Whilst out and about today at the antique shops, I ran across a '36 RCA 10T. Looked like it survived the years quite well, and had all of its' metal tubes there. Priced at $175... BUT it was on the half-price table. $87.50 sounds reasonable to me, but in this area, everything is so over-bloated in their pricing that I really don't know what is a good price. Talked to the proprietor for a good 45 minutes (he had a little Coronado there in nice shape and played good, with the red knobs and protruding indicator for $265), and he said it (RCA) had been there for a LONG time, and the woman who owns it wants to get it sold and he could make me a good deal. QUESTION: What in your humble opinions would be a good price for this MAMMOTH tombstone? Thanks!
P.S. All Knobs are there and function, and cabinet is in slightly better than average condition.
P.S.S. THE GUY SAID THAT IT PROBABLY JUST NEEDS A NEW POWER CORD!!! (and he meant it! And he had to be in his 60's or so...) LOL
Jim
If the cabinet isn't too bad, then anywhere between $50 and $100 is reasonable, more if the finish is really nice, and the set is all complete with good major parts. But I would see how much lower then $85 you can get, these are fairly complex radios, roughly equivalent to a Philco 116, but they often have rubber/gutta percha covered wire, and the power transformers have been known to fail sometimes. On that last point I would bring a multimeter with you and check the transformer windings, you can do this at the rectifier tube socket. Even if you want to gamble it is a set well worth restoring, even if you had to replace that, but if it is shot then you can negotiate more off the price, they always need more then just a power cord, or a tube, always.
Regards
Arran
(This post was last modified: 04-27-2018, 03:16 AM by Arran.)
Thank you Arran! That is precisely the information I was looking for! I like its' imposing gigantic cabinet and odd dial. All of the interior stickers were intact and in good shape, and had some color left to them. Chassis just looked dirty, not rusty. As to overall condition of the cabinet, the sides and front looked pretty nice from what I could see-don't think there were any veneer missing, but it was placed in the center of a large round wooden table with things all around it, and at the base of the table like sewing machines and such (arranged like a Christmas tree display) and the radio had a large ceramic "thing" on top of it, so I didn't get so good a look at that. The RCA was an afterthought for the man, because he didn't show it to me until I was ready to leave (we were talking about jukeboxes and Victrolas-he has some nice ones- THEN to radios, etc...). Arran, do you know off the cuff which pins I should be checking? I've looked at different posts on the net, and there seemed to be some disagreement about the procedure and analysis of the data. Any info is appreciated. Thanks
No pics (yet). Yes, this is absolutely a T10 with the mustachioed dial. I did a little digging and saw that the 10T-1 has a round dial. As I say, he hit me with this right before I went out the door and caught me off guard. It was weird in that when I first went in, I did say I was looking for tube radios, and he directed me to the Coronado. WAY too much for my blood for a "plain Jane". Then we proceeded to yack. Today was not conducive to going there though, and he did say it was there for a long time, about a year and a half, and told me not to worry, because it's going nowhere fast. HAH! I've heard that twice in the course of this past month alone concerning moving into a bigger place. Ripped it right out from under our noses...When they SAID they wouldn't. At any rate, I will swing by there tomorrow and hopefully he's open. If not, Monday. Oh, and if I do bring the multimeter with me, which pins on the rectifier tube socket should I check? Is checking the leads of the power cord or anything else I can put an ohmmeter on worthy of the effort? Thanks.
Jim
Even better - er - I mean, you don't want that radio. I'll give you what you paid for it so you don't have to restore it.
There is probably no good reason to ohm anything out. A HV winding can be off by only 10 - 20 ohms before it melts down. It's still a good one anyway. But like I said, if you don't want it - -
Yeah, Arran may have a valid point about spec'ing as many components out as you can to haggle for a better price, but I don't want to put any kind of jinx on it by doing that. Never had any reason to do this before. If I don't think about it, I never have to worry about anything in the bad components department. The only problem I ever have is when I break something and have to fix or replace it. I can "feel" that this one is alive, just in a long slumber, waiting to be awoken... Oh, yes. She weighs in only at about 48 pounds I believe, so shipping would be astronomical I would predict, were I to send it off. And I feel this one would be in my "wheelhouse", but don't worry. I won't do anything to the cabinet but clean it up, and the chassis will be faithfully restored to a far greater degree than what the 38-1 received.
P.S. Medford is only a 15 hour and 58 minute drive from Mesa, Russ...
With regard to checking the resistance of the transformer windings I now do that whenever possible as I have been burned a few times. I decided against buying a Canadian RCA A-23 on that basis, the difference between the two legs on the HV winding was something like 120 ohms, and whilst the set may have worked the transformer would probably start getting hot within about 15 minutes. On the Canadian Pye I also checked the transformer and it came through with a clean bill of health so I went ahead and got it.
Basically you just have to look up what rectifier tube the set uses and measure between the plate pins at the rectifier tube socket, if it's a four pin tube it's easy, the small pins are always the plate pins, large are for the filament. On a 5Y4 the filament pins are pins 7 and 8, plates 3 and 5, the same is true with a 5X4. On a 5Y3 the filament pins are 2 and 8, plates 4 and 6, the same is true with a 5Z4, 5V4, and 5U4, this set uses a 5Z4 for some reason. You can measure between each plate pin and the chassis as well, even if there are resistors inbetween the center tap and the chassis both legs of the HV winding should measure pretty close to equal, within 40-50 Ohms of each other. I would also check the speaker field if you get a chance. Here is the schematic on Nostalgia Air:
(04-27-2018, 10:07 PM)Electrothaumaturgist Wrote: Yeah, Arran may have a valid point about spec'ing as many components out as you can to haggle for a better price, but I don't want to put any kind of jinx on it by doing that. Never had any reason to do this before. If I don't think about it, I never have to worry about anything in the bad components department. The only problem I ever have is when I break something and have to fix or replace it. I can "feel" that this one is alive, just in a long slumber, waiting to be awoken... Oh, yes. She weighs in only at about 48 pounds I believe, so shipping would be astronomical I would predict, were I to send it off. And I feel this one would be in my "wheelhouse", but don't worry. I won't do anything to the cabinet but clean it up, and the chassis will be faithfully restored to a far greater degree than what the 38-1 received.
P.S. Medford is only a 15 hour and 58 minute drive from Mesa, Russ...
I've made that drive a few times. Several times on around-the -west radio collecting trips. I also lived in both Phoenix and Tucson but it was back in the 1960s.
Well, I went back to the shop today (open 7 days a week, apparently) And checked it out in better lighting. I removed all the stuff from around it and off the top, revealing a most disappointing display. Even though the veneer seemed to be ok (haven't had one without chipped veneer in decades. UGH!), what I originally thought was paint spatters and such, turned out to be blemishes in the finish (and yes some paint spatters), But this turned me right off, as I refuse to do anything more than clean-ups on cabinets anymore. Speaker and cloth poked through, too. Even though the chassis looks great topside in my eyes, the cabinet just shut the deal right down. I don't want to offer any more than $40 for it. I pointed out the crack in the veneer, but the proprietor seemed to think that was negligible. HMM... I brought up the fact that most all wiring would have to be changed, maybe coils, transformers, etc... He's like: well, transformers are cheap!!! OHHHHKAYYYY. I'm like: if I sink $300 into it, it will be worth $300. He's like: Beats doing a jigsaw puzzle. He obviously has no clue as to what is entailed in even reviving a radio, much less restoring one. Odd that he has some nice things, but he said he always had someone work on them, save for a couple of items that he REPLACED THE POWER CORD on and they happened to work!!! I bet I know who tried to fire this baby up!!! Have a look:
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