Very tired Montgomery Wards radio overhaul

Sometimes even the ugly radios need a little lovin'

[@stephenmusch56]

Seth, I don't care what the trolls are saying about how you do your restorations, or your knowledge of electronics, please keep the videos coming!!!!

[@ethelryan257]

It seems as though there are always a few who want to ruin it for everyone. They're jealous of how good Seth is.

[@bojacque6474]

@@ethelryan257you’re damn right! I’ve been restoring televisions and radios for nearly a decade and I ALWAYS learn something new from Mr Radio or techniques I was unaware of!

[@ethelryan257]

@@bojacque6474 Same here! My grandfather used to tell me that I got to restring all the tuning cables (and then the dratted Zenith and GE control indicator cables) because girls were better at those things. Certainly held me in good stead as an apprentice and then journeyman and now as a master, trying to teach best practices when dressing cables.

[@teacfan1080]

It's amazing how you bring those worn cabinets back to life! Old English should be a sponsor!

[@michaelpetersonjr]

Seth, this is one awesome set you have done with Bluetooth. Keep the videos coming and forget what the trolls are saying; they have no videos of their own but want to tell you the right way to do your restorations. Please do keep the videos coming!

[@peterkendell5214]

Amazing work on the finish. Really rate your honesty in not glossing over your mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes; not everyone has the guts to own up to them.

[@Kbrusky15]

Honestly its beautiful in its simplicity. I think it looks and sounds great.

[@thomasconnatser2478]

For Montgomery Wards items the first two digits of the model number are the last two digits of the model year reversed and the letters following them identified the manufacturer. WG identifies Wells Gardner, which you already knew; and 14 reverses to 41 indicating manufactured in 1941, one to the last sets manufactured before the U.S. entered World War II.

[@rayrussell6258]

This style cabinet is what I like best ..... wood, not plastic.

[@ethelryan257]

Impressive restoration!

[@1mctous]

Those push-pull 6K6's kick audio ass! The radio's sound greatly exceeded my expectations.

[@richroggio]

wonderful job Mr. Radio. it sounds good and the cabinet looks very nice 👍

[@LanceHall]

I would bet the early chemical dyes and/or solidifiers were not very stable and they break down the plastic or rubber around the wires.

[@robertdavis5714]

WD-40...................Wholly Cow. Like your channel, I am more 1976-1979 is what I buy. Your radios bring attention to my favorite Twilight Zone episode, the guy with his old radio that could bring in stations from 20-30 yrs past.

[@sgath92]

A 5Y3 (and 5Y4 which is the same tube with a different pinout) is just an 80 in a GT-octal package, a very reliable tube. There was also a heavily ruggidized version for the military during the cold war era that's pretty damn built proof that's an amazing sight to behold (ceramic & heavy plastic construction). The rectifier was probably killed by the electrolytics being wired in wrong the first couple tries. Another potential problem comes when using a variac on tube rectifiers is they don't always like super low voltages so gradually ramping up from zero can lead to problems. A solution is to make up some solid state rectifiers to drop in during initial testing... save some dead tubes, remove the glass & insides leaving the plastic base & pins... solder into the old tube base some 1N4007s and a dropping resistor and then you can pop them in during initial variac tests. Label the base with what tube its emulating.

[@ethelryan257]

Possible. I have tremendous respect for Seth. His strength in showing us his mistakes and thought processes is impressive. I enjoy his videos, learn from them.

[@sgath92]

@@ethelryan257 Its not meant or worded as a criticism.

[@ethelryan257]

@@sgath92 I didn't see your comment as criticism. You made valid points. One of the joys of the 5Y3 is that is must not be run in a horizontal position unless certain pins are exactly parallel with the horizon. The dratted filament can sag and cause a hard short, ruining the tube and taking a filter cap with it. I learned this in my grandfather's workshop a million years ago. It's in the RCA manual, though most of us think of this series as very reliable. It's possible Seth made a mistake with the electrolytics and the tube went bye-bye.

[@sgath92]

@@ethelryan257 Another common mistake with rectifiers like this is they have a very small maximum first-capacitor rating that is only sometimes mentioned in the tube data books and sometimes there's inconsistency in what they say the maximum size can be! This came up recently (~within last 6 months) on, I think shango's channel (?memory not great) that spurred on some discussion on the ARF. With too large of a input-cap (first electrolytic) the 80 can quickly self destruct while trying to hastily fill that cap on initial power up, then it melts & shorts over. Tungsol, one of the major tube manufacturers, claimed in datasheets the 80 should never see an input cap above 10uf (!). Of course, we all know they made plenty of sets that bucked that rule and survived to today...

[@ethelryan257]

@@sgath92 I think it was shango. I learn so much from him, though his politics sometimes make me want to throw things. The UX213 (first of this series of rectifiers) was brought out in the mid-1920s, before the AA5s. Didn't they use smaller filter capacitors and rely more on chokes and hum-bucking coils? I just don't know that much about that era. It would make sense, though - charging up a whopping 80μF. or larger capacitor would certainly put a strain on something meant to run with 10μF!

[@hestheMaster]

Airline model 14WG-806A made by Wells Gardner & Co. in 1941. Always consult the schematic even if what you think you see is something else. Check the tubes after replacing electrolytics. Wired them in reverse and killed the 5Y3. The cabinet came out nice Seth. The phenolic two pin socket is for a pre-amp. Used for input from a record cutter phonograph only and when selector is set to phonograph. Love that dial face design but would have tried getting the 6U5 eyetube to work. You need to get to the 1 Megohm resistor in the socket and replace it however. Sounds and looks great!

