Mystery Pye by Video

[Yorkie]

I've actually seen the clock in person when I visited Colin & Bron recently, and can say that the pictures don't really do justice to it, good as they are. The clock case was a wreck when Colin took it on as a favour to a friend. It wasn't just a question of stripping and re-polishing it - Colin had to rescue what was left of a rather shabbily built case and re-build it before he polished it. Needless to say, the owner (who has refurbished the movement) was delighted with the finished result

In his threads on his Ekco TV and Philco radio cabinet refurbishments Colin has shown how it's possible to 'bring back from the dead' not just clock cases but TV and radio cabinets. I guess that when most of us have a woody to refurbish, with a cabinet needing attention, we tackle the chassis and get the radio working first, then leave the cabinet to last, almost as a necessary evil. Colin goes for the cabinet first, and I guess that the stunning results he attains spurs him on to the 'easy bit' -the chassis.

Pondered & postulated Yorkie, (lost in France, where he can report from his hotel bedroom that 'All's quiet on the Western Front)':D

[Geaney]

Hopefully I'll have some clips of the Grundig cab restore shortly - I'm still at the stage of repairing the veneer but once that's done I can get on to the finish. This one is a bit more complicated than my Mystery PYE!
Cheers, John

[Retired]

Hi,

What lovely comments David; thank you so much. The technical side of TV/radio don't really do anything for me and I like to buy on appearance alone. The rougher the better regarding cabinets; my dream cabinets are basket cases but my nightmare is to just have to change a cap or resistor to sort a set out. I like to really get involved and never look for the easy option.

The only downside of fully restoring one of these wrecks is what to do with them after they are completed other than to dust or switch them on occasionally. The interest for me is in the doing and learning with each one.

Mike has kindly sent me a picture of the finished clock which I'm happy to include below. Mike made many new parts for the clock from scratch and made a superb job of the movement restoration; I've also included a picture of just how far Mike goes in one of his restorations.

Enjoy the Grundig John and please keep the posts coming as work in progress; it's great to see someone else encouraging all aspects of cabinetwork. What kind of joints did you use on this PYE and did you cut them using the router?

Kind regards, Col.

           

[Joe]

Thanks for the up-date, Col - it's nice to see the finished thing.

- Joe

[Geaney]

Hi Col, well there was no serious joinery in the PYE cab - basic lap joints cut with the router. I enjoy both the cabinetry and the electronics when restoring a radio so double the fun for me!

Right now the Grundig cab is completely stripped down, all finish removed and I'm repairing various bits of missing or lifted veneer. I need to come up with a nice way to restore the top and bottom edges which are badly damaged. Hopefully I'll get that done this weekend and I can start to think about the final finish. I'm thinking I'll use the same shellac process I used on the PYE.

Cheers, John

[Geaney]

Well the mystery PYE is back on the bench - a few nights ago it suddenly lost all shortwave reception. Medium wave is fine but when I switch to any shortwave band it works for about 10 seconds or so then dies. Being as it is a variant of the T19D I have a circuit diagram that is 'approximately' the same as my set but not exactly the same. Hopefully it won't take too long to sort out. All troubleshooting tips welcome.
Cheers, John

[Yorkie]

Errm, if it works for a few seconds on shortwave, that seems to rule out duff 'switchery' connections.

Just a shot in the dark John, but could it possibly be the frequency changer valve in the front end not wanting to oscillate at higher frequencies? The ten seconds could perhaps be the valve oscillationg ok on MW, then giving its last gasp when you switch to SW.
No signal from the mixer = nothing for the IF stages to amplify.

[Geaney]

Thanks David, yes that's what I was thinking so that will be my first area of investigation. I thought I might get to it this weekend but it looks unlikely now so once I get time for it I'll have a look and post an update.
Cheers, John

[Geaney]

Finally found some time to see about getting Shortwave bands back- changed one of the caps (200pf) feeding the freq changer and we seem to be back in business- English language service of China Radio International coming in loud and clear for about an hour so hopefully it's back in business! Interestingly the old cap measures exactly 200pf on my basic multimeter so who knows - might just have been poor solder joint or something. I'll give it a good soak test tomorrow.

Cheers, John