BVWS Winter Bulletin

[HamishBoxer]

That is good Steve, it always feels worse when everyone else has theirs.

[stevehertz]

Thanks Hamish!

Oh, I like the calendar this year, very nice.

[wartime sounds]

Still no show in East Bristol but awaiting it's arrival with great anticipation.

Peter

[Valvepower]

I also enjoyed reading the G6 article.

It was a bit of eureka moment seeing the picture of the Phillips G22K503 set at the top of page 45. I remember going round to play with a school friend after school back in 1970-71, he moved away in the summer 1971 when we both moved up to Senior School and I lost contact with him as he went to a different school some distance away.

His Mum and Dad had Colour TV and I clearly remember watching Scooby Doo, Whacky Races, Banana Splits and Lost in Space. His Dad was high flying sales chap and was able to buy gadgets like this TV for his family.

Every so often my mind wonders back, and I ponder what model of Colour TV it was… The only thing I could remember was the square transparent on-off (?) button on the front – well, I think it was the on-off button on the front? – anyway seeing the picture in the Bulletin it all came back… And yes, it must have been a Phillips G6.

Anyway, good days watching stuff like Scooby Doo on this TV after school some 53 years ago!

His elder brother had a guitar and a Linear 'cage' amplifier…. Anyway, I digress, as that’s whole different story!

Regards
Terry

Originally Posted by dazzlevision

I really enjoyed reading the article on the "low mileage, full provenance available" Philips G6 dual standard TV and it reminded me of when I encountered a few of these many years ago, plus a 22" single standard G6 (which was a frequent visitor to the workshop where I was employed for a couple of years in the 1971-73 period).

I thought it must have been based on a European CTV design, as I later worked on the Swedish made K70 hybrid chassis 25" sets (photo attached) - not for the faint hearted! It has the same general chassis layout as the K6 and G6.

[Wellington]

Received today!

[Paul Stenning]

Excellent. Hopefully any other late ones will arrive this week.

[David G4EBT]

It's been an exceptional year for the Bulletin, with 32 first-class articles, which are a credit to the authors and to Alex as editor. Carl Glover was a hard act to follow, but Alex has really grown into the job since he took on the role of editor. Some really top-notch well-written and well-illustrated articles, covering a wide range of often quite daunting restorations. Also, some fascinating well-researched historical articles about radio in all it's forms.

When you renew your subs, please remember to cast your vote for the Pat Leggatt Award before the end of January for what you consider to be the best Bulletin article of 2022. For me, it was no easy task to narrow down. If you paid online with a debit/credit card or with PayPal, it only takes a few seconds to make your nomination online at: https://vote.bvws.org.uk

And yes, yet another splendid Calendar!

[Paul Stenning]

I agree. Not an easy decision to choose just one favourite article from the last year, but I have and voted yesterday evening.

[Paul Stenning]

Originally Posted by Paul Stenning

There is a note on the payment page where you choose the payment method with the same request, but I have just changed it to red text to make it more noticeable.

Currently it's about half PayPal and half card.

Recent renewals have been around 75-80% card payments so members are now seeing the request whether on the website with the red text or in the bulletin. Thank you.

Originally Posted by Paul Stenning

I agree. Not an easy decision to choose just one favourite article from the last year, but I have and voted yesterday evening.

I have just looked at the online voting results and so far there is a clear winner, but it's still early days and not that many people have voted yet, so it could all change. Every vote counts!

[Dickie]

My copy finally arrived this morning! Well worth the wait!

