Help needed to value a HRO 5T

[mhennessy]

Hello all,

Hopefully this is OK - if not, please move/delete it as appropriate

A good friend has a HRO 5T and a set of coilpacks that he wishes to move on, and knowing that it might be of interest to people on this forum, I've offered to help.

But we've got no idea of what it might be worth. To be honest, he's not worried about the money as such - his first priority is to ensure that it goes to a genuine collector who will give it a good home.

In light of feedback received from this thread, we'll be able to decide a suitable price, and then I'll start a thread in the correct "for sale" section of the forum. I'll be able to put interested parties in contact with the owner via email.

It would need to be collected from Evesham - or I could bring it to the NVCF in May.

I'll attach some photographs, and here is a description from the owner:

Here is an HRO 5T in near original condition, owned by me for just over 40 years. There is a date stamp for the tropicalisation treatment dated March 19th 1945.

It was last fired up a couple of years ago and functioned normally.

Some minor mods done in the early years:

- Replaced original headphone socket with a plastic socket. Original is included with the RX.
- Fitted a screened cable to LO valve to suppress LO radiation.
- Xtal died in filter many years ago. I fitted a 455Khz resonator in it's place which works OK.
- Hole in rear of case where an I/F Q-multiplier had been hardwired to one of the I/F stages.
- Hole in case above aerial posts... used to have a small plate with BNC and 10:1 balun.
- Hole in front panel, cunningly concealed with genuine HRO bolt, where I fitted a fine tune control.

The power supply though has been thorougly butchered over the years trying different power supply arrangements. It was finally left internally back to a more original design, but the plate does bear the scars of previous experiments.

There is a full set of general coverage coilpacks plus a set of four bandspread coilpacks. However, the bandspread packs are from a glass-valved HRO, which (if I remember correctly) have slightly different component values to bandspread coilpacks for the metal-valved receivers. I think I ended up tuning the LO to the 'wrong' side of RX frequency to make them work on this receiver.

There is also a spare tuning knob - at on time I had 2 other HROs (one being a glass valved version which came with the bandspread coilpacks) in different states of 'modification'. They both went over the years.

The speaker was bought with the receiver and is obviously not a proper matching unit but does work, being fitted with an internal matching transformer.

A manual is included.

[mhennessy]

And a few more pictures...

[Radio Wrangler]

I've seen £50 to £70 for HROs with a set of coil packs, and one looking like new with £120 being asked.

David

[Gridiron]

I would have thought at least £70 with all the coils, etc.
Mike.

[mhennessy]

Great - thank you both for the suggestions. Will pass this along shortly...

All the best,

Mark

[Radio Wrangler]

Some of the coils have screws which when fitted into different positions switch them between general coverage and amateur band bandspread forms. The graphs have the other mode printed on the reverse.

The ones I saw in the past year had homebrew power supplies, not original ones.

By the way, in the Museum of communications in Burntisland, they have a brand new unused HRO in all its shiny glory. It was ordered before the war by a wealthy young man who never made it back. The set arrived and his sister put it in his room, still packed. When he died, the family closed up his room until his sister died several years ago. It was a time capsule of pre-war radio hobbyist stuff, no cost spared, and his cars were left in his garage.

It is quite interesting to see an HRO as it would appear brand new.

David

[ms660]

Ebay is the place to sell it if you can, sell the band spread coils as a separate lot, they normally fetch a premium, £12 to £20 each on a good day, the receiver plus general coverage coils plus the dog house could realize £120.

If it goes on Ebay it will more than likely go to an enthusiast as much as it would selling it anywhere else.

If the band spread coils have the same serial no: as the receiver then ignore what I said above and sell them with the receiver highlighting that fact, if the general coverage coils have the same serial no: as the receiver then ditto as above.

Good luck.

Lawrence.

[GW3OQK Andrew]

I won the auction at £140 for the same model last year. I had bid 190 for I really wanted one. It too was pristine but without a power supply.
73
Andrew

[mhennessy]

Hi again,

Thanks for all the advice. Having thought about it, my friend has decided on a price, and an advert has been placed. As you'll see, all proceeds of the sale will be donated to the wireless museum, so hopefully everyone benefits from this.

Thanks again,

Mark