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Old 14th Mar 2018, 9:41 pm   #1
slidertogrid
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Default Bargain GEC BC 5645

I bought this GEC Radio from the Harpenden Bring and buy for the bargain price of £4. Iit was very dirty had trims missing from two of the knobs and the back was hanging off.
I had evil intentions as I wanted a fairly beefy mains transformer for a future project. The plan was to rob it of it's transformer and any other useful bits.
However once it was home and on the bench I realised it was much too good to break.
I started off giving it a good clean and polish, this transformed it's appearance and having a good look at it it's a really well made set.
I gave it some juice. The amplifier worked producing a healthy buzz from the gram socket.
The valves looked a bit bright I found the mains adjuster had been set to 220v so I put it to 240v which returned the heaters to normal.
Thre was no reception at all neither on AM or VHF, I checked the Hunts capacitors to find they were all very leaky and some falling apart as they do...
I replaced them one at a time and tested the set after each had been changed, this made no difference at all still no reception.
I next had a quick check around the valve holders and found the voltages to be around what I would expect.
I checked the wave change switch and gave it a clean then switching to VHF I found I had stations!
After more checking around I found the inner winding of the AM aerial was shorting to the metal fixing bracket, I suspect the chassis had been inverted and resting on it as the bracket had cut into the winding.
After that had been sorted out I then had stations on AM.
I don't have a valve tester but I suspected that the mains adjuster had been dropped down to improve emission.
I tried swapping valves one at a time to see if any improvement could be gained. Changing the X719 made a big difference to the gain on AM so I replaced that one and cleaned the pins on the others.
I gave the chassis a dust off and removed some greasy deposits from the I.F cans wiped out the inside of the cabinet and put the chassis back in.
I hunt through the spare knobs box produced a couple of knobs that donated a bright and a outer trim ring to replace the missing ones.
The set works really well it sounds good for what it is and is surprisingly good on VHF.
I struggle with some sets to pick up a good signal on Radio 2 most sets need an additional aerial (or the telescopic aerial positioned carefully for best reception) but this set is quite happy on it's internal foil aerial.
A bargain for four quid I reckon..
All I need now is a space for it!

Rich.
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Old 16th Mar 2018, 11:38 am   #2
FERNSEH
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Default Re: Bargain GEC BC 5645

Interesting radio set. FM tuner uses two Z719/EF80 pentodes instead of the more usual ECC85. Mixer-oscillator X719/ECH81. IF amplifier W719/EF85.
For the AM detector and audio amplifier GEC stayed loyal to the DH77/6AT6. Two GEC GEX34 germanium diodes in the FM demodulator. An N709/EL84 output.
U78/6X4 HT rectifier.
A set that is well worth restoration.

DFWB.
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Old 16th Mar 2018, 11:57 am   #3
high_vacuum_house
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Smile Re: Bargain GEC BC 5645

Good morning,
That was my set I put in the bring and buy. I am glad it has had some TLC and is in working condition. I had it in my (rather full!!) loft and decided that I was not going to get around to restore it for it for years as I have too many pending restoration projects. I don't know where the rear cover screws vanished, they were with it. Must blame the spiders!!

Christopher Capener
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