Tag: radio

eBay and Honesty

By the title you can guess where I am going with this post.

I am a big boy and smart enough to know when a deal is too good to be true… Having said that some folks are just over the top dishonest.

I collect and with some luck restore, vintage electronics. I don’t do it for money; I do it because it gives me pleasure. I enjoy repairing something that someone else could not for one reason or another and… Sometimes I simply enjoy the challenge.

Small hand held radios — This is NOT the lot that I am writing about…

Small transistor radios from the 50’s and 60’s are a specialty of mine in that when I was a kid I thought that it was magic. How someone in one place could have their voice come out over a speaker in a small battery powered device well, was magic.

Thinking back on those days I wonder what I would have thought about smart phones?!

Selling and buying on eBay has its challenges and I think its opportunities for people to be a little better. With the feedback scenario it somewhat forces us to play nice; and that is a good thing.

While we should not need such a thing to play nice, that is simply the way of man. I wish it were different.

I often will purchase a “lot” of radio’s or a lot of some electronic thing that maybe I am looking for one or more of a certain kind in the lot and then sell the rest or repair them and sell them or what have you.

One such purchase was a purchase of a handful of RCA Radio’s from the 60’s.

When they arrived I opened the box and noticed straight away that they all rattled which meant that they had been taken apart. “That was not noted in the description.”

Upon taking the backs off not only had they been taken apart but they had obviously been in some sort of flood situation as they were covered on the inside with mud. “Also not noted.”

To further the “insult” some of them had parts missing from them, also not noted.

I paid a fair price for these as if they were simply “not tested.”

When someone says something like, “I don’t know how to test this.” Translated, “I did everything that I know how to do and this thing does not work!” I get that and I understand that people do this but… to sell something that has been taken apart, things removed from and oh by the way, had been under water! Folks, that is wrong on so many levels. This type of activity gives eBay itself a black eye and I think messes with the whole concept of eBay in that it is a self-policing community.

This blog is about one of those radios and how I managed to bring it back to life in-spite of the fact that it was pretty much ready for the re-cycle bin.

Taking the back off of the radio it pretty much just came apart looking as you see it.

The mud and rust are all one needs to conclude that this was under water and most probably in a flood situation as this is also the way the rest of them appeared.

Normally when water gets on electronics there is an acidic effect that actually eats the traces and I did not see that here.

Removing the circuit board and cleaning both controls with contact cleaner as well as washing the board I could then dry it and apply power to see what needed to be replaced if anything.

One small capacitor by the volume control was the only part that needed replacing. The rest was simply cleaning the mud out of the controls and doing a simple alignment.

Miraculously, the speaker just needed the dust blown out of it and while it is certainly not perfect it plays about as loud and with the fidelity that a radio of this age will have.

Here is the radio after cleaning and repairing with a new battery shield installed.

Radio after repair and cleaning.

People ask me when I am looking, what am I looking for in old electronics….

First and foremost, the case must be in tact.

The more damaged the case, the less of a collectible it is. The problem with transistor radio’s is that they are portable! Portable means that they get dropped, knocked about etc.

One of the radio’s I purchased was a Walkie talkie which I paid top dollar for. When I got it I found that it too had been under water but the board was green with corrosion and since it was surface mount technology with corrosion it was trash.

Folks, I will ding you if you knowingly sell crap. I have not had too many that I have dinged but, I expect some modicum of honesty. I sell as well as I am overly honest about what I sell as I would rather not get top dollar and have a satisfied customer than someone like me who feels the need to blog about it!

If it has been under water, tell the folks, it has been under water or under the chicken coop or what have you. the simple truth is that not everything that you own is worth anything on eBay or Craig’s list or the local junk shop. Somethings just need to be thrown away!

Had the fellow with the handful of radio’s been honest about them I might still have bid on them as the cases looked ok but at least I would have known that I was buying plastic cases that had been under water and, had parts missing!

Many people will not take returns on electronics and do you know why? People will buy them, take whatever parts off of them they were looking for and then return them as not working! So, they have screwed it up for everyone as I will certainly not take returns on electronics!

This is where it works really well if you take the time to “ding” a dishonest seller or buyer. If they do not make it right, than you know what to do.

