Herculodge

Sony Style Outlet Selling SRF59 Ultralight Radio for $9.99

Thanks to Ken who writes:

The Sony Style Outlet website is a good source of excellent prices on Sony radios and boomboxes. For example right now they have the Sony SRF59 for $9.99. 

This is one of the radios that pretty much kicked off the Ultralight craze several years ago. It's a fun little analog radio. I bring it along with me if I'm taking a walk around sunset and it's an amazing DXer for its price and size.

A Reader Asks, Should I Get the Grundig Satellit 750?

A reader asks if he should buy the $300 Grundig Satellit 750 and Blake gives us his take:

I know it is a hard decision to get the 750 due to some of the mixed reviews. I have only grown fonder of mine since my posted comments here.

 I was going to get the Grundig 350 just to use as an outdoor SW radio that would play loud enough. Since paying extra for the 750 was not a big deal to me I figured it had to be as good or better than the 350 for this purpose. I am very glad I got the 750. There is no other radio on the market now that I would choose over it. 

I also like the audo line in that is on the front of the radio. I plug my iPod in and listen to podcasts like Coast to Coast while in the back yard. Works beatifully. It plays at a room or back yard filling volume without the sense of strain I now notice with my other radios (excluding my Tivoli Model 1). If my 750 were accidentally destroyed I would purchase another one ASAP.

Russ Stanton's Tecsun R-308 Table Radio

 

I've been putting the Tecsun R-308 through its paces for almost a month now and I am very happy with it. It has great AM reception and a low noise floor on weak stations. It seems pretty good at nulling stations but I'm not very experienced at that. I do notice that pulling in WABC - 770 KHz and 50,000 watts - I can rotate it and pull in a county and western station way down in the grass but still very copyable. 

I'm in a fringe area so this business with the noise floor is important. The big problem with the Sangean LB-100 Lunchbox is that while it might pull in a weak station, it sounds terrible doing it and I find it irritating to listen to under those circumstances. I find myself shutting the Lunchbox off and running for the Tecsun. 

The dial alignment was badly off by 30-40 KHz on AM and a corresponding amount on FM. I opened it up and decided to try a shortcut rather than completely disassembling it to get to the dial pointer. There's 3 geared wheels that tune the radio and operate the slide rule dial pointer. I tuned the Tecsun to a known station and then removed the center gear that has the dial cord wrapped around it. I lifted it up so the gears were no longer meshing and turned it until the dial indicator was reading correctly and then reassembled it. Whew! That worked like a charm. Good thing because it was really bothering me! If anybody gets one of these and needs help with the dial alignment, I'll be glad to take pictures and guide people through the procedure. It's easier than it might sound.

FM performance is also pretty good for an analog tuner. The problem here is that while the FM antenna is nice and long, it doesn't pivot. Tecsun provides a little stand on the back to rest the radio on an angle, so the idea is to rotate the radio for best reception, rather than the antenna. That's not always convenient or even possible in some circumstances.

Battery life is way better than average. I'm still showing 1.4 Volts on the 3 D cells I originally put in the Tecsun and it still plays loud and clear.  Sound isn't bad with the Tecsun either. It is indeed as described here by others - pleasant and well balanced. It has some bass but nothing like the Sangean portables (LB-100 Lunchbox and U3). But that makes it almost ideal for talk radio which isn't true for the Sangeans. The slider tone control is more of a bass cut control. You use it to bring the bass up to a level you prefer. Nice. It's plenty loud also. It distorts towards the end of the volume range but within reason.

I'm very impressed with the build quality and the price. I paid $20 and $16 S/H. It took 11 days to get here in Pennsylvania from Hong Kong. 

Great Reception Is Much Like the 3 Ls of Real Estate: Location, Location, Location

(Re-post)

Well said, Blake:

My sister in law has a Grundig G6 which she wanted after playing with mine. She told me that she can’t get her shortwave stations with her radio on her night stand and that she needs to take the radio outside. I asked her what kind of light bulb she uses sure enough she is using a curly cue florescent bulb.

I checked her radio and it works fine. We only use incandescent light bulbs in our house and get great reception. If you move to the computer room reception trouble begins with all of my radios. I have a desk near a monster power strip for an entertainment center and I can’t use this desk for SW dxing for that reason. If I move 12 feet away to the coffee table reception is superb.

I can get decent SW reception in our basement. However as soon as someone turns on the treadmill AM reception deteriorates and SW reception is gone turning completely to static. Great reception is much like the 3 L’s of realestate, Location Location Location.

