The Pitfalls & Positivities of 'Classic' Radio Ownership

Hi All,

I hope you're all keeping well and enjoying your radio interest no matter what they may be.



I'm lucky enough to own what some may call a 'classic' radio and others may call a bag of.....you get my drift.
It's a 1980's vintage Yaesu FT757gx (as some of you may be aware) and I have a little soft spot for the old girl being my first licenced Amateur Radio transceiver.

I've had some problems with the old girl since I've owned her as she wasn't exactly in fine fettle to start with taking quite a few hours out of my life in repair time. (Front end diodes, realignment, VFO repair etc.) Yet still I happily pull her apart in my long term strive of restoration and have become quite adept at disassembling and reassembling this particular radio.

A while ago the 'up' button on the band selection had stopped working and I had promised myself I would fix it but instead just cycled round with the band 'down' button to get where I wanted. (These radios can be a pain to tune 'quickly' jumping around with the 500kHz switch and spinning that VFO frantically! But I've never had an issue with that particular foible. )

However the 'down' button also stopped working recently so I had no choice but to strip her apart again and take a look at replacing the affected switches.

I knew that I'd never be able to get hold of the original switches (being 40 years old) but I was in the safe knowledge that amongst my drawers of collected junk there was bound to be something that fit the job to hand.

Here she is stripped naked with the afflicted board (PITA front panel job) and some replacement buttons which if memory serves me correctly came from an old FAX machine front panel......



The white square switches are the originals with the round buttons being the replacements.

All looked good with everything operational so I screwed her back together delighted that I'd fixed her once again......

....Except that I hadn't!?!  

Turns out that the switches I'd carefully selected were just a little too long, so I popped in some shorter ones only to find out that they were no good either. Arrrrggghhh!!

Thankfully I'd replaced one of the memory switches at the same time and that one was working perfectly despite the length. Knowing that the memory switches had been used less than the band up/down units I decided to flip them around so that that they sat in place with the memory buttons now sporting the replacements.

Success!  

Unfortunately no photo but then that was the last thing on my mind after disassembling and reassembling the damn thing now several times.

She's all back together sitting proudly in her place on my shack desk shelf and serving me well once again.  


Now why the hell would someone want to put themselves through such a rigmarole for their radio enjoyment?

Firstly, I simply can and I know a lot of people would shudder at the very thought of removing even one screw from their radios. Secondly, I'm using my own time and not charging someone else for it so my service 'charges' are quite minimal. (Especially as I enjoy it so much and seem to have never emptying spares drawers full of decades of collected parts!)

The other and for me the main reason is that I simply enjoy this radio, she's a great old girl.
I love powering her up, the buttons, the switches & knobs let alone spinning that big old VFO tuning knob which is a simple joy.

Despite notions of 'old' radios being cr*p compared to modern stuff she does do rather well at digging signals from the mush. Luckily with my recent homebrew switching arrangement I've been able to flick between her and more modern DSP technology transceivers and have been amazed at how well she really does. (Sometimes picking out signals the other stuff doesn't!)


Besides, if it wasn't for me enjoying this sort of thing this poor old girl would have been destined for the bin a long time ago......

That or done the eternal eBay rounds of "my late Fathers radio" with the usual no returns disclaimer or even with a high mark up price sporting the title of a 'classic'.

She'll do me nicely and sit pride of place....unless I come across a nice FT101E or other such.




Once again a bit of my 'waffle' and if anyone wants to complain about that then why not write your own posting and pop it up?

Enjoy your radio.


All the best,
Victor

Well done Victor. Great feeling when you get the old radios working again. 2 weeks ago I picked up an old FT101ZD few little niggles I am sorting, but very, very clean. And only $100! It is strange how you forget what you have to do to tune those old hybrid radios.

Hi Jeff,

Cheers mate.

Well done with the FT101ZD. My old Ham friend has a MK3 I have particularly lusted after on my rare visits to his shack.

It's great that there are people out there willing to do this sort of stuff and keep these good old girls operational.


Good to be able to have 'other' radio fun too, especially with the current solar storm bashing the bands a bit.


All the best,
Victor

Hello Victor,

Nice work.

I do enjoy my old radios. Although they are not in the same league as the ham equipment, I do enjoy my Stalker and Superstar radios in particular. I like the controls, they have a good over-engineered click when I change channels or modes.

Got to get my old Lincoln sorted. I have repaired the unusual speaker plug arrangement these radios have and need to investigate the intermittent audio fault on transmit.

73s John.

As you know full well John I drool over the thought of your Stalker everytime you mention it!

I remember years ago a mate had a Uniden 2830 with reports of intermittent audio on TX and yet we chatted many times often for hours without so much of an issue heard. That's often why I ensure my own radio reports accurately rather than rely on someone else!

If it wasn't for my bear paw hands and bat like eyes nowadays (plus not worrying if I ever b*gger my own stuff up!) I'd happily take a look for you but my days of doing that are well and truly over with.

I wish you well with it mate and also anyone else living with the foibles of a 'classic' rig in any guise.
(You've just gotta love these old radios! )


73,
Victor

Hi Victor,

Thanks, Matey.

It has had the fault for a good while now and someone did say it was quite common on these radios. They did tell me what the offending component was likely to be..... but it was so long ago, I have forgotten. Lol.

73s John.

Ah, probably one of those medieval-blood-letting capacitor faults that always do the rounds.


The only thing I remember 'common' about these old rigs John concerning audio was that they don't like a low power supply voltage. (Car battery running flat to about 11 volts or so or big linears dragging the voltage down overall.) The other was running them with a high SWR where the PA would suffer distorting your TX signal to hell and I think even 'dodgy' PA transistors were sometimes blamed.

Been so long since I looked at one though that it was probably back in the day when everyone swore blind it was the best 'CB' you could ever get....how history changed peoples attitudes with that one!
(Just like my FT757 being a bag of you know what nowadays. )

I hope you get sorted and well done you for being so passionate about these older rigs.  

(I still want your Stalker! )


73,
Victor

Hello Victor,

I will give it a try on a good, reliable power supply.It has been a few years since I last used it. The last descent contact I had on it,  was on the last cycle into New Caledonia. I Ran it into a two element beam, lashed to a fence and it was only a couple of metres off the ground.

I remember lusting after them, when it was launched in '86 (I think). They looked very pseudo ham with the design and built in frequency counter, which is probably what influenced people..... But, as you say history has shown radios such as the Stalker are much more revered. The PC893 board in the Stalker and the President Jack are so stable on SSB. I think it was the same board in the Grant, too? (I need a Grant in my collection).

Thanks for the comments on the older radios. They can still do the business with the right antenna system.

73s John.