40-190

Home Philco 20 90 Philco 39-30 40-150 40-150 #2 40-180 40-190 Service Bulletins

 

Rotating Antenna

This is a Philco 40-190.  The 40-190 has a distinctive Art-Deco look to the cabinet.  Electronically it is virtually identical to the 40-150 and 40-180. The Riders schematics detail the differences in the chassis.  The differences amount to an added antenna coil for the 40-150 and/or a tube change.  One of the revisions includes a series resistor to stop oscillations with a particular tube on the SW band.

This radio has a rotating antenna for broadcast bands.  Some times this antenna is missing.  Or the service bench needs to mock one up.  Here are some details. See what is inside that rotating antenna !

 

Shop Pictures Before

IM000159.JPG (76344 bytes) IM000160.JPG (74043 bytes) IM000162.JPG (262432 bytes)
Accumulated grime around the knob area.   YUC. Dust, dirt and dings. You can see the dirt and scratches on front of this cabinet.

 

Cleaning

I tried several methods to clean the cabinet. I started with GoJo.  It did not remove much of anything.  Next I tried a rag and alcohol.  The rag turned an instant shade of dirt!.  Later I moved to four ot (#0000) steel wool and alcohol.  

With the 0000 steel wool the pickled, orange peal finish stripped right off.  A combination the dirt, a coating of dark tar like matter, all the paint splatter, crayon marks and grime around the control knobs also came right off.  Underneath is a beautiful three dimensional, grain pattern  finish.  The type of finish with visual depth and grain that catches the light and shimmers as you move your head side to side.  The overall appearance lightened up too.  

I found that CRC no residue contact cleaner (found at Home Depot) remove significant stains from the grill cloth too!  I used a light scrubbing action with a sponge.  Too hard a hand will un-weave the cloth.

 

Strip

There is no need to strip the finish off of this cabinet!  The original finish is a rich brown color. 

 

Blemish Touch up

I used a combination of magic marker like stain pens, a bit of finger rubbed stain to tone the nicks, scratches and dings.  There was a dinged edge on one of the inside edges of vertical "balusters" (for lack of a better description) immediately to the right of the dial scale.  It was expanded back out by putting a few drops of water on the depression, placing a small wet towel over the nicks and quickly (count 1001, 1002) placing the heating element part of a soldering iron on the rag.  I checked the progress and repeated the steaming about 8 to 12 times.  The crushed wood expanded back out!.  A proper treatment of stain pens and careful application of lacquer to build up the thickness of the finish.  It looks pretty good.

 

Shop pictures After

IM000201.JPG (236023 bytes) IM000202.JPG (176387 bytes)  

I will add some pictures of the finished radio with a repainted bezel (A muted GM Gold spray paint from the auto parts store looks great) and new push buttons from "Old Time Replications is owned and operated by Larry Bordonaro".  You can see the new wine colored push buttons on the 40-150 page.

 

Runway Shots

Please enjoy these pictures since adding Wine transparent push buttons, a good dusting and added station presets tabs.  Just imagine your favorite nostalgic music or a sports game broadcast. Click on the little picture below for a lager image.

This is the original finish.  No need to strip and refinish this radio.  Warm look beautiful sound. .  

 

im000066.jpg (42996 bytes) im000062.jpg (49695 bytes)  Original Finish.  This unit was washed with alcohol, dings and nicks touched up and coated with several hand rubbing sessions of MINWAX furniture paste wax. im000067.jpg (44503 bytes)
im000064.jpg (59016 bytes) im000065.jpg (63131 bytes) im000077.jpg (48548 bytes)  

No Flash.  Push in call letters can sometimes be found on the internet.  This temporary set was created with Excel.  Any one can do it.  Just spray the printer output with lacquer and toner.  The hard part is trimming.  Put a small piece of scotch tape on the back so they do not fall out.  These will be replaced with better trimmed inserts and the font adjusted for a nice fit.
im000072.jpg (154497 bytes) im000075.jpg (309070 bytes) Original speaker cloth.  The speaker outline is less visible in room and day light. im000071.jpg (173006 bytes)
  im000070.jpg (129696 bytes) 1/4" knot on right rear top  
im000061.jpg (55662 bytes) Rotating the tall broadcast antenna, on lower left, to either minimize interference or peak reception of a station.  

See what is inside that rotating antenna !

 im000049.jpg (48248 bytes) Original, cleaned up chassis.  This one did not receive the wire brush, buffer with rouge compound.  im000050.jpg (62459 bytes) Polarized power cord can be easily replaced with a vintage non polarized.   
im000051.jpg (83271 bytes) As usual all paper/electrolytic capacitors, resistors (in or out of tolerance) and deterioration wiring has been replaced.  Multiple alignments have been performed (just because I am a picky engineer).  im000054.jpg (64134 bytes) Sort Wave loop works surprisingly  well. But add a wire (to the ANT terminal for improved reception. im000052.jpg (56953 bytes) 40-190 sticker

 

 

 including your thoughts and comments. 

Don't overlook the LINKS page.  I have collected many resources over the years.

45,868 unique web site visitors from October 2004 through December 2008.

Copyright © 2009. All rights reserved.