Well said, Blake:

Less Pretentious Fashion Store, More Radio Performance, Please

Ante laments the direction of Tivoli Audio as it navigates toward pretentious boutique styling and branding, evidenced in their new Cappellini Collection, a bad sign when it comes to radio performance. He writes:

Tivoli is more and more becoming like a fashion store, rather than radio making company. Many regards, Ante. 

Hipster Or Flipster: This Is One Manly Radio

Angelo has apprised us of what appears to be a Hipster Lloyd's transistor radio, not "Flipster," as the seller claims. This is one manly radio, only for men who rank so high on the Man Points scale that no one dare question their masculinity as they traipse around Crate & Barrel while snapping their fingers to KC & the Sunshine Band thumping through this colorful radio. 

The Length of a Ferrite AM Antenna Doesn't Tell the Whole Story

Hugo uses his tech expertise to come up with some provocative questions regarding ferrite antennas:

I've bough an old Realistic Radio (I think SW-100 model) in Ebay a few weeks ago and after testing it to see how good it was on AM I've found it had a quite mediocre AM sensitivity and because it cost me so cheap (10 dls) I began to disassemble it but it occured to me to change the 4" ferrite for a new 15" just for fun (using the same coil) and with this new ferrite the radio performed like a real DX champion ala GE Superadio 2, after having fun I changed the ferrite with a  piece 6" of a broken 10" ferrite (which I've bought from an Ucranian Ebay seller and days ago I broke it and I kind of glued the biggest parts survivors), anyway to my surprise the radio STILL was very sensitive in AM like a DX champion but obviously a little less than before... 
 
So I was wondering Why a little change in size from the old 4" stock to the broken piece of 6" could make so biiig difference in reception...??  Anyway I changed again the ferrite (third change) but this time with a smaller piece of 3" from the same original ferrite (Now the ferrite is smaller than the original) and to my surprise the radio was as sensitive as it was with the old 4" stock ferrite....
 
I was scratching my head for a while trying to understand why a a broken and glued piece of ferrite of 3" make the radio  as sensitive as the original 4"....  and the only one explanation I have is that the Chinese factory used ferrite of very low quality.... What do you think of this ?

PD I left my radio with the broken piece of 6" and it performs on a par with my best AM radios....not bad for a Realistic one....
 
Regards
Hugo Ali
 

 
 

Another Radio Lover Who Can't be Cured

Herculodge Reader "WC" Gives Us His Radio Collection with Brief Comments on Each

MY RECEIVERS As of April '09

CCRadioSW ... (RP2100) Nice reception and sound Decent on batteries

CCRadio Plus (AM/FM/TV/WX) (Kiwa audio and sensitivity upgrades)

Drake R8

Eton E1 XM Satellite/AM/FM/Shortwave Announced as the Satellit 900

Eton E10 Nice take travel radio reception good

Eton E100 Small well built travel radio

Eton S350DL (Kiwa audio upgrade)

Eton S350 for sale

Icom R75

Icom R71A (Kiwa upgrades .... including memory board)

Grundig G5 .. Had an E5 and they do not perform as well.

Grundig Satellit 800

Grundig Yaght Boy 400 for sale

Grundig Yaught Boy 500 Another favorite with RDS for FM

Kenwood R 1000 (Kiwa audio & power supply upgrade)

Kenwood TS-140s (amateur but used for SW receive.. no TX)

Panasonic RF- B65

Panasonic RF- 4800

Radio Shack DX-398

Realistic 12-655 TRF AM "Dx-er" "OLDIE"

Realistic DX-66 for sale

Realistic SW-60 Sold

Realistic SX-190

Realistic DX-302 for sale

Realistic DX-390 for sale

Realistic DX-392 for sale

Sony ICF-2010's With full Kiwa mods. Just sold 1 of 2.

Sony ICF-5900W (X 2)

Sony ICF-6500W

Sony ICF-7600GR

Sony ICF-7600

Sony ICF-SW55 Very nice

Yaesu FRG-7 (Kiwa upgrades)

Zenith TransOceanics ..... D7000Y & R7000-1

　

PAST RECEIVERS

Grundig Satellit 700 (full compliment of Eproms) Bells $ whistles...static prone!

Grundig Satellit 750 El Junko!!!!!

Kenwood R-5000 died 3 hours after private purchase! PLL

Panasonic RF-3100 nice

Panasonic RF-2200 Great analog

Realistic DX-160 Great beginners set

Realistic DX- 400 good receive but very limited features

Realistic DX- 440 (Sangean ATS 803A)

Sony ICF-SW77 Many bells and whistles ... lousy sound

Sony ICF-7700 Average .... Not to be confused with FRG-7700

Yaesu FRG-100B No keypad noise floor no better than FRG 7700!

