[Jayce]

I don't own this radio yet, but my friend talked about letting this radio go and wondered if I was interested in it if he did. This is one of the few radios he did not let go through the auction of his repair shop and has been sitting in his garage. It sat in his back room for a while too, but is still in good physical shape. Does not have the remote or the stereo decoder and appears to have never had either. Now, I am wondering what headaches we might get into with this radio being a really high ended German set? Would it be worth the effort to redo or should we both just send this thing on its way? I've been trying to find an RCA 8-RF-13 for a while, but this SABA set would easily take the place of that if he does decide to sell for a fair price. Yes, I know German radios can be headaches from previous experience, but also know they can be very nice when rebuilt right. Any advice would be nice.

[RodB]

SABA 400, known as the most complicated radio made. Several YouTube videos on it and I'm sure you can get lots of assistance. All you need is time and money. Maybe Manuel Caldeira can give you some pointers, he loves SABA restorations.

[Jayce]

Thanks. It might also be a 300 as I can't remember which one it is for sure and all I saw today was the back of the radio up in the garage loft at my friend's place. Was too hot to dig it out, but it's a BIG table top radio and I do know it has automatic tuning. Either way, I want to get a better look at it again and he said if he recalled right, it has 13 tubes, which would make it a 400. Bleah, now I am going to be wondering until I get back up there!

[RodB]

If it's automatic it will clean your house. :-o

[morzh]

This is a great radio (not that Germans made any bad ones).
My Grundig 8058 is really good, but it only has 9 tubes, and this one is 13.
5 speakers in that cabinet!

But if the price is reasonable (or especially if it is a gift), it's a no-brainer: grab it.

[Jayce]

I called my friend and he did a quick check to confirm it is indeed the 400. It is the 'Beast' so to speak. He didn't realize it is known as one of the most complicated radios built. Now I can definitely do my homework on it.

[morzh]

Jayce

Since I haven't seen many 50s German radios restored here, I think my thread on Grundig 8058 might turn out to be useful, if only for the things to expect, like flimsy wiring, the way parts are mounted and the ERO caps (I suspect that was go to cap compant for film ones) replacement.
If a record player is used, I also suspect they might've used Perpetuum Ebner, as this seems to be the player of the day.

[Paul Philco322]

Here is a video, or Horror Movie, depends I guess. Often the complex when done right are truly awesome.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuOb3gAraFM


Paul

[Arran]

This fellow here works on many post war West German radios of the 1950s and 60s https://odysee.com/@ElectronicsOldandNew:c he has a backlog of restoration series posted on odysee, which is a much better site to view them on then Y.T, much fewer commercials. Most Saba sets have a name, I have no idea what a Saba 300 or 400 is but their top model used to be the "Freiberg" among the table models. West German sets have a lot of weak points, the main one being the fact that they use the band switch assembly to turn the power on and off which is also a dirt trap, and that actions wears them out faster. Most models are also sort of average in terms of AM performance, middle of the road on FM too, without extra IF stages, or a tuned RF stage, much of the focus seems to me in the tone correction/compensation in the audio stages.
Regards
Arran

[GarySP]

I haven't worked on a German set, but it seems that the engineering is very similar to many German cars I've worked on in the past ... take a simple collection of components, and find a more complicated way to build them! Take care and BE HEALTHY! Gary

[Jayce]

I have three German radios of my own, including the Emud T7 that transformer burnt out on a few years after it was totally rebuilt. Ron actually commented on that one while he was still with us telling us how he had a restored radio chassis do that right on the repair bench while doing the final test run. I also have the little German radio my late radio buddy worked on that made him swear to never ever repair another German radio again! I agree about the average AM performance of most German radios, though the ones I have usually do well on FM and shortwave overall. I am usually amazed how well they do with the lower tube counts, but they did tend to stick with all nine pin tubes that usually handled multiple tasks. One of the tubes in the SABA 400 for example is a triple diode-triode.

[morzh]

And their magic eye tube is also very specific....in mine it has two sectors, coarse and fine.

[RodB]

I've restored four German radios over the last 5 years, 3 Grundigs and a Graetz. The Graetz was the worst. It felt like a twelve year old had put together a kit with his new spot welding set. All the peripheral units like the dial backplate, the FM chassis, antenna socket plate, etc, were welded to the chassis. Nothing came apart. I had to mask off the rest of the chassis to spray paint the dial backplate. The ERO paper caps are trash in all the German sets but they would be replaced anyway. But the Grundigs really produced the nicest sound.

[Arran]

Jayce;
Failed power transformers seems to be a fairly common fault in West German sets (I say West German because there are also East German sets out there, at least in Canada). One feature, and perhaps disadvantage on the W German sets is the tapped primary on the power transformer, I have a feeling that many were used on the wrong setting, they should have been set on the 120-125 volt tap, not the 110 volt one, whether this could cause some of the failures I don't know, but insulation breakdown on the H.V secondary is a possibility over time, causing shorted turns, you are also overrunning the tube heaters this way. Running the sets with leaky caps can also do this, and the selenium bridge rectifiers can also short. I think many were like brand Z sets, used a barely adequate transformer with no room for failure, smaller cores equal less copper wire, and less wire costs less money. I think the same motivation was why they used a selenium bridge, no need for a rectifier tube winding, and they could use thinner gauge wire in the tube heater winding instead of opting for a 6X4. The East German tube sets I have encountered used tube rectifiers, which is odd because as Mike and Peter can attest the Soviet radios from that era used selenium ones.
Regards
Arran

[morzh]

Jayce


One more thing: I know it is a common practice to replace selenium rectifiers, but in German sets they are often in remarkable condition and are almost as good as new.
I have not notice any degradation of performance and so I kept it.
It is alway a judgement call, of course.