[stevehertz]

Y'know - and I'm probably going to get stick for saying this - I sometimes get fed up with reading restoration articles that inevitably follow an oh so predictable route of, I then changed this capacitor, and that capacitor, a faulty valve cured that, this resistor was out of tolerance, I treated the pots and switches with switch cleaner and so on. However! I do glean interest and satisfaction from reading about the more 'mechanical' side of a restoration such as the case, repairing mechanical links and switches, making missing or damaged backs and dials etc. It's just that the electronics side is so predictable; quite simply and as we all know, aged components need weeding out and replacing. I realise that to have substance and to be complete a restoration article has to include at least some of this stuff, it just gets boring and predictable, samey. Saying that, I myself have written such restoration articles that have been published in national magazines, but if I wrote another now I would attempt to somehow condense the repetative, elongated, 'component by component' aspect of the restoration. And no, I'm not currently planning a restoration article in the short term.

Does anyone else at least partly share my view?

[kalee20]

A bit!

There was one last year about the Ever Ready 5215 portable, in which the design was discussed, and one the year before, written from the radio's point of view in the style of Black Beauty.

Gary Tempest's restoration articles are always good, he deals with all aspects - and so are Stef Niewiadomski's well-researched articles on either a pioneer, or some aspect of circuitry.

As always, Alex can only print what he's given, it's a question of us the membership putting in the variety! Maybe a letter for publication appealing for a change of style and giving an indication of how it could be improved, when writing-up a restoration, would help?

[stevehertz]

Well, I think most BVWS members will be members on here and read my comments. Secondly, although I am professional writer in the electronics industry, it's not my role to attempt to guide a magazine in its editorial approach, the BVWS Bulletin has a dedicated Editor. But there's nothing to stop me commenting in my own way, and that's what I've done. I mean, it's no big deal (!), basically (in my opinion!) it just doesn't need a blow by blow account of how every faulty component was found and changed. That doesn't leave nothing left to write about. For example, set procurement, rarity, different versions, design, basic electronic restoration, mechanical restoration, how well it works and so on.

[Penally]

Radio restoration is a hobby for me, taken up after early retirement. I am still learning and really enjoy reading the restoration articles in the BVWS bulletin. They are not predictable for me, and I often refer back to earlier articles if I am working on something similar. I find the bulletin an excellent publication.

I also subscribe to a hobby journal related to my 40 year professional life, many articles in it I find simplistic and I am often surprised at the intense interest taken in things that were just part of everyday life.

It really just depends where you are on that learning curve, whatever stage of life you are in.

[draenog]

Originally Posted by stevehertz

Well, I think most BVWS members will be members on here and read my comments. Secondly, although I am professional writer in the electronics industry, it's not my role to attempt to guide a magazine in its editorial approach, the BVWS Bulletin has a dedicated Editor. But there's nothing to stop me commenting in my own way, and that's what I've done. I mean, it's no big deal (!), basically (in my opinion!) it just doesn't need a blow by blow account of how every faulty component was found and changed. That doesn't leave nothing left to write about. For example, set procurement, rarity, different versions, design, basic electronic restoration, mechanical restoration, how well it works and so on.

Firstly let me say that I entirely respect your opinion, and after restoring numerous radios and TVs I can sympathise with it, but there's the rub. Been there, done that, no longer interesting/informative. But what about inexperienced restorers? You say you're a professional writer in the electronics industry, so obviously the other aspects interest you most. But to somebody new to the electronics side a blow-by-blow description is exactly what they want, especially if it contains the "why" (why THAT capacitor, why THAT resistor). Of course, there are two styles of restoration (blanket replacement versus component "trouble shooting"). But in each case a why is useful (all waxies are bad, coupling capacitor, etc.).

[Radio Wrangler]

Originally Posted by stevehertz

Y'know - and I'm probably going to get stick for saying this -
.
.
.
Does anyone else at least partly share my view?

That intro usually gets moderators hiding under ther benches....

