The Craftmans Shop > New from Old
Racal RA17 re-born : A trip down Memory Lane
awemawson:
Amazing how a little persuasion works - he's come back with a tracking number :clap:
awemawson:
My RA17 has risen to the top of Ian's 'In-Tray' and he has started the investigation prior to replacing all the resistors and capacitors.
There are the expected signs of overheating and charring - the large wire wound resistors in the PSU will be replaced by metal clad chassis mounted ones, which was an official Racal modification back in the day.
From the components installed it seems that it last had it's capacitors replaced some 40 years ago so this will be at least the second time.
In one instance (in the 2nd mixer) one of the original capacitors is still in place but the wrong place! Supposed to be across the valve heaters but would seem to had been originally mis-wired at manufacture. Apparently Ian has seen this same error before, but on an RA117E (which is basically the same as the RA17) so Racal had a hole in their QA !
awemawson:
More progress reports: Ian has been concentrating getting the mechanical side of things sorted before going on to the component replacement and re-alignment.
He has replaced the none standard sockets on the rear (mains input, aerial input and IF / LO output co-ax's) but the main thing was that he found that the mode selector 'system' switch was completely wrong, the original three wafer one having been replaced by two wafer one. Fortunately he had a correct one to install.
. . more to follow . . .
seadog:
Yaxley switches, Loved them.
awemawson:
Yes always fun taking apart and getting them back together :clap:
I put out a plea on a vintage radio forum for the missing louvered metal cover (the one I substituted a green corrugated sheet for when packing) and it's produced results and also an RA63 sideband adaptor to match so that adds another aspect to my interest. All I need to track down now is the RA66 panoramic adaptor with its MA251 buffer amplifier to get back set up as I wanted decades ago :lol:
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version