To learn electronics in a very different and effective way, and gain access to Mr Carlson's personal designs and inventions, visit the Mr Carlson's Lab Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/MrCarlsonsLab
"Tiny Radio Restoration With Detailed Procedure" isn't that a bit of an oxymoron in your case? I have never seen a video of yours that was not "Detailed". Your videos are the longest I know on average.
@@michaelkellner6881 there is your problem😀. I was born in 1980. My definition of young is below 25 years old or so. Quite a sliding scale you see. If I had to guess(not my strongest point), I would assume Mr Carlson is of my age or older. Which doesn't qualify him as young to me, but certainly to you.
I find Working on these little guys relaxing even though it requires a lot of patience, concentration and discipline. That's a unique one with the battery in the middle. Appreciate the mention from the master himself!
@@stevem.1853 From my experience the ferrite slugs in the IF can slowly lose or change their permeability. This is 1-2% over one decade, but after 50-70 years the effect would be noticeable. Also capacitors in the IF can change their value, sometimes combined with the silver mica disease. There might be also other problems, such as leaky bypass capacitors loading high impedance circuits, or a capacitor going open, etc.
Wow that brings back memories while riding the school bus to High School back in the early '60s when the transistor was the coolest thing! Senior student, Gary, had just put together a 6 transistor radio from a kit to listen to on the way to school. I was really impressed! At the same time, I was into Ham Radio with all the big heavy stuff to homebrew. Gary later entered the NY State Science Fair that year and won first prize for building a bulky computer with wood dials etc. I built a Tesla Coil from old TV parts, cardboard tubing, and a Model T spark coil. At least I made Honorable mention haha.
Cool is building a working atomic pile in your back yard as an American teenager did a few years ago..........he did however by the Atomic Energy Commissions estimates shorten his lifespan by 20 years........
@@derrekvanee4567 see above. Hundreds of LEDs in parallel. Autonomous LEDs belong to no one. Have a flying at 100 mph day like my LEDs do. Amelie! Amelie! Hit 'em with that +15 dB b-bass, bb-bass. Amelie Lens! I need my Spica grey 6 transistor radio back! I owe this to my patents because I took apart the one they bought me and I am forever cursed on YouthTube for it/Malcolm McDowell impersonation. Ok and cut! That was a good take. Let's try one more. Oh, untimely death/John Lennon. Hit'em!
Shango's channel is fun, he revives so real basket cases with whatever works, he's really good at finding the problems. It's guy's like you that make RUclips.
so true! hi quality passion & knowledge sharing content! can't thank 'em enough. Very likely whoever know Mr. Carlson's Lab channel will know shango's too.
Shango is albeit, a tad 'grumphy', however - it fits with whatever poor treatment the radios and TVs he is restoring, got... Amazing what can be revived, believe that was not before, in the days, as it would be deemed to expensive, even then... :-D
What a memory. When I was in 10th grade, (1966) my girlfriend and myself would walk 4 blocks for lunch listening to a Motorola 9 transistor radio about the size you are reviewing. Man did that radio eat a 9 volt battery in about 10 hrs. I would love to find that radio again, as my wife misses it too.
As child in the 60's I had a transistor radio and would tune in the Grand Ol' Opry from Nashville on Saturday nights and put the radio under my pillow and drift off to dream with the crackling sweet sounds of the radio waves.
For us in Britain, the station many teenagers listened to in bed was Radio Luxembourg. The BBC played very little pop music back then, and no adverts. Radio Luxembourg did both. ♥
@@Bartok_J Yep, in Chicago back then, it was either WLS (890) or WCFL (1000), and that would be in kilocycles, thank you. Guess that old transistor radio under the pillow trick wasn't that uncommon after all.
Mr. Carlson is the best part of our day. My husband was in gown and housecoat about to have triple hernia surgery and the Cape Breton Regional Hospital canceled his surgery. Mr. Carlson has brightened his day. Thankyou Mr. Carlson. You make so many people happy.
Mr.Carlson is the best man out there who explains everything in detail , without any annoying background music. His voice is music to my ears ...Best wishes from Singapore .
i bought a mini Tube radio for my wife but it requires a weird battery voltage and it does not have a AC adaptor although there is port for one. After seeing this video I am getting itchy to see if this radio could be brought back and updated. I will search for a Schematic and see what else I can learn about it. Really do appreciate your postings. You are like a Technology Minister! calm and deliberate with a clear mission, figure out how it works, evaluate how it is performing and see what needs to enhanced or repaired. Very Professional. Thank You, D
I learned about Shango from Mr. Carlson during one of the lab tours. I really like the contrast between both of them! They've really help expand my knowledge. Very thankful for that.
I used to repair lots of these radios starting when I was a 12 year old. My Dad taught me from the age of 8 when he bought me a "Denshi Block" electronics kit for my Birthday. Brings back the memories! Many thanks indeed Mr Carlson.
I love these videos, such a great variety in your material. This particular one reminded me of a day maybe 45 years ago when I was trying to trace an underground 220V 60 amp service cable to my house. I didn't have a line locator so after some head scratching I grabbed a cheap AM radio and put it near a line source and tuned it till I heard the 60 hz buzz. I turned on the electric oven to create a large amp draw and went outside and started sweeping the radio with the bar antenna down back and forth near the ground till I heard the 60 hz buzz and started marking and walking and sweeping. It worked like a charm! I felt half-way smart that day solving a problem with a simple hack. Thanks for the nice memory!
Fascinating! Using $10,000 dollars worth of test equipment to fix a $10 radio! On a side note, I recently fixed a San/Bar FM tuner that was used in 1A2 telephone key systems to provide music on hold before ASCAP, BMI, SESAC. etc. Turned out to be a bad electrolytic between the amp module and the output transformer. I actually used my telephone audio tracer probe to find the missing signal similar to something you did in another video. We used those tracers with a tone generator to find cable pairs, etc.
I discovered Shango's channel a few years ago because I like vintage TVs and I like repair videos (and I like to repair vintage electronics). First I was reluctant to watch the radio repairs as I thought they would be kinda boring (and they often are kinda long), but Shango's sarcastic comments, his way of trolling phone scammers and his mumble rap always make my day. Better than most of what's on TV. Some other similar channels worth checking out are radiotvphononut and Jordan Pier.
