"Vega" Selena B 212 c. 1975

[howard]

Hello,

I have five Selena radios from the former Soviet Union including two 'new old stock' examples (neither of which worked on arrival but are now fixed) but this B 212 is my favorite. The Selena radios were built between 1974 and 1994 at the huge Minsk Radio Works in Minsk Belarus so are not Russian built as is commonly believed. They were known as 'Okeans' in the SU and all are mains/battery sets with FM/MW/LW/SWx5 and were available with two FM options and various SW options. All are conventionally built with 17 transistors (no integrated circuits) and were largely hand made. These sets were sold in quite large numbers in the UK and throughout Western Europe and Scandinavia. The name Vega was a brand name used by the Soviet export organisations Mashpriborintorg and Tento, and had no connection with the Vega brand name which appeared on sets within the Soviet Union which were built at the Vega Berdsk Radio Works in Siberia.
The B 212 is one of the first Selenas built in the mid 1970s and has a black grille.

I went and collected this one which I won on eBay for just £13. It was a bit grubby and had those wretched BBC markers stuck all over the dial, and was working but not very well. It was complete (with its mains lead) and in good cosmetic condition with no damage except for a small ding in the top chrome trim. I took the set apart to clean it properly and to overhaul it. It comes apart by pulling off the waveband switch knob on the side and by removing four screws in the back panel - one of the screws was partly covered in a sort of plasticine wax, the factory seal, which I scraped off and saved to put back later. The wooden case then lifts off. I pulled off the four knobs on the front so I could clean under them properly - be very careful with those knobs cos they are not robust, a small piece broke off the end of one of them, but fortunately it was still perfectly usable. I gave the case a good clean and spent ages picking off the old BBC station markers. I used B&Qs sticky stuff remover to help shift those, and any remaining goo came off with switch cleaner. I then polished the outer case with Mr Sheen.

Not a lot goes wrong with these sets, the volume pots become noisy and the aluminium contacts on the turret waveband switch corrode. Sometimes the loudspeaker coupling capacitor fails resulting in loss of bass but that's straightforward to replace. So I squirted a little switch cleaner into the volume pot and into the ends of the afc/on/off/dial illumination switches and cleaned off the tarnish on the waveband contacts with duraglit and switch cleaner. I then reassembled the set.

This is a fabulous Soviet transistor radio and it looks good too ! On MW/LW and all five SW wavebands it picks up everything and sounds pretty good as well. On FM, which is a little fiddly to tune, it sounds very good, on a par with Hackers and the better Roberts sets. These Selenas were truly world class radios which even won Which? magazine best buy awards in the 1980s

Howard

[GJR 11L]

I like these too, my 212 does lack bass compared to my 215, I suspect that the 212 here has at least one iffy resistor on the a/f board too as it has rather more background hiss than was present the last time I plugged it in.

I love the way that these are put together, the turret and those germanium i/f devices being straight out of the Grundigs of a decade or so earlier.

That 212 of mine is almost as sensitive on the SW bands as my Satellit (when it's going properly) and that's no mean feat considering that the 212 has no selectable bandspread facility or other such refinements.

I'll see whether I can get the time and strength to get into that later today as I feel a bit of investigative work coming on and will check that cap.

I bought the genuine factory service sheet for the 212 some time ago so that'll kill an hour or three!

Yes, good sets and my 212 is near mint and stands me the grand total of 99p with mains lead! (I paid more for the ones I'm using for parts)

[mickjjo]

That looks really nice Howard, As discussed in post #3 here:- https://www.vintage-radio.net/forum/...ad.php?t=10248
I picked up my first Russian set, A mint Selena 215, for £8 last Sunday, and am quite impressed with it. The dial looks more detailed on the 212, so I may have to look out for one of those now....... .

Regards, Mick.

[howard]

Hello Phil, Mickjjo,

I must go to more car boot sales, I thought I'd done well at £13 ! This B 212 is mint apart from a tiny ding in the top trim. I do have two brand new B-215s acquired for £40 the pair which were still in their unopened boxes and are the best sounding of them all, but I still like this one best. The prices for Selenas on eBay go up and down between £12 and £35 apiece but even at those prices one gets an awful lot of radio for ones money and they do survive well ... except for those knobs !

I hope you fix yours Phil, these radios sound excellent when working well. One of my Selena B-215s awaits a new loudspeaker coupling cap as well.

Howard

[howard]

Originally Posted by howard

All are conventionally built with 17 transistors (no integrated circuits) Howard

Having worked on a late Selena B-215 today the later B215/216/217s do in fact have one integrated circuit and a ceramic filter. The B212 which has germanium transistors doesn't.
The fault in one of my Selena B-215s reported above as probably a failed loudspeaker coupling capacitor turned out to be a sticking loudspeaker cone. The loudspeaker has now been replaced by a good one from a scrap set and the set sounds a lot better.

Howard