I had another mini success story today. Someone on Audio Karma was asking for tips on how to repair his Advent 400 radio recently and it tweaked me into working on one of my own procrastination projects.
Aside: I would like to make "project" and "procrastination" into one word. Projectination? Procrastiject? I'm not sure either quite has the ring I want...
Anyway, the Advent 400 is a neat, high quality table radio with external speaker from c. 1975. The FM only tuner is supposed to be of very good quality and the fairly substantial (for a radio) speaker is quite decent. The tuner does appear to be quite sensitive. It has an auxiliary input and a tuner out so you can run a CD player or other device through it or send the radio signal to a larger amplifier.
The fellow on AK described a similar problem to mine, and that is very low, almost non-existent volume. I have had this radio for a year or 2 and even bought a batch of capacitors with this radio in mind, among other projects. Someone else chimed in on the thread there with specific capacitors to try first so I decided to go for it after work today.
As usual, I forgot to get pictures while I had the patient under the knife, but the operation was a success! I am listening to CBC Radio 2 right now and it comes in well with no antenna attached. The volume is all I could want from a table radio and the bass and treble controls work well. Tuning is vernier style which allows for accurate fine tuning.
I had a few minor glitches along the way. I ended up replacing 3 capacitors but at first only did 2, those being the ones closest to the volume control. Along the way I blew the fuse and had to solder a new one in. Also the caps I had were the right value but the wire leads were radial (both at one end) not axial (one out each end) so were a bit tricky to get into a tight spot. It all worked though and it is now working great!
Too bad about that little scratch on the face...
Edit: I found the new home for the Advent 400 in the dining/kitchen area at our cabin. It works over there and looks good next to the Dansk Kobenstyle coffee maker and those sushi plates (or whatever they are)
Aside: I would like to make "project" and "procrastination" into one word. Projectination? Procrastiject? I'm not sure either quite has the ring I want...
Anyway, the Advent 400 is a neat, high quality table radio with external speaker from c. 1975. The FM only tuner is supposed to be of very good quality and the fairly substantial (for a radio) speaker is quite decent. The tuner does appear to be quite sensitive. It has an auxiliary input and a tuner out so you can run a CD player or other device through it or send the radio signal to a larger amplifier.
The fellow on AK described a similar problem to mine, and that is very low, almost non-existent volume. I have had this radio for a year or 2 and even bought a batch of capacitors with this radio in mind, among other projects. Someone else chimed in on the thread there with specific capacitors to try first so I decided to go for it after work today.
As usual, I forgot to get pictures while I had the patient under the knife, but the operation was a success! I am listening to CBC Radio 2 right now and it comes in well with no antenna attached. The volume is all I could want from a table radio and the bass and treble controls work well. Tuning is vernier style which allows for accurate fine tuning.
I had a few minor glitches along the way. I ended up replacing 3 capacitors but at first only did 2, those being the ones closest to the volume control. Along the way I blew the fuse and had to solder a new one in. Also the caps I had were the right value but the wire leads were radial (both at one end) not axial (one out each end) so were a bit tricky to get into a tight spot. It all worked though and it is now working great!
Too bad about that little scratch on the face...
Edit: I found the new home for the Advent 400 in the dining/kitchen area at our cabin. It works over there and looks good next to the Dansk Kobenstyle coffee maker and those sushi plates (or whatever they are)