Hello, Mr. Carlson, I'm a huge fan of your videos, (and Shangos as well) and I've been working on electrically restoring old vacuum tube radios and amplifiers and what not since I was 13 years old and I'm now 32 years old (going to be 33 in a couple of weeks on the 27th of September). I just recently finished working on an old Scott 299-D Stereo Integrated Amplifier and Also a Bogen AP-30 Stereo Integrated amp, and both of them supposedly had the same issue which was bad humming, well it turned out to be an issue with missing tube shields on the 12AX7 preamp tubes and speaker wires that were grounding each other out. The Scott which actually had an issue other than humming turned out to be an issue with bad coupling caps on the output tubes and a shorted coupling cap on one of the phase inverter tubes, so I replaced those capacitors and the amp just came to life. The Scott was actually having issues with one of the output tubes in the left channel red plating and arcing and and no audio, I repaired that issue and then the right channel (which was working previously) decided to die, and that was because the 4 MFD 450V Electrolytic coupling cap for the right channel's phase inverter tube (6GH8A tube) had gone open, I repaired that and now its working fine. I also worked on a 1950 Zenith Trans-Oceanic Radio model G-500 that all I had to do with that was repair the dial string and that's it, its still working on all of its original parts yet including filter caps and tubes. Have you worked on any of those aforementioned units before? If so I would love to see the videos of those repairs.
A very long time ago, I built a Sinclair 'Micromatic' Pocket Radio. It was actually so small that after a couple of days it disappeared. I had put it somewhere and searched frantically but never found it again. True story. Very nice that someone is showing these old small transistor radios the love they deserve.
I built the Sinclair scientific calculator in 1968. It had trig and log, sq root. Kit cost was about $69. At the time it was a very powerful calculator and quite a useful device. It was about a third of the size of this AM radio in the video. 5 digit fixed decimal with 2 digits of exponents of 10.
@@kentbetts Yeah I remenber longingly reading the ads for those Sinclair calculator kits! It was probly in the late 70's or early 80's. It would have been so cool to build my own calculator at the time. Wasn't there a Sinclair (8 bit!) microcomputer kit around then too? ZX80 maybe. Geez before that I'd been programming the 'Canon Canola (100?)' micro computer with Canon cardboard punch cards about the size of a bookmark. Each line of code on the punch card had 7 or 8 little rectangles that could be pressed out & removed to represent a zero, etc! The teacher would give us a paperclip we would open out to push the little squares out. We had a folder to look up all the commands & codes. I remember the frustration if I punched out the wrong one! D'oh! Syntax or punchcard reader errors invoked an annoying message if you got it wrong. It might have been early assembly language, but we still had to convert it all to binary for the cards! Ancient history now!
... Wow!... I had almost the exact same radio which my Mum & Dad bought for me around 1960 from a shop very near Kings Cross Station England... that little beauty was my pride and joy... a time when 'Made in Japan' was seen as like 'Made in China' is today... my, how things have changed
Thank you so much for sharing this! I had that same radio when I was a kid. I got it early 80's at a yard sale and it worked perfectly. I don't know where it wound up, but I used it through the 80s and vividly remember listening to it while fishing. I can't get rid of things like I used to. They are treasures, now. This was a real treat to see and such a blast from my past!
Nice that they didn't leave an old 9 volt battery inside to corrode everything. This especially good because it is placed right in the middle of the radio. Looks NOS. BTW Shango is da man!👍🏻 I always appreciate the electronics knowledge demonstrated by both Mr. C and Shango! My tower computer and flat screen TV both have SMPS's and play havoc with my bathroom radio on the AM band. So I usually listen to FM on it instead.
When I was about 8 years old back in the early 1960's My Uncle Don who worked at Sylvania gave me one of these transistor radios for Christmas. I was amazed with it and it became a fascination for radio for the rest of my life. Including becoming a HAM. Thanks Mr Carlson. Well done as usual....
Back in the 1970's took a correspondance class in electronics & color TV. Put together a 25" Heathkit TV, O scope, tube & transistor tester and a radio like the one you have. Everything worked but the radio. Only got static on it and never spent any time on think they called it alignment. Asame that young people now a days never learn to solder or use a basic meter. Every Christmas used to put 2 sets of train tracks with 4 switches and lights inside plasticville buidings together. Started playing with trains around 8 years old. My electrician dad would draw a picture then explain how to do it. Luckily the low voltage side of train transformer had a circuit breaker that tripped when I wired something wrong ( dead short ). Great vid.
Look at the 6:30 mark... I know that it's the wrong viewing angle but doesn't the upside down logo look actually look like the old time Starfleet logo???
Too many coincidences here. The prop communicator flip cover had to have been made from the grille of this radio, and the logo proves it beyond a reasonable doubt for me.
I agree with you Paul. That original spaghetti piping stuff on those 30uF capacitors looks like the woven fibreglass insulation. That stuff is heatproof, as well, & should last forever!
I am a regular viewer of Shango, love his comedic way of work. When my eldest sister was taken by brain cancer her daughter brought me a small box of those little radios. I rehabbed 5 of the seven, two were beyond my capability and are laying in a pile of parts stuff. They are fun to play with though.
I only saw it for a minute, but I don’t remember seeing the asymmetrical rear points, or the star in the middle. So I don’t think it’s connected to Star Trek. Interesting coincidence though!
Great video Mr Carlson. I remember having several 6 transistor radios very similar to this one back in the mid 60's. I would listen to the pirate stations broadcasting from ships in international waters around the UK. Radio Caroline North / South, Radio London, Radio 270 and Radio Luxembourg. I would constantly tweak the IF stages to get the best signal possible. Unfortunately I only had a metal screwdriver and would crack the ferrite cores. Usually just as it was out of tune! And they would always put that annoying wax in there to make the job even more difficult. That's the reason I went through so many "trannies." Happy days being 11 years old at the time...