If you have some old electronics that you would like to sell, drop me a line. I have purchased radios from all over the globe and while I am not trying for a number that would have me move out of the house to store them, I am interested in finding some that I don’t currently have. It does not have to work, it just needs to look good and have all of the parts.

-Best

Technology, Have we gone too far?

There are days that I long for the twisted pair; you know the POTS line or (plain old telephone service.) Yes, the one that hooks up to the one phone, on the wall or in the hallway in that special little nook that was designed by the architect for it. I would even go back to the dial phone, as I think that it was not only a simpler time, but probably a more reliable form of communication. OK, maybe not, but since we were not on it all of the time we had no idea when it was not working. The phone after all was not for kids..

I don’t know how many of my friends had a dial phone but, if you did not, you missed out. Calling a radio station to be the 25^th caller was a real chore back in the day. If you won and I did once, it was a real conquest!

Speaking for me personally, I have at least 6 email addresses, the cell phone, the business phone, fax lines, house phone and of course SMS text messaging and even IM on FaceBook. I am also a ham radio operator and have half a dozen radios that can all be going at the same time, but most of the time not.

No, not me, but my station back then looked a lot like this!

It would seem that I should be able to be reached. Back in the day, I had a pager as well although, that thing was really nothing more than an electronic leash; for whoever had the number.

When I was a kid if I wanted to talk with a friend, I would go get on my bike and ride to their respective homes and ask the “parent who answered the door” is “fill in the blank” home and can they come out and play? Yes, a little like the Cleavers..

When I was a little more sophisticated, (8years old,) I used a Walkie Talkie to talk with my friends that lived within a half mile or so. That in a large part prompted me to get my ham radio license at a whopping 13 years old. With that; I have visited with thousands of folks all over the world, but that is another story for another day.

The Smart phone, which is why I am writing today, is a marvel of technology. It is the Swiss army knife of communication! With that device I can call anywhere in the world from just about anywhere. I can send text messages and pictures of whatever interest me. I can get them as well. I can send a video to someone or receive the same. With Facetime or Skype, I can live video chat with people too! I can watch movies or play games and yes, I can poke someone on facebook from the waiting room at the Dr.s office. The camera quality is such that if I had the mind to I could take a “quality picture of my dinner” and post it on facebook as we all want to see what you ate for dinner, right? Wink wink. The camera part is really quite true, it is a really decent camera for a phone!

There are some issues with this however; of which I wish to expound upon. First and foremost, SMS text messages (at least with my phone and service) are not guaranteed to make it. Back when e-mail was new, the common greeting on a phone call was “did you get my e-mail?” E-mail is not 100%, it never has been, and it never will be. E-mail is more reliable today as the servers are more persistent and the internet is more robust. It is still not guaranteed to get there.

Text communication whether SMS or e-mail or chat on some service can be dicey as you don’t get the facial queues that you do; well… in person. One can discern some queues in tone of voice when on the phone but, without emoticons and “LOL,” we might not know if the person was serious or kidding! That type if communication leaves lots of room for miss-communication.

We are in fact a world in transition regarding our communication. I have many “friends” on Facebook but, how many of them know me personally? How many of them know my favorite colour or type of food, or I theirs for that matter? So one has to ask, just how good of friends are we? Would they even want to be my friend in person?

When is the last time that you spoke with your neighbors? Do you know their names or anything about them? I have two new neighbors of which I have made a point to introduce myself to, welcome them etc but, I also made a point to know their dogs name, and introduce myself to him as well. You should have seen the owners face light up when I took the time to get to know his pooch! I am not bragging about myself; or chastising you, I mention this because I realize that most of us pull into the garage, and close the door behind us. We leave the same way and “in my case” I use a lawn service so I don’t even have the opportunity to meet while I am butchering my grass. “hence the lawn service, I ruined the yard when I cut it the first time.” It was tiff grass I think, and my mower was not made for it…. I think. That is my excuse and I am sticking to it!

Don’t depend on text or e-mail as it is not super reliable. There are times my phone will go off in the middle of the night, with all sorts of text messages, from days ago! I keep it with me most of the time but I have to admit, it too feels a little bit like a leash at times.