Yaesu FRG 7700 Great analog receiver ....... no memory installed

Yaesu FRG 7700 #2 .. Just traded April '09 Memory board installed.

Tivoli Model 1 ..... AM/FM table

Many others of lesser value

i.e.

Nordmende

Panasonic

Aiwa

Realistic

GE

ETC.

Scanners

Current....

Bearcat 898T "800" band

Alinco DJ-10X DC to Daylight coverage including "Cell"  Just Sold

Uniden 246T Handheld ... "800" band.... less cellular

Realistic "Race Track Pro 99" ......... "800" Band .... no cell

Realistic Pro-34 Cell band .... full 800 coverage

Past

Realistic Pro-2006 Cell band

Realistic Pro-43 Cell band

Pro-26

Pro-2021

etc. ... many others(Realistic basic scanners)

MISC.

Sony AN-1 Active antenna

MFJ-959B Tuner/Preamp

MFJ-1026 Noise cancelling signal enhancer .... works great!

Discone antenna

9:1 Balun ..... 80' longwire (zig zagged on 35' yard)

TPA ACTIVE ANTENNA ... Ameco

GE SR3 and SR1(X 2) (AM/FM ... good for dxing even on FM!

Angelo's Big Buddy and Little Buddy

 

On the left:  The familiar and some say legendary General Electric P-780 AM radio.  If you are into vintage classics and you don't have one, look for one.  It's an early solid state powerhouse that is engineered to replicate the sound of a warm tube radio.

On the right?  To me, it looks like a little sister to the P-780.  It's the "AIMOR" J-87-17373-A.

From what I can tell, it was sold by the Spiegel Catalog, Chicago.  I'm not sure when it was made/sold, but I would guess early 1960s.  The resemblence to the big GE is unmistakable, right down to the caramel color, chrome grille and carry handle.  One difference is that the GE is a plastic cabinet, while the AIMOR is genuine cowhide (and it's not a leather case----it's actually an integrated leather cabinet).  The little instruction booklet that was still with the radio when I scored it on E-Bay states that this AIMOR radio is "Extra high sensitive, luggage type with leather carrying handle, built in cow-hide cabinet, 10-transistors and 1 diode and de-luxe front panel made of die-cast."  Also, "Special ferrite core antenna, specially designed high sensitive ferrite core antenna self-contained, considerably improves sesnitivity of receiver."  It goes on:  "High efficiency A class push-pull amplification system.  Use of a pair of transistors for A class push-pull output circuit offers powerful output and rich tone."  And there's more: "Perfect printed-circuit board, modern perfect print-circuit system assures freedom from damages and also ensures unifrom quality and performance of receiver."  There's more, but you get the idea.  They were proud of this little radio. 

It takes six "C" batteries and really does put out powerful sound.  In fact, one issue I have with the radio is that when I turn it on, at minimum volume, it's a little too loud.  It's clear----not distorted----and it's fine to listen to from a distance, but if it's right next to me, it's not low enough.  I don't want to bother trying to fix it---I do use it, placed about 10 feet away and it's just fine.  Really, only one local station is super loud like that.  When I do a little DXing, it's not a problem.  It's not the best AM radio I have, but it's well made and very interesting---and it does work well.  I like the fact that the little users manual was still with it----and I got it for a song, along with a Lloyd's shortwave portable that I will review soon----once I have a chance to give it a few days use.  For now, I've been playing the AIMOR more often.  I buy and sell----and haven't decided if I'll let this one go or not.  It's a blast from the past, especially with the connection to the Spiegel Catalog.  Maybe some 1960's game show featured it when they announced Spiegel as a sponsor at the end of the show (I seem to recall "Truth or Consequences," "To Tell the Truth," "The Dating Game," "The Newlywed Game" and other shows like "What's My Line" listing their sponsors at the end and sometimes showing samples of what the sponsor sold.  Spiegel might have featured watches, luggage, radios and such---maybe someday I'll see my little AIMOR on a re-run!   

Angelo    

Manly Watch on a $94 Budget: Casio G-Shock GW6900-1 Solar Atomic

I don't know how you can do better at this price. Black 50 mm bezel gives this G-Shock a rugged look. Solar power means no battery changes. If I had to buy on watch on this budget, this would be the one. Good review on YouTube. Also the video allows you to see how big and burly this watch is.