Hello, Mr. Carlson's Lab, as I just wanted to say that I highly enjoyed your electrolytic capacitor surgery on that vintage 6 transistor pocket portable! Both the capacitor readings and the alignment procedures were both informative for me personally-speaking! Your radio repair took me back to the 60s as a young boy when I used to go beyond just replacing batteries out of curiosity as to what made the radio work, i.e., transformers, tuning capacitor, capacitors, resistors, & so forth! I would end up breaking my radio(s) whereas my parents were very reluctant to repair and/or replace my radios! LOL! I plan on enjoying your RUclips channel indeed! Thanks...
Your comments about what techs thought about the miniaturisation of back then and how much incredibly smaller things are these days were really interesting. Someone I know was an electrical engineer from about the end of the tube era through to I think sometime around the 90s and he would agree I'm sure - the engineering interest has never left him, and recently he randomly came in the room holding some super-cheap gadget (can't even remember what it was, it was just an "unremarkable" incredibly cheap item, I think it had bluetooth) and raving about how incredible it was. He'd dismantled it of course. We might see such things as just commonplace rubbish, but the technology behind modern electronics really is amazing. I love that this guy sees that and that it gets him so excited, its like I imagine he was back in the day when his first hobby project was to make a TV out of an old WWII radar CRT - times have changed but interests have not!
It is so interesting to see how you go about fixing these old radios... The schematic inside the radio was a nice touch by the manufacturers forward thinking that their radios would be serviced and kept operational past it's purchase... today's electronics are just the opposite: they are intentionally obfuscated, some are potted, part numbers are erased, digital components encrypted or JTAG fuses blown, etc. There's no way in... And a schematic? Ha! No chance... You have to buy a new one, and surprise! There's a new model with a different style (and incompatible) connectors with likely new and incompatible software so you have to buy everything all new again! Lather, Rinse, Repeat...
Mr Carlson, you have just brought back the memories I had when I was a teenager working on the summer job at radio manufacturing factory in Hong Kong, thanks a bunch
Interesting seeing Mr. Carlson taking on a project this small. My husband has a Toshiba 6TP-309 from 1959 I think? Likely it needs new caps. In Canada the same radio was also sold as Seabreeze.
I am just amazed on the attention to details the old transistor radios possed. Even the cover on most were made from leather. Hard to believe that such small touches made such a difference in the look and feel of the product. I still have my first AM and FM radio which plays just fine. Would bet you everything I own and my life that today's product quality will never be that stellar. Nice work Mr. Carlson's Lab. Thank you for educating us on this type of products.
What a cute little radio. It looks like a Star Trek Communicator! I love Shango's channel as well. How cool that two of my favorite electronics channels are friends. If I was a millionaire It'd be so cool to throw a bunch of money at Mr. Carlson and commission him to make some "cost no object" tube amplifiers and watch him design and build it on his channel. How fun would that be? or not IDK.
Excellent. Gosh you have to love these things. In the mid 1960s something like this probably sold for about $20. This was at a time that you could buy a new Ford Mustang for $2000. They replaced small tube portables with ghastly batteries which were the most compact radios of the late 50s and early 60s. Thanks for a very fun video. It is sincerely appreciated.
Nooo !! Not Duracell please, I haven’t seen one that haven’t leaked acid. Plz use Energizers, less likely to leak or better yet rechargeables. Thanks for doing this restore and link to someone that also do this. Love your work !!!
I used to work for Duracell back in the 1980s. Every now and then we'd get a bunch of leakers from the plant and jlhave to figure out what went wrong. The stuff that leaks out is electrolyte. Its not an acid but rather as strong alkali base, I.e.pottasium hydroxide
You are brilliant , yours videos remind me my childhood. I have got the same kind of transistor radio.thank you to show us what are those harmonics because only to heard that from my father I haven t any practical idea what they are and made by , capacitors avoid a lot of disagreements when they are in good capacities.
@@Drottninggatan2017 I think so. Based on the description of how it connects it must be the one on the bottom towards the left. EDIT/Addendum: it's the one right above the word "battery".
Shango's channel is what got me watching vintage tech restoration videos. Its great that the skills still exist to service this stuff. I bet modern tech won't be being serviced in 50+ years from now. Anyone making these videos deserves respect as they're documenting what will probably become a lost skillet.nice to know that people still care about this stuff. Most modern tech isn't designed to be repaired by anyone as it's regarded as disposable.
You're actually missing several zeros with modern microprocessors. The AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (which was introduced 2 years ago and is not even the top model) has 10 billion transistors. It really is incredible to see how much that has progressed...
This is just incredible! These videos were something that I have always been looking for! Ever since the first time that I have seen the inside of a radio and saw all of the parts inside I always wondered how they work. Now I see that sometimes these parts fail and need to be repaired or replaced. I am sure that it takes a lot of scientific knowledge to know how to troubleshoot and fix these things and even more knowledge to originally design and make these radios and the components inside. Lots and lots of scientific knowledge. Thank you to this guy in the video and to RUclips for making it available.
Shango66 channel is cool but .radiotvphononut's Channel is even cooler especially when hes discussing ups and the post office ha ha .but mr C has the tidest bench
Love how guys like you and Shango006 restore the antique radios so that maybe some younger folks could appreciate the gear they own today. Being a kid in the 70's my first radio would have been a small radio like this and I enjoyed it thoroughly to have a hand held device. Of course when I became a teen technology had advanced to the point of CD'S but watching this work and seeing how simple the circuitry was I get nostalgic for my fold out turntable(LOL HAPPY DAY'S) but the time I spent enjoying music on these devices is priceless no matter the quality nothing replaces that old scratchy sound love this channel.
in 1969, my grandfather got me a small transistor radio. They were proud of transistors because it said "Transistor Radio" on it. It worked fine. I wish I still had it.
I still have a few of these as well as the original calculators. They all still work. I hooked a small microphone to the amplifier and it worked so well that I could hear a fly walking. After more than 50 years I still use it for other purposes of course. It's great to have a channel showing how to take apart and fix things.
Loved the repair, excellent troubleshooting. Reminds me of when I was a kid in the late 50s and I would go to the salvation army junk piles where they would toss out things that were not a quick fix and I would get them home and work on them, with my little VOM from Lafayette electronics, I am long since retires with an MS in EE, What I learned as a kid served me well all my life.