You know the old story about the lost invitation to the party, it may really have gotten misplaced. If something seems out of character with the person that you know, trust your instinct and call. If the invitation to the party does not arrive, call. If you were not invited well, re-evaluate that friendship. If you sent them a text, they may not have responded because they did not get it!

Finally, turn off the computer, phone, and tablet and unless you are watching a movie with the family, turn off the TV too. Spend time with those that you love, as you never know when or if you might have the opportunity to do it again (if ever.) Life is too short to have regrets and when I see complete families out at expensive restaurants, all on some phone, or some device well….it makes me a little sad for them. What memories will the children have? What about mom and dad when the kids are gone?

To me eating out is an event. To some, who do it all the time it is simply eating. I can eat at home but there is the preparation and the cleanup. If I eat out I am “served!” There is not preparation and no cleanup and there is also the friendly exchange of conversation not only between whom I am eating with but, I also make a point to learn the servers’ name, and use it. While they are, “serving me;” I make certain that they know I appreciate them.

Life is about making memories. Good or bad, life is what it is. One day, not too many years ago I was taking my daughters friend to a college across town. After we left her college I picked up a bolt in one of my tires which left me and my daughter stranded on the side of the road in a less than great area of town. It was summer about 110 degrees on the side of the highway. It was about 300 after I got the car jacked up and about 500 when I discovered that the oil change service that rotated my tires had not put the tire lock key back in the glove box! We had no water, and now I was back out in the heat taking the jack back from under the car all the while having her call the auto service. You know *4357… Yeah that one.

After getting back in the car, the auto service had no information on me or the account and would not send a wrecker. Even after I told them that I would pay the wrecker just please send one! They refused to help because I was not a customer they were not obligated to lift a finger. The auto service was paid for through the cell phone carrier and it is insurance that you pay for monthly. We were a customer and the customer service girl just fat fingered it when she looked up the phone number, you know the 10 digit phone number that should have been on the screen in front of her!?

Very long story short, after witnessing drug deals, going through gas to keep the air on and doors locked and wondering if the car would overheat, and having to go to the bathroom, we finally got a wrecker right at 5 in the afternoon, rush hour traffic! We had been out since 9am without food or water or bathroom, on the side of a busy highway since about 10 am.

Even though that was not a great memory, it is a memory, and I did get to spend the entire day with my daughter with no computer to compete for my time with her. OF course in retrospect, I don’t think either of us was real great company…

Is a poke on Facebook, or a text to someone, more important that being with friends or family in person? I too am guilty but, I try to be aware of it and resist the temptation.

-Best to you and those that you care about!

Yesterday, A simpler time.. #radio #vintage

Nostalgia is not lost on me. To that end I truly enjoy bringing things back to life of the electronic type, that should have otherwise gone in the dumper.

Currently there are countless transistor radio’s that were dead and now work once again at least as good as they did new, and some of them probably better as materials are now better. While the challenge of transistor radio’s is finding the parts; tube radio’s magnify that issue as no one is making new tubes for radio’s that I know of.

My latest project is this Tube Radio that I have had well over 30 years. I bought this for next to nothing and of course it did not work. If the case is in good shape and the parts are all there, that is about all I require.

The Radio is an Emerson 744B that was made in 1954. It sold for $34.95 which, back then was a heap of money.

Sadly there are many that will read this blog and not know what a tube is. With that in mind I have taken pictures of my latest project and will “splain” a few things as we go. The glass objects are tubes. These either are dead in the case of the rectifier tube or weak or leaky as with the rest.

The tubes house a filament, some metal structures that emit and collect electrons as well as things that control the flow of the electrons. Some house a thing called a “getter.” The Getters sole job is to collect and burn off any o2 that should get in by way of the pins. The getter is coated with a chemical that accomplishes this.

The British refer to these “tubes” as “valves” and in actuality that is a much more accurate description as that is in essence how they work.

This is the audio output tube in action. Notice the filament is glowing.

Here is a top view of the radio in operation.

Here is a bottom view of the radio showing the point to point electronic components. If you know anything about electronics you will notice the modern parts that I have installed, replacing the parts that failed.

Back in the day, capacitors were expensive to manufacture so they would use just what they needed and nothing more in terms of capacitance. Today that is not the case and with technology I was able to offer much more capacitance and higher working voltages to the circuit for around $6.

