many pieces arrived to Europe for example to Switzerland. I attached some photos about.
Best Regards
Istvan
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Istvan,
Welcome to the Phorum.
Henry
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City: Ferdinand
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Hello Istvan,
That is a really neat Philco Tropic receiver!
I do not have an exact year of manufacture for your 3104. I have no information for 1949, 1951 or 1954 production of Philco Tropic sets. Therefore, I would have to guess that it is probably a 1951 model as it is very similar to the USA model 53-960 but while still managing to look a bit "older" than the 53-960.
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Ron Ramirez
Ferdinand IN
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It was made in Canada, very interesting. However that doesn't necessarily mean that it will be found in the RCC manuals since it was clearly an export set. If it was a domestic Canadian set it would have either a 120 V 40/60 cps power supply, or a 115 V 25/60 cps power supply, not a 120/240 volt 50/60 cps power supply.
Regards
Arran
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I looked - it isn't in the RCC manuals.
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Ron Ramirez
Ferdinand IN
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I wonder why the documentation is treated like an ugly sister on exports? Years ago I had a Westinghouse export set that I still regret selling that did have a schematic in a misc. section in Riders.
Henry
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I would say the reason is that export sets were not expected to be encountered in the USA after they were built and shipped out of the country, so documentation was not provided here for the most part. Notable exceptions being 1939-1942 Tropics in the RMS Year Books of those years, and 1948, 1950, 1952 and 1953 domestic service data. And the 1948, 1950, 1952 and 1953 data might be incomplete.
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Ron Ramirez
Ferdinand IN
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Ron,
I understand what you are saying but you would think we would be able to find the data if it was sent overseas. It should be somewhere.
Henry
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Somewhere...perhaps...but obviously not here.
Oh, it was probably retained at Philco in Philadelphia. However, in spite of the Philco archives having been transferred to the Ford Historical Archives after Ford bought Philco, I wouldn't count on Ford still having anything on this subject.
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Ron Ramirez
Ferdinand IN
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Istvan,
I see your radio is posted in Radiomuseum along with a schematic. I am curious to know what publication the schematic and information is from.
Thanks,
Henry
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The schematic there is a Philco service bulletin for (USA) model 53-960.
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Ron Ramirez
Ferdinand IN
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