What a great bit of deja vú from back in the day and even prior. Who all remembers homebrewing with PNP germanium transistors like the Raytheon CK-718 (predecessor to the venerable CK-722)? And the first hobby grade RF transistor, the CK-768? Thanks for the memories Sir!
I love working on the small transistor radios. I got my first one in 1970 when I was 12 yo. I restore them, then put them on a shelf.My favorite is an old Arvin c. 1960. It plays great. I enjoyed this video very much. I also have been subscribed to Shango66 for several years now.
I really appreciate the fact that your quick explanations of different aspects of what you are looking for. Sad as it sounds, I actually learned a few things from you today. Thank You as always for sharing!
When I was a kid back in the mid 1960's I had a job working as a farm laborer for 5 bucks a day, room and board. I saved up my pennies and bought a brand spanking new JADE transistor radio, it was turquoise in color. Well i quickly wore out the 9 volt batteries on the set listening to the rock and roll at night out of Bismarck ND and Oklahoma City OK when the moon was just right. So after some time I decided that I usually listened to the set in my room and it really didn't need to be that portable, so I soldered on some wires and hooked it to a 6 volt lantern battery. I was having a hard time getting my favorite stations in, and so I began screwing those little colored screws back and forth, well by the time I got done with it, I no longer had an AM Radio, but instead was receiving short wave at night, during the day I was getting some of the local (for the USA) stations like the time out of Colorado Springs and VOA which was blasting 24/7 back then as well as radio Cuba for the communist folk in our nation. I took it up to the local DJ to look at, he thought it was cool and hooked it up, sort of, to the main antenna for the AM Radio Station, we were getting all sorts of things with her. Well a few years back, I cleaned mom's house out so we could sell it, as she went into the nursing home, where she still resides today at age 97 and counting. I found the old radio, mom had kept it after I left home and started my own family. Sadly, the old radio had no life left. in her no matter how much voltage I fed her, I tore her apart and used some of the parts on other old sets I have laying around. I think I still have the case somewhere.
Thanks for all you do. I'm in the middle of my first transistor radio repair right now and I'm trying to watch as many videos as I can to soak up knowledge.
![Stop RF "Radio Frequency" Interference! [Ways To Solve Noise Issues]](/img/1.gif)
To learn electronics in a very different and effective way, and gain access to Mr Carlson's personal designs and inventions, visit the Mr Carlson's Lab Patreon page here: www.patreon.com/MrCarlsonsLab
"Tiny Radio Restoration With Detailed Procedure" isn't that a bit of an oxymoron in your case? I have never seen a video of yours that was not "Detailed". Your videos are the longest I know on average.
@@michaelkellner6881 what is young to you? I would not think Mr Carlson young, but that is an estimation as I do not know his birthday
@@michaelkellner6881 there is your problem😀. I was born in 1980. My definition of young is below 25 years old or so. Quite a sliding scale you see. If I had to guess(not my strongest point), I would assume Mr Carlson is of my age or older. Which doesn't qualify him as young to me, but certainly to you.
Great content. I like your method of troubleshooting while demonstrating the use of different types of test equipment. Thanks for sharing
I was watching so intently, I smelled the old rosen when you started to removed those two top caps.
I find Working on these little guys relaxing even though it requires a lot of patience, concentration and discipline. That's a unique one with the battery in the middle. Appreciate the mention from the master himself!
You're very welcome Shango, you deserve way more subs!
👍👍🍻
I've done some Google searches on what causes radios to go out of alignment with no satisfactory answers. Is it just aging of components?
@@stevem.1853 From my experience the ferrite slugs in the IF can slowly lose or change their permeability. This is 1-2% over one decade, but after 50-70 years the effect would be noticeable. Also capacitors in the IF can change their value, sometimes combined with the silver mica disease. There might be also other problems, such as leaky bypass capacitors loading high impedance circuits, or a capacitor going open, etc.
@@stevem.1853 It's mostly the phantom twiddler
Wow that brings back memories while riding the school bus to High School back in the early '60s when the transistor was the coolest thing! Senior student, Gary, had just put together a 6 transistor radio from a kit to listen to on the way to school. I was really impressed! At the same time, I was into Ham Radio with all the big heavy stuff to homebrew. Gary later entered the NY State Science Fair that year and won first prize for building a bulky computer with wood dials etc. I built a Tesla Coil from old TV parts, cardboard tubing, and a Model T spark coil. At least I made Honorable mention haha.
Cool is building a working atomic pile in your back yard as an American teenager did a few years ago..........he did however by the Atomic Energy Commissions estimates shorten his lifespan by 20 years........
All your transistor bases are belonged to Gary
@@derrekvanee4567 see above.
Hundreds of LEDs in parallel.
Autonomous LEDs belong to no one.
Have a flying at 100 mph day like my LEDs do.
Amelie!
Amelie!
Hit 'em with that +15 dB b-bass, bb-bass.
Amelie Lens!
I need my Spica grey 6 transistor radio back!
I owe this to my patents because I took apart the one they bought me and I am forever cursed on YouthTube for it/Malcolm McDowell impersonation.
Ok and cut!
That was a good take.
Let's try one more.
Oh, untimely death/John Lennon.
Hit'em!
@@wazza33racer We were trolled hard on that one.
I can't get enough of Mr. Carlson's videos. He is like the Bob Ross of vintage electronics
If Mr. Carlson ever says "happy little trees" during a restoration, that'd be amazing!
Amen to that
@@spytromics: Or "happy accident"!
dah!
Shango's channel is fun, he revives so real basket cases with whatever works, he's really good at finding the problems. It's guy's like you that make RUclips.
Thanks Orange!
Agreed!
so true! hi quality passion & knowledge sharing content! can't thank 'em enough. Very likely whoever know Mr. Carlson's Lab channel will know shango's too.
Totally agree. I like forward to you both.
Shango is albeit, a tad 'grumphy', however - it fits with whatever poor treatment the radios and TVs he is restoring, got... Amazing what can be revived, believe that was
not before, in the days, as it would be deemed to expensive, even then... :-D
What a memory. When I was in 10th grade, (1966) my girlfriend and myself would walk 4 blocks for lunch listening to a Motorola 9 transistor radio about the size you are reviewing. Man did that radio eat a 9 volt battery in about 10 hrs. I would love to find that radio again, as my wife misses it too.
