[Groundhog74]

Started fooling around with the two new consoles the other day while between projects. The Airline I just gave a quick visual and cleaned the cabinet with some go-jo and Howard's. It improved somewhat, but not as much as I had hoped. The chassis had a nice mouse nest inside and a petrified ex-resident. After vacuuming that out it is very clean underneath. Apparently the resident was able to find enough to eat he/she didn't start eating the radio parts. Replaced an e-cap that was crispy crittered. No reception but does have static when on. Had one tube read very weak though. The rubber cushions for the tuning cap are basically gone so the dial sits a little low in the glass. I'll get around to that one sometime.

The Silvertone was totally silent when I got it. All tubes checked good but for one which was a little weak, and the eye tube tests ok but does not light up (or is so dim I can't see it). The chassis was filthy and while cleaning it I noticed a wire had popped off the speaker connector from a bad solder joint. I re-soldered that and I had static. Then I noticed that one of the tube shields (the very close fitting kind with a cap) was pressing hard on the wire going to the top of the tube (6A8G - 1st detector and oscillator). I relieved the pressure off of it thinking it may be shorting it out and was rewarded with a very nice sounding radio! This thing looks mostly original underneath, but receives and sounds as good or better than some of the radios I have re-capped. It should be a nice one when done. The cabinet improved greatly with a first cleaning but still has some issues. It will not be pristine looking without a strip and re-do, but it should be a pretty nice looking set with some obvious "road patina". All in all I'm pretty pleased with my 50 dollar investment. I'll try to get some pics posted when I get finished with some of my "honey do" projects.