[Ron Ramirez]

[jerryhawthorne]

On with the saga. As you may recall, there seemed to be a short across the mag tuning switch. Certainly looked like good old item 97 switch could do it and with it installed as it was, it was always closed. Cool I thought so tonight down to work on it again. Took one wire off the switch and YES the switch was closed in any mode of the mag tuning switch or speed dial. Should only close on the speed dial mode. With a little effort and some neat tools I did some nudging on the switch which is like a reed switch, bending one slightly so they were not locked together at all times. Well, I'll be, it now stays open and only closes with the speed dial goes by it. Lovely. Unfortunately, there is still a short across those two leads. That was one, but somewhere there is another. I'm depressed but it is now time to start taking off some more wires.
One short removed, another one to find.

Jerry

[jerryhawthorne]

More depression! the little insulating washer (more like a little fragile tube, very thin that slips around the tuning shaft and isolates the muting tab from the shaft) after several removals fell into pieces. I doubt that any exist and I wrapped the shaft with several winds of teflon tape. Seems to work nicely for now but still thinking about how to fabricate a new one. Any ideas out there? The thickness is not much more than thick paper and the length of the "tube" is about 1/8". Just another bummer along the track. Too cold and still snowing to work in the shop. A day off to contemplate my navel. I still have to find the second short and start to remove some wires.

Jerry

[klondike98]

Jerry, what's the diameter of the shaft you are trying to insulate? Would a plastic or even paper straw work? Or maybe make something out of paper sort of like the ones these folks sell: http://www.ppgintl.com/products/dielectr...ing-tubing .

[Steve Davis]

Maybe a short piece of heat shrink

Steve

[jerryhawthorne]

Thanks Steve and Bob, two great ideas. I will have to measure the shaft but just guessing 1/2 to 5/8 inch. Not certain I can find heat shrink that large but have not looked. That manufacture sure has some neat stuff, think they would like to sell 1/8" of it? Certainly looks if they have the right ID and wall thickness it would work nicely. I think heat shrink might work as well.
Jerry

PS: A straw would be lovely with probably the right wall thickness but one seldom sees a straw with that big an ID! There is a picture posted at the start of the thread with the piece that has to be insulated from the shaft. It is that little clip/washer that slides down the shaft but no touchy it.

Jerry

[jerryhawthorne]

A new update for those that care. The teflon is working on the mute switch all good for the time being. The mag tuning off and on switch is working. Great there. The mag tuning reed switch is now working nicely but as indicated earlier, the whole thing for the mag tuning is still shorted from one leg to the other basically keeping it turned off. I removed the caps from the can that sets in the middle of all that to see if I did something wrong. Look at the nice schematic that Ron had posted. Everything was hooked together (3 caps and a ground) properly and the two wires that were "brown" were tied together and hooked on a terminal strip. Why two coming out of the cap can that were hooked to the same point when one could do the job, I'm clueless. The other wire was color coded as indicate and went to the next terminal tab. None of the wires were ever removed from the terminal strip which had a ton of crap wired to it. After finally looking closely at the wires, one brown was hooked along with the striped wire to the same tab on the strip, together. The other brown of the legs was hooked to the other terminal strip. This essentially shorted the two legs together. A little moving of wires around, everything works properly. The two legs involving switch 97 and the mag tuning switch will now close the connection across the two legs as they should. On to trying to to adjust the mag tuning. Lesson learned, never trust the wiring color on the schematic.

Jerry

[Ron Ramirez]

Good! It's a great feeling to finally defeat a nagging problem in one of these old sets, isn't it?

[Gene Pederson]

Great news Jerry!!! You have had a long haul with this set. Congratulations

Gene

[Phlogiston]

Good job Jerry.

[jerryhawthorne]

Thanks for your help and encouragement gang. Well, I finally went on to adjusting the mag tuning. I will be dang, it did adjust and now works. The chassis is done other than the one cap I referred to earlier that was buried under the sub chassis. Does not look to have any real voltage on it and until Ron wants to put on a class on removing these dang things, I think I will let it go. Nice radio! I have not seen the cabinet as it was delivered as a chassis and speaker. My friend who owns it does great wood work. This thread is finished I think. Good night.

Jerry

[jerryhawthorne]

Here a a couple of pictures of the finished chassis. Seems someone in the past had removed the tube shield bases from the two 6J5G tubes used in the mag tuner. Perhaps to install metal ones? Well pin 1 on either of them is unused and not tied to ground. Seems to work well, the mag tuning so unless someone has the base and shield, does not seem to have any problems. Any thoughts on this? My friend has found some heat shrink tubing large enough to work as a spacer/insulator so off again with that and a new dial, of which the one on it has been "cleaned" by someone using water. Dang, more taking apart on that.

[Image: http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/nn129...8-1161.jpg]

[Image: http://i303.photobucket.com/albums/nn129...8-1162.jpg]

[Radioroslyn]

Looks GREAT!!!! Makes me want to get busy on my 37 models but still have that 36 Packard set to finish up. It's only been a year???
Terry

[Ron Ramirez]

Yup, that chassis is purty.

[jerryhawthorne]

Thanks Ron and Terry for the kind words. I know the chassis does not look like "new" but let's face it the old girl shows a little age. I have not seen the cabinet for it yet, it is in New Mexico. My friend after warming up in the Phoenix area for the winter will cruise by and pick it up. He will do an excellent job on the cabinet. Can't wait till they get married together and some pictures. Also can't wait to get the chassis and speaker out of my shop! If I have figured this whole thing out on the mag tuner, it is really only necessary to tune on when using the speed dial to get to a station via pushing in and locking onto a particular button that has been set to "close" to the proper station. As I see it, it will never be dead on, or likely to be dead on as each selection can only be adjusted slightly for the station via the screws. It would also be less likely to be on station depending on which direction you turn to it. The radio doesn't drift as far as I can see. A neat feature if you mess up manually as it will if slightly off station bring it in. It appears to me to be a crutch for the imprecise speed tuning set up. Been wrong often.

Jerry