As child in the 60's I had a transistor radio and would tune in the Grand Ol' Opry from Nashville on Saturday nights and put the radio under my pillow and drift off to dream with the crackling sweet sounds of the radio waves.
For us in Britain, the station many teenagers listened to in bed was Radio Luxembourg. The BBC played very little pop music back then, and no adverts. Radio Luxembourg did both. ♥
@@Bartok_J Yep, in Chicago back then, it was either WLS (890) or WCFL (1000), and that would be in kilocycles, thank you. Guess that old transistor radio under the pillow trick wasn't that uncommon after all.
Mr. Carlson is the best part of our day. My husband was in gown and housecoat about to have triple hernia surgery and the Cape Breton Regional Hospital canceled his surgery. Mr. Carlson has brightened his day. Thankyou Mr. Carlson. You make so many people happy.
Thanks for your kind comment Mary, I wish your husband well!
Best of luck to you and your Husband, Mary. Best wishes from Halifax!
I have just had hernia surgery and I can confirm Mr Carlson is brightening up my day as I recover!
Doesn't matter big equipment or small radio. You attention to detail is INCREDIBLE.
Mr.Carlson is the best man out there who explains everything in detail , without any annoying background music. His voice is music to my ears ...Best wishes from Singapore .
They spoil their own videos with distractions from loud music, destroying the very purpose they are showcasing. Pathetic for the audiences patience.
i bought a mini Tube radio for my wife but it requires a weird battery voltage and it does not have a AC adaptor although there is port for one. After seeing this video I am getting itchy to see if this radio could be brought back and updated. I will search for a Schematic and see what else I can learn about it. Really do appreciate your postings. You are like a Technology Minister! calm and deliberate with a clear mission, figure out how it works, evaluate how it is performing and see what needs to enhanced or repaired. Very Professional. Thank You, D
Cool that you gave Shango a shout out. Both of you have excellent channels!
I like that he used Shango's "cap-jumping" troubleshooting method too.
I learned about Shango from Mr. Carlson during one of the lab tours. I really like the contrast between both of them! They've really help expand my knowledge. Very thankful for that.
@@jeffkamen2307 Yeah I liked that as well. Its such a great technique but its not one I ever thought of till I saw it done.
I used to repair lots of these radios starting when I was a 12 year old. My Dad taught me from the age of 8 when he bought me a "Denshi Block" electronics kit for my Birthday. Brings back the memories! Many thanks indeed Mr Carlson.
I love these videos, such a great variety in your material. This particular one reminded me of a day maybe 45 years ago when I was trying to trace an underground 220V 60 amp service cable to my house.
I didn't have a line locator so after some head scratching I grabbed a cheap AM radio and put it near a line source and tuned it till I heard the 60 hz buzz.
I turned on the electric oven to create a large amp draw and went outside and started sweeping the radio with the bar antenna down back and forth near the ground till I heard the 60 hz buzz and started marking and walking and sweeping.
It worked like a charm!
I felt half-way smart that day solving a problem with a simple hack.
Thanks for the nice memory!
you guys know all the "tricks"!
Fascinating! Using $10,000 dollars worth of test equipment to fix a $10 radio! On a side note, I recently fixed a San/Bar FM tuner that was used in 1A2 telephone key systems to provide music on hold before ASCAP, BMI, SESAC. etc. Turned out to be a bad electrolytic between the amp module and the output transformer. I actually used my telephone audio tracer probe to find the missing signal similar to something you did in another video. We used those tracers with a tone generator to find cable pairs, etc.
You and Shango has always been my two favorite radio repair/restore channels.
Thank you for this nice radio restoration tutorial! Hope to follow again soon. Greetings from Lima - Peru -South America.
I discovered Shango's channel a few years ago because I like vintage TVs and I like repair videos (and I like to repair vintage electronics). First I was reluctant to watch the radio repairs as I thought they would be kinda boring (and they often are kinda long), but Shango's sarcastic comments, his way of trolling phone scammers and his mumble rap always make my day. Better than most of what's on TV.
Some other similar channels worth checking out are radiotvphononut and Jordan Pier.
Hello, Mr. Carlson, I'm a huge fan of your videos, (and Shangos as well) and I've been working on electrically restoring old vacuum tube radios and amplifiers and what not since I was 13 years old and I'm now 32 years old (going to be 33 in a couple of weeks on the 27th of September).
I just recently finished working on an old Scott 299-D Stereo Integrated Amplifier and Also a Bogen AP-30 Stereo Integrated amp, and both of them supposedly had the same issue which was bad humming, well it turned out to be an issue with missing tube shields on the 12AX7 preamp tubes and speaker wires that were grounding each other out.
The Scott which actually had an issue other than humming turned out to be an issue with bad coupling caps on the output tubes and a shorted coupling cap on one of the phase inverter tubes, so I replaced those capacitors and the amp just came to life.
The Scott was actually having issues with one of the output tubes in the left channel red plating and arcing and and no audio, I repaired that issue and then the right channel (which was working previously) decided to die, and that was because the 4 MFD 450V Electrolytic coupling cap for the right channel's phase inverter tube (6GH8A tube) had gone open, I repaired that and now its working fine.
I also worked on a 1950 Zenith Trans-Oceanic Radio model G-500 that all I had to do with that was repair the dial string and that's it, its still working on all of its original parts yet including filter caps and tubes.
Have you worked on any of those aforementioned units before? If so I would love to see the videos of those repairs.
A very long time ago, I built a Sinclair 'Micromatic' Pocket Radio. It was actually so small that after a couple of days it disappeared. I had put it somewhere and searched frantically but never found it again. True story.
Very nice that someone is showing these old small transistor radios the love they deserve.
Sorry you lost your radio! Was it ever found?
I built the Sinclair scientific calculator in 1968. It had trig and log, sq root. Kit cost was about $69. At the time it was a very powerful calculator and quite a useful device. It was about a third of the size of this AM radio in the video. 5 digit fixed decimal with 2 digits of exponents of 10.