One old .05 MFD capacitor is still in the radio and functioning so I left it. The white square capacitors replaced two of the three .05 which are now .047.

The two modern electrolytics replaced the huge combination capacitor that some “purists” will actually disassemble and install the newer capacitors inside of it. I know very few who are going to take the metal bottom off of the radio and look underneath to see the parts. This radio sounds like a new one.

Here in North Texas we have a station that plays music from the era that this radio came from. http://www.kaamradio.com/

Big Band music I just never get tired of…. Anyway, this radio sounds great playing that station.

-Best to you and those that you care about..

Ebay, some things to watch for.

Greetings to you and so long 2013!

I have spent a number of years on eBay and for the most part been happy with the services and products. Having said that a few stand out in my mind and I thought an airing of the facts might help someone else.

Sites like eBay have accountability built in however; many of us don’t leave a negative rating when the person deserves it, thus skewing the results. Some of us leave them a bad mark because the item was defective or what have you when it was clearly marked “as is no returns.”

I have been known to leave them a positive feedback but then voice my concerns for their way of doing business in the comments. For instance one fellow sold me something and then just threw it into a “if it fits it ships box, no packing and barely any tape. Why the post office took it is another story but it did make it. The box did not survive and the device inside looked as if the Cowboys used it for a football. Anyone reading his feedback will see that he needs to step up his shipping game.

Here is my argument, see what you think. I have always felt that we are too litigious of a society, we are “sue happy.” Anything goes wrong and there is some lawyer somewhere looking to make some money and will take the case no matter how petty the suite. Much like sharks; the more hungry the beast, the more appetizing a license plate or old shoe looks as opposed to a “wrongful death suite” that just don’t fall into “everyone’s” lap..

Is there a time to sue and is there a time to leave a negative rating? The answer is yes to both. If you are suing someone because you see it as a way to make money; (much like the lawyer,) than probably not. However; if you are bringing legal action as a way to hold the entity accountable, and possibly get them to change the way that they do business, than I believe that you are not only justified, but you should. The same is true about not leaving five stars.

Did they earn it?

Was the description accurate?

Was the product or service delivered as expected?

Was the shipping “normal” or was it high?

Was the item packed correctly?

If there was a problem, did they go out of their way to make it right?

Did they communicate with you until it was resolved?

Online buying has evolved over the years and I would suspect that the day of shopping via printed catalogue will be history in the next few years. With companies like Amazon, and others, it seems that the market place is much larger, only limited by internet access and access to the mail, or UPS or what have you.

I collect, purchase and refurbish old radio’s, purely as a hobby. I visited a re-cycle plant a few years ago where I saw home electronics being shredded, ground up, pulverized etc. While there is a need for this, I really would like to salvage some of “Americana” via its technology of the 50’s and 60’s and before, for the next generations. This quest has me looking for and purchasing unique antique e-stuff and than looking for the parts to repair it. Few young people today know what a tube is or how it works. We have managed to pack a video camera into wristwatch that still tells the time and only a few years ago (60) the transistor was replacing the tube allowing for smaller power supplies and of course smaller radio’s. We got the first transistor radio in 1954 which was a combined effort of Texas Instruments and Industrial Development Engineering Associates. A year later over 100,000 pocket radios were on the market. That is when Raytheon jumped in to make a better radio hence came along the 8 TP 1 which basically was a radio that doubled the amount of transistors incorporated from 4 to 8 allowing for better sound.

eBay seems like a natural place for this as it is rife with all kinds of these things.

Here are some things that I learned over the years that may help you and or might guilt the person or person’s who practice this type of behavior to stop it.

When selling an old “transistor radio” the seller said, “I am not sure how to test this.” Translated “I have done everything that I know and this thing is dead.” If you are incapable of installing a 9volt battery and turning a couple of knobs to see what happens, than perhaps you should not be selling on-line.

“I put a battery in and just static, there are no AM stations in my area.” Unless you live on the moon or in a cave or a solid brick building, there are radio stations that you can hear, that is especially true if you have the internet and cell phone. Translated, “this thing is screwed up and I will say this in hopes that someone will buy it.”

