[Guest]

Joe, FStephen, and Ron,

First, thank you for your replies. I appreciate your insights.

I am located outside of Philadelphia. How do I find a radio club, as FStephen mentioned. (his mentioning that I didn't want to buy a tube tester for one project was on the money)

I am by no means tempted to just replace the power cord and try to turn the radio on. As I look at the back of the radio, I assume from y'alls posts that the chassis is the actual guts of the radio that the tubes plug into? Anyway, as I look at the back, the power cord's rubber is totally a loss. I'm not even sure that I can just simply replace the insulation. But there are other wires. The ones that go to the speaker are covered with cloth and appear to be in decent shape. Then all the way to the left, as you look at the back, there is a plate with "1, 2, 3, 4" and a little further over there is the antenna/ground. The wires that go to 1, 2, 3, and ground, I think, are cloth and appear to me to be OK. 4 and Antenna (really its ANT on the plate, but I made the leap) are badly decayed.

So all that info is to say, OK, I know I am replacing the power cord, and I guess the 4 and ANT wires. But then what? Start with the tubes? Do I blanket-ly replace them all, as if I was changing the batteries in my house's smoke detector, or should I ferret out which ones are good and which ones are bad?

And how do I ID these wax paper capacitors of which I was cautioned? Oh, and you might as well add the resistors to that question.

Oh, and the buttons on the front... what was that stuff? I don't think I have an intact button on the face at all. (reddish material) Is the pushbutton material the same as whatever appears to be snugged around the metal chassis?

Thanks again to you guys.

Brian