@@kentbetts Yeah I remenber longingly reading the ads for those Sinclair calculator kits! It was probly in the late 70's or early 80's. It would have been so cool to build my own calculator at the time. Wasn't there a Sinclair (8 bit!) microcomputer kit around then too? ZX80 maybe. Geez before that I'd been programming the 'Canon Canola (100?)' micro computer with Canon cardboard punch cards about the size of a bookmark. Each line of code on the punch card had 7 or 8 little rectangles that could be pressed out & removed to represent a zero, etc! The teacher would give us a paperclip we would open out to push the little squares out. We had a folder to look up all the commands & codes. I remember the frustration if I punched out the wrong one! D'oh! Syntax or punchcard reader errors invoked an annoying message if you got it wrong. It might have been early assembly language, but we still had to convert it all to binary for the cards! Ancient history now!
There's no question you would be hard pushed to find anyone with the knowledge and experience of mr Carlson.
i love shango! you and him both are national treasures
*international treasures
Hi Walczyk! Is Walczyk a Polish name?
@@paulgrodkowski3412 yes but i am just an american with a polish grandfather!
Shango is the real deal, colourful and competent. Rare breed
Thank You for mentioning Shango. His channel led me to yours. Been watching you both for years.
... Wow!... I had almost the exact same radio which my Mum & Dad bought for me around 1960 from a shop very near Kings Cross Station England... that little beauty was my pride and joy... a time when 'Made in Japan' was seen as like 'Made in China' is today... my, how things have changed
Thank you so much for sharing this! I had that same radio when I was a kid. I got it early 80's at a yard sale and it worked perfectly. I don't know where it wound up, but I used it through the 80s and vividly remember listening to it while fishing. I can't get rid of things like I used to. They are treasures, now. This was a real treat to see and such a blast from my past!
Nice that they didn't leave an old 9 volt battery inside to corrode everything. This especially good because it is placed
right in the middle of the radio. Looks NOS. BTW Shango is da man!👍🏻 I always appreciate the electronics knowledge
demonstrated by both Mr. C and Shango! My tower computer and flat screen TV both have SMPS's and play havoc
with my bathroom radio on the AM band. So I usually listen to FM on it instead.
When I was about 8 years old back in the early 1960's My Uncle Don who worked at Sylvania gave me one of these transistor radios for Christmas. I was amazed with it and it became a fascination for radio for the rest of my life. Including becoming a HAM. Thanks Mr Carlson. Well done as usual....
Your very welcome BP.
Back in the 1970's took a correspondance class in electronics & color TV. Put together a 25" Heathkit TV, O scope, tube & transistor tester and a radio like the one you have. Everything worked but the radio. Only got static on it and never spent any time on think they called it alignment. Asame that young people now a days never learn to solder or use a basic meter. Every Christmas used to put 2 sets of train tracks with 4 switches and lights inside plasticville buidings together. Started playing with trains around 8 years old. My electrician dad would draw a picture then explain how to do it. Luckily the low voltage side of train transformer had a circuit breaker that tripped when I wired something wrong ( dead short ). Great vid.
When initially pulled from the case, it reminded me of the old Star Trek communicator.
Look at the 6:30 mark... I know that it's the wrong viewing angle but doesn't the upside down logo look actually look like the old time Starfleet logo???
@@thiesenf it does indeed 01:51
I came here to say this. LOL
🖖
YES! The sixties had a very distinctive style! 🖖
Too many coincidences here. The prop communicator flip cover had to have been made from the grille of this radio, and the logo proves it beyond a reasonable doubt for me.
Nicely done - so glad you reused the piping. 💪
I agree with you Paul. That original spaghetti piping stuff on those 30uF capacitors looks like the woven fibreglass insulation. That stuff is heatproof, as well, & should last forever!
wow something different today as usual great
Just watched your video. All I can say is BRILLIANT
Glad you enjoyed it!
Good shout out to Shango. I enjoy his videos regularly, along with Radiophononut's. Thanks again for the doing these videos, and peace :)
As obsolete as they are, these tiny radios are still miracles of human ingenuity. Very enjoyable and instructive video. I think you are a genius.
Everything else aside, that's just a really attractive little radio - it just looks smart. What a nice piece of industrial design.
I am a regular viewer of Shango, love his comedic way of work. When my eldest sister was taken by brain cancer her daughter brought me a small box of those little radios. I rehabbed 5 of the seven, two were beyond my capability and are laying in a pile of parts stuff. They are fun to play with though.
Love the "Star Trek Symbol" where the battery goes...and how the radio looks a bit like a TOS communicator :)
Hey, sharp eye ! Indeed quite Star Trekky Maybe it was Gene Roddenberrys first radio he listened to scifi radio shows on ^^
I only saw it for a minute, but I don’t remember seeing the asymmetrical rear points, or the star in the middle. So I don’t think it’s connected to Star Trek. Interesting coincidence though!
Excellent repair job, thanks for showing the whole procedure.
Congratulations..
Great video Mr Carlson. I remember having several 6 transistor radios very similar to this one back in the mid 60's.
I would listen to the pirate stations broadcasting from ships in international waters around the UK. Radio Caroline North / South, Radio London, Radio 270 and Radio Luxembourg.
I would constantly tweak the IF stages to get the best signal possible. Unfortunately I only had a metal screwdriver and would crack the ferrite cores. Usually just as it was out of tune! And they would always put that annoying wax in there to make the job even more difficult.
That's the reason I went through so many "trannies." Happy days being 11 years old at the time...
Oh wow I had one in the 70’s and loved it … I would listen to it at midnight when Art Bell was on…. Great stuff
Oh, oh, a tiny one. Usually Mr Carlson is working on the bigger stuff, so this is neat! :)
A neat little radio, in the sixties I had a couple similiar. Cool show thank you.
Very well done Paul. I have always liked the amount of detail that you put into your restoration videos.
