UK Vintage Radio Repair and Restoration Discussion Forum - The Story Of My Ferranti U1003 Repair

A sorrowful tale initially, though with patience, a touch of bravado & hint of dashing do, the ending is a happier one!

A Ferranti U1003, (also known as an Ekco U319), either model I was keen to obtain, I like the look & one came up ‘on-line’ at a sensible price with shipping. On the face of it, the set would have cleaned up lovely. From the description, the set required replacement of ‘time expired’ components, bit of a buff up and, ‘jobs a gooden!’ It was a worker, but a very quiet one … I was the highest bidder & before we knew it, the set was on its way.

However, the delivery person presumably had a bad day & must have fallen from a whopping great height, tumbling a considerable distance using my boxed-up wireless, as a cushion! Arriving home, my ‘signed for’ parcel was found under the car port, so at least it was dry, & of course, had arrived!

Opening the boxed revealed all was not well, the dubious dent in one corner of the box a clue as to the sets fate. On the plus side, all the ‘bits’ were contained! Yes, the bakelite cabinet had not fared well, & was in 3 large pieces, with debris in the bottom of the box. The dial glass had a corner missing, bits also in the bottom of the box, the chassis was bent and the only thing holding everything together was the now slightly misshapen, back cover. The mains lead although original, was incredibly short too …

On making contact with the seller, providing photos of the set & photos of the box, I was given a full refund & told to ‘keep the set’ & ‘he was very sorry to hear it had arrived in such condition’. I can only imagine he then claimed from the delivery company so was not out of pocket financially, as the set was insured.

Spotting the date inside the set, 22nd November 1957, work began in December 2016, this radio has to live to see its 60th birthday!

The smaller bits were gathered, bagged, the larger parts carefully removed from around the chassis, placed safe to one side … Once the chassis was free, provisional checks carried out & I was happy that it was ‘doable’ connecting things up, power was applied via the Variac. Sure enough, there was life … just not an awful lot & yes, she was very quiet. Still, this proved the active parts of the set were a viable project, this being placed to one side for the time being. Up to now, the radio looked totally original & untouched from new …

Attention was given to the poorly cabinet & dial glass. There were enough parts of a sensible size to make the cabinet & dial glass presentable. The cabinets’ saving grace? Being made to stout dimensions! I was able to drill 2mm holes along the ‘neat’ breaks on opposing faces, & I managed to find some 1.6mm screws of a decent length to make dowels. Once I found a dead-flat surface to work on & enough clamps to form a jig, out came the Araldite! Cutting the heads off the 1.6mm screws, marking, checking, rechecking, trial fitting, nope, not right, trial fit after another trial fit, mainly keeping things ‘square’, over the course of a week (leaving the glue 24 hours each time) thin beads of adhesive were placed on the broken edges while the new holes for the dowels were filled with Araldite.

While the cabinet was coming together, attention was given to the dial glass. Simply laying this flat & using a small amount of glue to hold the bits in place was good enough to handle. Once dry I used flowable silicone sealant on the outer face, as the idea of cutting ones digits open whilst traversing the dial in search of content left Goosebumps!

Leaving the cabinet & dial glass for a further week to fully harden paid off. The cosmetics were given a good clean, the cabinet coming up quite nice with little effort, & indeed, the dial glass, save for the grime, would have been a perfect example, had the set not been posted! Sadly, the set was just too far away to make a special trip to collect in person …

Once we had a sound enclosure, attention was paid to the chassis, which really was nothing more than replacement of time expired Hunts capacitors, a couple of waxies & a good number of higher value resistors. Anything from 470K was up in value by some margin, & anything 680K was in one case, up by an order of magnitude …! The blue upside-down capacitor is Y-rated & one used for the Gramophone input (the other one hiding), the manufacturers data sheet shows this devices’ failure mode is open circuit … a wise choice for a ‘possible’ live chassis … The mains lead has been replaced & incorporates a moulded plug, fused at 1 Amp, like all my radios. (RS part number for the fuse is 412-986) No association, just a very long standing, happy customer.

Following my efforts, the set was assembled, a run though the setup revealed only a mild ‘nudge’ to bring things in line & there she sat, pretty much unused until November 2017, her 60th! The set was used (rather than a fleeting test) over the 2017 Christmas break in my ‘escape room’, & the longer she ran … the quieter she became … odd, ‘never have a valve radio do that before’ was my initial thought … winding the volume control higher & higher, eventually giving in when the hum was louder that the programme! Testing the original valves on my Windsor/Taylor valve tester showed UF89 & UABC80 when left to fully warm, were very low emission, yet from cold, didn’t look too shabby … In my box of used goodies, I found a UF89 & UABC80, both Mullard, & both checked out as goodens! Promptly replacing the duffers, the sound is very impressive indeed, great tone, lots of volume now & she pulls in lots of stations, & weather permitting, lots on AM too!

Like many of us here I would imagine, in our workshops we have many ways of tuning in to TV &/or radio. Yet despite the shelf-load of projects, of all the things missing from my workshop, was a genuine/working vintage radio to use, since they normally end up at the main house. Needless to say, you are now looking at my ‘workshop’ radio, a charming set. I know not a rare example or worth a wodge of cash, but the extra work involved fulfilled the creative bug, which this hobby at times, requires!

The original instruction booklet was acquired January 2018, funny how we take these things under our wing(s) … :-)

Mark