Roberts general questions

[j.m.g.k]

hello to everyone on the board, I have enjoyed reading past posts from all the big names...and now I'm the proud owner of a Roberts R800, which I understand is not terribly well thought of by the experts!, I have some questions about it and Roberts radios in general.
I have seen mentioned that the R800's case is MDF - however mine is mostly 7-ply, or possibly 5-ply, I haven't counted, with 2 small blocks of mdf for the battery "compartment", and seems very sturdy.
I wondered what construction earlier roberts radios had - do they have Solid Wood?

Despite the small "plasticky" speaker, it actually sounds pretty good. However I have plans to replace this with a speaker with a visible magnet and a tweeter - unless anyone thinks that's a bad idea. would I in fact be better off finding an eliptical speaker maybe. Is it just the speaker that you disapprove of or does the whole audio path through amp and tone control have a lower quality than times past?

I'm quite interested to know.

Thanks!

[John12868]

Hi, I've just looked at my own R800, serial no. 2786, and that too is of ply construction, with mahogany(?) ends.

No early Roberts transistor sets are of solid wood construction that I know of, the exceptions (aren't there always) being the RM series of table top receivers of the early to mid '70's.

I wouldn't worry about the opinions of the so-called "experts" regarding the plastic speaker. Most people's hearing isn't good enough to distinguish the audio "fidelity" between a plastic speaker or metal framed one. It's a question of perception. Metal = good, plastic = bad.

As has been noted on the forum, Roberts had problems with both production quality and componants during their manufacture, but in saying that, it's not been my experience.

I have two of these sets, a black one and a red BWFB set. My only criticism of these sets is of the screen printed tuning dial which can suffer from wear.

Enjoy your set, and welcome to the wonderful world of "vintage" wireless!!

[Paul_RK]

Yes, my R800 is of plywood with teak ends as well: MDF came in with its successor the R900, which even so would get better marks from many of us mainly for sound quality (a small but very massive speaker) and perhaps also for having bass and treble tone controls in place of that slider. I too don't think the R800's speaker is a terrible letdown, it wouldn't have been used if it had been, and I doubt you'd get any great improvement in sound quality from any standard unit that would fit in the available space. Solid wood cabinet construction hasn't been much seen in radios since about 1930, but older Roberts models were of more rigid construction than the narrow, long-sided R800/R900 generation, whether or not that had much effect on audio performance.

There's not a lot wrong with the R800 to my mind, it's just a slightly disappointing top-of-the-range model when compared with the R707 and R606MB which came before or the R900 and RCS80 from after...

Paul

[Heatercathodeshort]

There was a dramatic difference between the plastic speaker and the metal framed one in the Rambler. The early ones had rectangular buttons and conventional speaker. The later ones had round buttons and a plastic speaker. The difference in quality was considerable, so much so that I had to return several to Roberts for assessment. They were returned as 'up to specification' but I was not happy with the results compared to the original version. I think the problem was caused simply by a poor speaker rather than the material used for the frame. The R900 had a very fine performance but due to a wiring fault in early models the battery ran down in a week! This fault also caused the on/off section of the switch assembly to be blown O/C. There were mod sheets for these problems. [I have them somewhere] Battery life was never good with the R900 generating customer complaints and it was later suggested by Roberts that the set was sold primarily for mains use. Regards, John.

[Paul_RK]

Yes, the Rambler plastic speaker looks to be from the same manufacturer (Philips?) as that in the R800 but is a lot smaller and doesn't perform nearly so well. The R800's sound quality came as a pleasant surprise to me when I used mine for the first time in a while: perhaps because one set I use fairly often is a Hacker Windsor, mains-powered table model in a long cabinet with one of those plastic-framed speakers at each end, and I do think they let it down severely.

Paul

[j.m.g.k]

Thanks for all your replies.

As an experiment, I removed the plastic framed speaker (along with alot of gunk, dirt and dust that had been trapped by the grille) and replaced it with a beefier-looking 4" speaker salvaged from a found speaker. It sounded terrible compared to the original, really weak and thin! Having re-installed the plastic speaker, I have a new-found admiration for it. I think the design must be a little special. I did find that It sounds alot better with its back to a wall.
I must say I'm quite impressed with this radio (it arrived all muddy!). It would be nice if it was a colour other than black, though.
Having had a good peer inside it's lovely to see all real components, no SMDs here! I'd love to do up a stinker. I miss the soldering

[geofy]

I too have to defend the plastic frame speaker, I am listening to my Rambler that I rescued from a jumble sale a few years ago and it sounds quite good enough, it is after all only a small,speaker and any small speaker will have its limitations though usually these are better for listening to speech. I find running the radio on a new 200mA/H PP3 sized nicad makes the radio sound better by keeping up the terminal voltage for longer.

Geof

[Heatercathodeshort]

Originally Posted by j.m.g.k

It sounded terrible compared to the original, really weak and thin!

With regard to the plastic speaker query. Yes the Roberts Rambler sounds ok with the plastic speaker but sounded even better with the metal one. It caused quite a fuss at the time due to the inferior sound quality from the later models. The rep at the time [He had been with Roberts since the 1930's] confirmed the queries and later the higher priced models were always fitted with the better speaker. I was a Roberts dealer both service and sales for many years. Regards, John.

[geofy]

You would have known the Roberts radios better then John. It might have been that the heavier speakers made the radio more stable so they sounded better, and changes in the audio amplifier would have made a difference, the capacitor coupled speaker in the Rambler may have 'sounded' different to earlier transformer coupled designs. A new thread could be started to analyse why the plastic frame speakers have some for and some against them maybe

Geof