Hello, Mr. Carlson's Lab, as I just wanted to say that I highly enjoyed your electrolytic capacitor surgery on that vintage 6 transistor pocket portable! Both the capacitor readings and the alignment procedures were both informative for me personally-speaking! Your radio repair took me back to the 60s as a young boy when I used to go beyond just replacing batteries out of curiosity as to what made the radio work, i.e., transformers, tuning capacitor, capacitors, resistors, & so forth! I would end up breaking my radio(s) whereas my parents were very reluctant to repair and/or replace my radios! LOL! I plan on enjoying your RUclips channel indeed! Thanks...
I like how Mr Carlson reccommends viewing Shango channel and immideately proceeds to poke a cap into the defective circuit :-D
Thank you Mr Carlson, i must get round to that little perdio mini66 I've been meaning to do..
Cool little radio Paul. Nice to show the thought process on troubleshooting this. Shango does have interesting videos. Thanks for sharing.
Who is Paul?
Your comments about what techs thought about the miniaturisation of back then and how much incredibly smaller things are these days were really interesting. Someone I know was an electrical engineer from about the end of the tube era through to I think sometime around the 90s and he would agree I'm sure - the engineering interest has never left him, and recently he randomly came in the room holding some super-cheap gadget (can't even remember what it was, it was just an "unremarkable" incredibly cheap item, I think it had bluetooth) and raving about how incredible it was. He'd dismantled it of course. We might see such things as just commonplace rubbish, but the technology behind modern electronics really is amazing. I love that this guy sees that and that it gets him so excited, its like I imagine he was back in the day when his first hobby project was to make a TV out of an old WWII radar CRT - times have changed but interests have not!
It is so interesting to see how you go about fixing these old radios... The schematic inside the radio was a nice touch by the manufacturers forward thinking that their radios would be serviced and kept operational past it's purchase... today's electronics are just the opposite: they are intentionally obfuscated, some are potted, part numbers are erased, digital components encrypted or JTAG fuses blown, etc. There's no way in... And a schematic? Ha! No chance... You have to buy a new one, and surprise! There's a new model with a different style (and incompatible) connectors with likely new and incompatible software so you have to buy everything all new again! Lather, Rinse, Repeat...
Well said Ray!
The reason why we we want right to repair formally recognised.
Greetings:
Any chance you are the famous JRM from Compact Satellite Services?
@@jamesmdeluca no sorry, I guess my name is very common.
Q
Mr Carlson, you have just brought back the memories I had when I was a teenager working on the summer job at radio manufacturing factory in Hong Kong, thanks a bunch
Glad you enjoyed it Albert!
Interesting seeing Mr. Carlson taking on a project this small. My husband has a Toshiba 6TP-309 from 1959 I think? Likely it needs new caps. In Canada the same radio was also sold as Seabreeze.
I like your style you show people what’s going on
Great shoutout to Shango066. He also has an incredible channel.
I am just amazed on the attention to details the old transistor radios possed. Even the cover on most were made from leather. Hard to believe that such small touches made such a difference in the look and feel of the product. I still have my first AM and FM radio which plays just fine. Would bet you everything I own and my life that today's product quality will never be that stellar. Nice work Mr. Carlson's Lab. Thank you for educating us on this type of products.
Yay, I knew it was going to be a good day.
Best Radio Restoration And Nice Explained Mr Carlson's Sir.
Thank you kindly
What a cute little radio. It looks like a Star Trek Communicator! I love Shango's channel as well. How cool that two of my favorite electronics channels are friends. If I was a millionaire It'd be so cool to throw a bunch of money at Mr. Carlson and commission him to make some "cost no object" tube amplifiers and watch him design and build it on his channel. How fun would that be? or not IDK.
Excellent. Gosh you have to love these things. In the mid 1960s something like this probably sold for about $20. This was at a time that you could buy a new Ford Mustang for $2000. They replaced small tube portables with ghastly batteries which were the most compact radios of the late 50s and early 60s. Thanks for a very fun video. It is sincerely appreciated.
Glad you enjoyed George!
Back in the day they were called "transistor radios." I had several in the 60s and 70s. Thanks for the video.
Sometimes we'd just call them 'transistors'! "Hey mate don't forget to bring your transistor with ya to the beach!...".
Brilliant as usual... 👍👍👍
Love yours and Shango's videos.
Keep up the good work.
Thank you very much!
Thank you for the detailed description.
No problem!
Nooo !! Not Duracell please, I haven’t seen one that haven’t leaked acid. Plz use Energizers, less likely to leak or better yet rechargeables. Thanks for doing this restore and link to someone that also do this. Love your work !!!
Workaholics are my favorite!
I use heavy duty batteries in all of my vintage transistor radios.
I have had better results with the cheap hf batteries than duracell.
I used to work for Duracell back in the 1980s. Every now and then we'd get a bunch of leakers from the plant and jlhave to figure out what went wrong. The stuff that leaks out is electrolyte. Its not an acid but rather as strong alkali base, I.e.pottasium hydroxide
You are brilliant , yours videos remind me my childhood. I have got the same kind of transistor radio.thank you to show us what are those harmonics because only to heard that from my father I haven t any practical idea what they are and made by , capacitors avoid a lot of disagreements when they are in good capacities.
Nice to see the inside again .
In the 70s i destroid many handheld radios as a kidd to experiment whith it
Greetings from the netherlands
Mr Carlson,
So on the schematic, which cap was it that went bad?
Good question.
Might it be one of the things marked 30M and has a striped symbol?
@@Drottninggatan2017 I think so. Based on the description of how it connects it must be the one on the bottom towards the left.
EDIT/Addendum: it's the one right above the word "battery".
Shango's channel is what got me watching vintage tech restoration videos. Its great that the skills still exist to service this stuff. I bet modern tech won't be being serviced in 50+ years from now. Anyone making these videos deserves respect as they're documenting what will probably become a lost skillet.nice to know that people still care about this stuff. Most modern tech isn't designed to be repaired by anyone as it's regarded as disposable.
shango's a legend, if jesus had a chassis he could bring him back from the grave
I have a rack and I am ready to be recapped.. sufficient ?
At the beginning when you tried to tune in a station. That noise was today's top 40 you were hearing.
BTW, Shango066 brought me here.
You're actually missing several zeros with modern microprocessors. The AMD Ryzen 9 3900X (which was introduced 2 years ago and is not even the top model) has 10 billion transistors. It really is incredible to see how much that has progressed...