[@Tech_481]

Hey dont worry about all these mean comments! You put out a video showing your mistakes for other people to learn from and that it self requires alot of courage! You where smart enough to realize something has gone bad and stopped it before it went catastrophic and thats all that matters!

[@ShadowsOnTheScreen]

Wow there is a lot of negativity in these comments. For me, I think you did a fine job, and it turned out great. My only question is: did the eye tube work at all? Thanks Dan

[@ethelryan257]

It goes in waves. Most of the time, there's happy discussion of this or that particular chassis or aspect to one of Seth's well done projects.Those of us around here who actually have the education and background to understand what he's doing are universally on-board with him.

[@larryward1082]

And since I was about 1516 years old grandparents would find them and give them to me and I would get them working again I would work on the cabinets all the stuff new power cords on them replaced to replace resistors capacitors and sometimes tuners tuning capacitors I did all this stuff for years and I sold some of those radios and I still kept some of the most rare ones have a deck to attic and we had these radios I had them stored up there with components and thousands of tubes for these old radios and we had the roof of the house and they had to remove some of the decking I never thought anything about it if I go up in the attic and look around didn't take any of the components is radios all worked 1617 years old that is not going to work contacting the police on something like this that you have stuff like this it could be something else in the Attic of your house and you have roofers comeyou better put a camera up there to watch see what's going on or check on it yourself anyway it's very interesting to see this stuff I've been there a long time ago I still sometimes somebody will bring me something like that and I'll get it working for him anyway it's all in my head I don't need any wiring diagrams

[@stereomann83]

the knob that says Phono FM can that for an external FM tuner?

[@johngalt7382]

Why add a trailing wire when a 2 pin, or rca adapter to anything, to the existing 2 factory inputs would have just worked?

[@ethelryan257]

Seth's goal is to preserve the entire sound envelope - this means an additional step to combine the left and right signals to produce a true monaural. On some systems, he also has to add yet another component to prevent the input from interfering with the automatic gain control. Then, of course there is the isolation problem on 'hot' and floating chassis. Referenced to earth, these two systems have 120VAC at high enough current to kill.

[@rayrussell6258]

well J, why not do it the way he does it? It works. He's done lterally dozens of radio restorations on this channel for the radio auctions they do, and has never failed to make even a basket--case radio work like a charm. Having retired from an engineering center career myself, I can with confidence say there is almost never only one way to accomplish an objective.

[@johngalt7382]

@@ethelryan257 All done with a cheap ebay cable, maybe play with a resistor and a cap inside if you want a different tone. SORRY I would have just used or modified what was there already, and probably front panel selectable.

[@sgath92]

You could combine the left and right side by making a 3.5mm audio cable (like for headphones) where, somewhere in the middle of the cable, the left and right side gets summed with two resistors in heat shrink before terminating on the radio end with a mono plug (say an RCA plug or phone tips if its a 1930s set), the problem is that if someone down the line looses the cable or uses an unmodified one instead, the user will "loose" the resistors and potentially damage the external device supplying the audio signal.

[@johngalt7382]

@@sgath92 3.5mm to dual rca cable, then a stereo to mono rca adapter. All common off the shelf items. It would just work, most "phono" inputs of that era were for crystal cartridges, basically line eq.

[@waynebrettzky99]

Granco console sighting

[@1964corvan]

or do what i do and test all the tubes first before starting any and every repair, that way you (97%) know for sure if you will have some issue or not outside of everything else. tehehe =D

[@MartinSBrown-tp9ji]

I have been watching your videos for a few years and I have a tip for you. Take a coarse in electronics at a community college. You will better understand what you are doing. (Less mistakes you will make)

[@rayrussell6258]

This was a very unusual chassis, Seth generally does these restorations with extremely few do-overs ever required. I do not believe for one-second you have watched this channel "for years", unless it was ONCE, years ago, and ONCE today. There are a lot of internet users like you who just like to cause trouble. Seth, delete this guy. The world will not miss him.

[@MartinSBrown-tp9ji]

@@rayrussell6258 Seth has a good knowledge of the many radios he has restored but me, being an electronic teacher for 20 years at a college can see his short cumming of his understanding of electronic circuits and components. I am not being critical of his part changing, but a course in electronics would give him a broader understanding of the science and better ways to approach circuit tracing. .

[@michaelpetersonjr]

Not for nothing. But every time I see you pop up on here, you do nothing but cause trouble. And I agree with Ray Russell, Seth will delete you and the world will not miss you. Seth has been working on sets for a while, so who in the hell do you think you are by telling him to "take a course in electronics at a community college?" He is already in his mid-40's. He doesn't need college. And I have a tip for you: stay out of his business if you have nothing nice to say.

[@sgath92]

I cremated a rare 5Y3-WGA (military spec) testing a power-supply/amplifier chassis I built from scratch for a 24-tube midwest... inexperience on my part. The hammond transformers were wired in a configuration I wasn't used to and I was shorting the filament windings to chassis. After try#2 I realized my mistake! Luckily the $400 in transformers survived and the DIY chassis works.

[@MartinSBrown-tp9ji]

@@michaelpetersonjr It is people like you that can't take a suggestion, are causing this country to fail in production. Example, Boeing, GM, Ford. Good education is important. Don't show how dumb you are Michael.