Repairing and Restoring Tube Radios - part 1

This is for the electronics geeks out there. I am repairing and restoring an old Marconi model 220 tube radio and I thought I would make kind of a do-it-yourself documentary to share my little hobby with everyone. In part 1, we look over the cabinet and pull out the chassis and speaker.

Category:

Howto & Style

Tags:

• radio
• tube
• electronics
• capacitor
• repair
• marconi

[mritsfast]

I trust you didn't have this radio plugged in when you banged around on the metal chassis. Anyone working on one of these needs to caution these were a HOT chassis design. Current is flowing on the chassis as this was the design so its' components could get power. Please don't touch the chassis! You can get electrocuted!

[aliendaddy32]

No way... I've experienced a "hot chassis" first hand and don't plan on doing it again!

We're very safety conscious when working on our radios and it is never powered when we're just poking around, especially when the kids are helping.

[MrGramaphone78]

Why would the speaker have several hundred volts running through it?

[123ravindra]

very nice..!

[Quaaludedude714]

these will get harder to find and become more uncommon :) QC

[chris061290]

for those of you who still have tube electronics you need to keep them. do not sell them because every day that goes on these will get harder to find and become more uncommon. i am 21 years old and i got a lot of tube radios. ima learn how to be vintage radio repairs man. i want keep this tube era alive even as new technologies come out.

[bandet888]

@mritsfast I used to like to collect old tv's. Anyway I had one that used a hot chassis (depends on which way the plug was pluged in. It had a cable plug in but I used it for an antenna. that means one of the antenna was connected to the chassis. pluged in the wrong way and the chassis is hot! Antenna touched a heat duct from the furnace and POW! No major damage and I figured out why it happened.

[Teflon65]

This is fascinating to me, and you are a good instructor. I don't know if I have the mettle to ever fix an old radio, but I am enjoying this.

[jimmybobo]

Thanks for this. I have to pull these parts out to drop them off for repair. Found this a good primer!

[hydrolisk1792]

*Stops vid at 56 seconds* I would have loved to get that too insted of the xbox and PS3, lol That pad is asbestos!!! It should be removed with caution. Take a look at my vids, the Westinghouse WR-186 that I'm restoring had that same pad at the bottom, and I'm going to put a piece of sheet aluminum at the bottom as my fire shield. Just be really careful, there learks 200 - 300 volts in one of these sets.