And yet, I saw a video of someone PROBING a single transistor. Search for "Unreal Precision - Analyzing a Single TSMC 7nm Transistor". Mindblowing.
This is just incredible! These videos were something that I have always been looking for! Ever since the first time that I have seen the inside of a radio and saw all of the parts inside I always wondered how they work. Now I see that sometimes these parts fail and need to be repaired or replaced. I am sure that it takes a lot of scientific knowledge to know how to troubleshoot and fix these things and even more knowledge to originally design and make these radios and the components inside. Lots and lots of scientific knowledge. Thank you to this guy in the video and to RUclips for making it available.
This radio is smaller than my wife's heart but is bigger than my mother in law's brain!
I'm sure many of you can relate:-)
L.
Welcome back sir
Shango66 channel is cool but .radiotvphononut's Channel is even cooler especially when hes discussing ups and the post office ha ha .but mr C has the tidest bench
And *the* best audio. Anywhere.
@@WxWaterFire I am at a bit of loss on the best audio bit . did you mean the best audience regards shaun
@@shaunsiz.itsbetterbytube2858 No- the best audio quality! It's something many of us have noted in his videos.
@@Af00112 👍
I continue to watch and really enjoy your videos when I have time! (Clearly I'm behind schedule!!)
I had one of these Fleetwood transistor radios, including the leather case w/handle. 👴
Shango, Glasslinger, Dave Tipton, Mr. Carlson-- incredible.
Love how guys like you and Shango006 restore the antique radios so that maybe some younger folks could appreciate the gear they own today. Being a kid in the 70's my first radio would have been a small radio like this and I enjoyed it thoroughly to have a hand held device. Of course when I became a teen technology had advanced to the point of CD'S but watching this work and seeing how simple the circuitry was I get nostalgic for my fold out turntable(LOL HAPPY DAY'S) but the time I spent enjoying music on these devices is priceless no matter the quality nothing replaces that old scratchy sound love this channel.
Thanks for taking the time to share your story Quinton.
in 1969, my grandfather got me a small transistor radio. They were proud of transistors because it said "Transistor Radio" on it. It worked fine. I wish I still had it.
Thanks agian Mr Carlson I have been watching for years always enjoy your videos!!!!😘
I appreciate that!
I was just watching shango and after your video popped up in the feed.
Hey Mr. C, your videos are really top notch. As a former electronics assembler and RF engineer, I really dig it. Cheers from NYC.
Thanks for your kind comment Brian!
I still have a few of these as well as the original calculators. They all still work. I hooked a small microphone to the amplifier and it worked so well that I could hear a fly walking. After more than 50 years I still use it for other purposes of course. It's great to have a channel showing how to take apart and fix things.
"...could hear a fly walking!..." Lol! ..."Could hear an ant tripping over a grain of sand!"...
Delighful FLEETWOOD radio , and equally delighting you spent time showing us and fixing Mr Carlson.... brilliant
Came here from Shango066 channel and not disappointed. Thanks.
Really great video mr. Carlson 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻 also interesting and educational
Thank you kindly
I agree with Shango066, you are a master. Watching you work is mesmerizing. How is that much knowledge contained in one brain? Truly amazing.
Loved the way you saved the sticker👍
Loved the repair, excellent troubleshooting. Reminds me of when I was a kid in the late 50s and I would go to the salvation army junk piles where they would toss out things that were not a quick fix and I would get them home and work on them, with my little VOM from Lafayette electronics, I am long since retires with an MS in EE, What I learned as a kid served me well all my life.
Thank you for the video Mr. Carlson.
You are very welcome!
@@MrCarlsonsLab ty!!
What a great bit of deja vú from back in the day and even prior. Who all remembers homebrewing with PNP germanium transistors like the Raytheon CK-718 (predecessor to the venerable CK-722)? And the first hobby grade RF transistor, the CK-768? Thanks for the memories Sir!
I love working on the small transistor radios. I got my first one in 1970 when I was 12 yo. I restore them, then put them on a shelf.My favorite is an old Arvin c. 1960. It plays great. I enjoyed this video very much. I also have been subscribed to Shango66 for several years now.
Thank you Paul! The video was fantastic!
My pleasure!
Reminds me of the little transistor crystal radio I built in Boy Scouts back in the 80s. So fun! This really brought back memories
Mr Carlson you're making the impossible, possible. Thank you.
THAT was lot of fun!
Thank you!!
Glad you enjoyed it!
I really appreciate the fact that your quick explanations of different aspects of what you are looking for. Sad as it sounds, I actually learned a few things from you today. Thank You as always for sharing!
Haha. I’ve been waiting for something like this from Mr C.
When I was a kid back in the mid 1960's I had a job working as a farm laborer for 5 bucks a day, room and board. I saved up my pennies and bought a brand spanking new JADE transistor radio, it was turquoise in color. Well i quickly wore out the 9 volt batteries on the set listening to the rock and roll at night out of Bismarck ND and Oklahoma City OK when the moon was just right. So after some time I decided that I usually listened to the set in my room and it really didn't need to be that portable, so I soldered on some wires and hooked it to a 6 volt lantern battery. I was having a hard time getting my favorite stations in, and so I began screwing those little colored screws back and forth, well by the time I got done with it, I no longer had an AM Radio, but instead was receiving short wave at night, during the day I was getting some of the local (for the USA) stations like the time out of Colorado Springs and VOA which was blasting 24/7 back then as well as radio Cuba for the communist folk in our nation. I took it up to the local DJ to look at, he thought it was cool and hooked it up, sort of, to the main antenna for the AM Radio Station, we were getting all sorts of things with her. Well a few years back, I cleaned mom's house out so we could sell it, as she went into the nursing home, where she still resides today at age 97 and counting. I found the old radio, mom had kept it after I left home and started my own family. Sadly, the old radio had no life left. in her no matter how much voltage I fed her, I tore her apart and used some of the parts on other old sets I have laying around. I think I still have the case somewhere.
Thanks for all you do. I'm in the middle of my first transistor radio repair right now and I'm trying to watch as many videos as I can to soak up knowledge.
Glad to help!