Yes, I partially share your view. There will be many levels of readers, and what one person needs may bore the pants off others. Writing professional material like service manuals is not too difficult because your target audience can be assumed to be pre-selected and qualified. Writing for a hobbyist audience means you have to offer something to everyone of a much wider spread of levels of knowledge and experience. I got asked to write the oscillators and synthesisers chapter for the ARRL handbook. It was going to be read by absolute beginners and by experts in the field... and all levels in-between. It was planned and written in layers. A beginner can read through, and though a lot will be out of his grasp, he will grasp enough to get some benefit and will find it encouraging. He should not only emerge at the end knowing more, but also seeing that he knows more. The areas he doesn't yet understand should feel like something for later, not as terrifying dragons to be slain. Similarly, peple approaching with more experience should get a good ride and similarly increase their knowledge and widen their comfort zone. For people at the top of the game, there needs to be a few things they might not have come across, there needs to be no cracks that the off knife could be got into.

All in all, not an easy task, but once done it's good to see that it's appreciated, and it's even better to see people getting benefit from it.

One amazing side effect is that Ulrich Rohde (son of founder of Rohde & Schwarz) in his subsequent synthesiser book mentions the chapter and recommends people read it first. At the time I was a senor design engineer at HP... big competitors of R&S. Having someone who owns 50% of HP's biggest competitor in RF instruments sat something like that is, um, special. Well, would you not have hung a framed copy of those words over your desk?

So writing for a hobbyist magazine, well, maybe more like editing one, has to cover all the levels of readers and offer each something worth reading. It's a different world to professional publications.

Radio, electronics etc magazines don't offer me anything I really need. If I want something I can sit down and design it from scratch if I need to. They are interesting from the viewpoint of seeing where other people are going, where their interests lie.

David

[Hybrid tellies]

Mine has just arrived. So will be renewing membership in the near future but if I can avoid it it will NOT be via the post.

[Paul Stenning]

https://membership.bvws.org.uk/

[Dave Moll]

Thanks for the reminder. I have now renewed (by credit card). I had been waiting until my credit card billed, but then forgot.

[David G4EBT]

Looking back over the four issues of 2022, (or indeed in any year come to that), I can't see a single article which I would class as repetitive or 'run of the mill'. Quite the contrary in fact. Many are really quite challenging, such as the final part of Gary Tempest's 3-part article on the total strip-down and rebuild of a Philips 753 motor-tuned radio.

I can only reiterate what I said in post 47 about the Winter edition, which had an eclectic range of articles on vintage radios, amplifiers, TVs and historic interest, all with first class diagrams and colour pictures, with the text and pictures well laid out. To touch on just four of the articles:

Ordinarily, I have no interest in TVs, but how could anyone not be impressed with Graham Goslings 13-page article, illustrated with 30 excellent pictures on the Philips G6 colour TV? At the outset he explains that the article is 'about the exposition of the G6 - not a blow by blow capacitor/resistor restoration'. How daunting that must have been for TV engineers who cut their teeth on B&W TVs? 21 valves, 17 transistors, 46 diodes, and 25,000V EHT.

That article evoked memories of the one-year Radio and TV night school course I did back in 1976, and the end of which the main lesson I learnt was: 'don't take the back off a TV or you might kill yourself'. I did not find the tutor's comments that: 'it's Volts that Jolts and Mils that Kills' at all reassuring. (Too young to die - tool old for nasty shocks!).

Another TV article was by Christopher Capener (forum member 'High Vacuum House'), on a projection TV.
As a professional electronics engineer working with EHT, that would have held no fears for Christopher.

A nine-page article on a 30-Watt 1960s amplifier with 30 excellent pictures.

A five-page article on the Ecko A22 by Roger Grant, with 19 excellent pictures, which included the creation of a new dial and casting replica knobs.

All in all, 58 pages of editorial.

I can't bring to mind any commercial or hobby society magazine which has so much editorial that comes even close to The Bulletin. The BVWS has come a long way from it's first Bulletin edition in July 1976:

https://www.bvws.org.uk/publications...volume1number1

Ironically, having had six articles published in the Bulletin in the past ten years or so, I've found the overall standard so high that I've self-censored several articles I might otherwise have written and submitted as I considered they might be a little too 'samey' and 'run of the mill'. Just as well that I did it seems. I'll hold that thought.