Nothing better than another RCA CR-88A Shortwave Communication Receiver

As Henry Rogers told me, "You can never have enough CR-88A's!".....so I picked this CR-88A up from some super nice people in Quebec, Canada. It wasn't cheap to get it to California but well worth the price for the careful packaging done by :
Surplus 2D Ltee
813 St-Jacques
St-Jean-sur-Richelieu
Quebec, Canada J3B-2N2
Telephone # 1-450-346-7460
These folks went the extra measure to ensure this approx 100 lb (50 kg) receiver got here safely.

With it and my other CR-88A (see Youtube videos), I will build a dual diversity receiving system. What is diversity? Well, get more info here at http://www.radioblvd.com/ar88.htm

The audio you hear is piped thru an amp from KCEA on a wireless internet radio to an HP 8640B signal generator. From there it goes at 30 MHz to an antenna and then is received by the CR-88A on a longwire antenna. These days it is the only way to get decent music onto your vintage receivers. There is little music on shortwave anymore.

This CR-88A was in excellent shape to begin with. I did clean the tube pins and sockets, and all the contact surfaces on the rotary switches. Basically little else was touched. I do need to test and replace the old carbon resistors that have edged up or below their rated resistances. This is very typical. The capacitors, mostly oil type, are performing well, like the day they were made. Incredible performance for a piece of 1947 technology.

Enjoy.

Greg
K6SRO

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• RCA
• Shortwave
• ham
• radio
• RF
• vintage
• ether
• marconi
• boatanchor
• AM
• diversity

[JillmanVideo]

What i wouldn't give for an 88A of my own.

What a lovely radio and great music!

[hackller]

please do a new meter back scale for that, looks awful. you can do it on the pc. not hard to do

[rockangel1967]

hello

i have been looking at ebay for months and did never seen a RCA CR-88. i have hallycrafter and a eddystone but nothing like this one. :-(

[hro60]

They are a wonderful receiver . I have 2 Cr-88a's as well as a Ar-88lf. I'm being buried with them. Ar-88lf has a lower noise to signal ratio ,the noise being very low and the signals just as good as the Cr-88a( could be the IF freq ) ,whilst the Cr-88 has better audio from the 6k6 apposed to the 6v6.

[kg6tgr]

That's a sweet radio my man. I love the handwritten Smeter back. More posts like this!