03-03-2010, 04:12 PM
Hi Tim,
I just finished restoring one of these sets within the past couple of months. It is sitting on my desk at work and I am listening to it as I type. It is best to replace the capacitors in the radio for long term reliability. They may or may not be causing your issues. This model uses mostly loktal base tubes (7F8, 7B7, 7H7, FM1000, etc) which I have found to have problems with making good contact in the sockets unless you clean the pins properly. What I have done that has been very successful is to use a piece of 220 grit sandpaper on the tube pins to clean off any oxidation. Put contact cleaner in the tube socket on the chassis and work the tube in and out of the socket a few times. After cleaning all of the loktal tubes this way I then will extensively wiggle each tube in the socket while the set is playing just to make sure that the pins and socket contacts are cleaned sufficiently. If you get any scratchiness while wiggling a tube you know that it will need more attention.
For the capacitors you can get them from a few vendors on the internet. Radio Daze, Just Radios, Antique Electronic Supply just to name a few carry the higher voltage capacitors needed to replace the original capacitors in vacuum tube type equipment. There are about 30 paper capacitors in the 48-482 and another half-dozen or so electrolytics. This radio really is not for a beginner but I have worked on worse radios that definitely are not for the beginner.
I just finished restoring one of these sets within the past couple of months. It is sitting on my desk at work and I am listening to it as I type. It is best to replace the capacitors in the radio for long term reliability. They may or may not be causing your issues. This model uses mostly loktal base tubes (7F8, 7B7, 7H7, FM1000, etc) which I have found to have problems with making good contact in the sockets unless you clean the pins properly. What I have done that has been very successful is to use a piece of 220 grit sandpaper on the tube pins to clean off any oxidation. Put contact cleaner in the tube socket on the chassis and work the tube in and out of the socket a few times. After cleaning all of the loktal tubes this way I then will extensively wiggle each tube in the socket while the set is playing just to make sure that the pins and socket contacts are cleaned sufficiently. If you get any scratchiness while wiggling a tube you know that it will need more attention.
For the capacitors you can get them from a few vendors on the internet. Radio Daze, Just Radios, Antique Electronic Supply just to name a few carry the higher voltage capacitors needed to replace the original capacitors in vacuum tube type equipment. There are about 30 paper capacitors in the 48-482 and another half-dozen or so electrolytics. This radio really is not for a beginner but I have worked on worse radios that definitely are not for the beginner.
Sean
WØKPX