I guess what I see most of is that “I got this at an estate sale and have no way to test it.” Folks, the most idiotic person out there knows that it is worth more money if it works and most people who buy at an estate sale know more than just a little about what they are buying. So, translated, “I did everything that I know, called all of my normal resources and this thing appears to be dead so I will say I don’t know how to test it and it will be someone else’s problem.”

A few others that I have received over the years are “for parts or repairs.” Now this is fair game. Accompanied along with pictures so people can see what they are bidding on, I now know that it is dead, that you don’t know how or don’t want to repair it and you want to move it. Here is where the rub comes in.

I have bought many such radio’s to find that someone had opened them up and removed parts to repair another radio and then sold what they did not want as “for parts or repair.” Translated, “I took what I needed, but I am not going to tell you that there are parts already gone.” The real problem is that I can’t prove that is what they did, but I can watch them and not purchase from them again.

Another “parts or repair item” is this, electronics that have been under water. Folks, it is dishonest to sell something as “unknown condition,” parts or repair, I don’t know how to test etc if the item has been under water! It is ruined if that is the case. Case in point, I purchased a “lot of 3” RCA radio’s from the 50’s. Three radios’ that were of an unknown condition, “for parts or repair.” There were fuzzy pictures of the cases and that was about it. By the time you bid against others looking for these little collectables, pay shipping to find out that they are worthless well; that is just wrong on so many levels. Not only were parts missing out of the three, each and every one was filled with mud. The cases are not pristine so I pretty much threw away money and have nothing to show for it.

My last bone of contention is really the first radio that I bought like this. As a long time Ham I started my radio hobby with a borrowed Hallicrafters SX-99 back in the late 60’s. If you have not experienced what I am going to relate, you have missed out. There is something magical about sitting in front of a radio such as this and listening to stations from all over the world; bask in the glow of dial lights, knobs and meters swaying with the signal strength. It is as if you are somehow connected to the station on the other end. I remember listening to a station in Hawaii and for a few moments I was there. Shortwave used to be much more influential than it is today. I think it was used as a propaganda method as well as a way to get information into areas that were blacked out by their local government. To control the people, you control what they hear, see, read and so forth. We still do it today but that is another blog.

I think a huge part of the success of eBay is people, much like me, trying to reclaim that lost moment through an old radio or trinket or favorite toy. I started my search looking for one of these radios. They are popular these days so the bidding gets intense and they frequently go for much more than they are worth.

Found one and bid on it. After an intense bidding war I got it from a local store and by local I mean in Texas. Bad news there, not only did I pay premium dollar but, I had to pay sales tax. Good news, I arranged to pick it up some weeks later when we were both going to be at the same event saving me $40 in shipping.

At first glance the case was not right; I could tell that it had been dropped. Looking through the top cover everything else seemed rough but workable. The money I paid for this the radio should have been turn key but alas, it was not.

After getting it home I pulled the case off of it thinking I would straighten it out, to discover that this radio must have sat in a barn where water was allowed to enter it every time that it rained and stay until it evaporated. My guess is that it was in this barn for years. A restoration of that radio would mean replacing each and every control, the capacitors and who knows what else. These things are very old and finding parts for them is not as easy as one might think.

The person, who sold it to me, took it on trade. The person who traded it to him is likely the person who knew its history, and just did not care.

So here is my last bit of eBay advice, if they took it on trade, you may want to think about looking elsewhere as that is another escape clause if you are unhappy. “No returns, all sales final etc” are just things that I tend to stay away from. Now I know why some take no returns as there are those out there who need a part and will buy your item, take the part that they need from it and than send it back to you as a DOA. You are then held hostage by your eBay rating.

I would rather eat a bug than take advantage of someone or a circumstance or in this case, steal from someone. Wouldn’t it be nice if everyone felt that way?

Watch their feedback, if it is less than 100%, why is it that way? If you get had by someone; warn others by leaving them less than positive. eBay has a good resolution center which I have used before but this was really only when someone sold me something that they did not have to sell. This happens more than you might suspect.

Hope that you have a great New Years and that you can use this to your advantage or at least to protect yourself, friends and family from the less than scrupulous people out there. And by the way, some of the junk on eBay really does need to go to the e-cycle place, especially if it has been under water.

Best to you and those that you care about and Happy Bidding!