A Challenger!

[sabaman]

Hi,

A Challenger both in brand name and attempts to find any information on this manufacturer. I recently purchased this radio locally on eBay, having been drawn to it by its obscurity.
It appears to be a 12 valve set including magic eye & rectifier (missing?)
Identified valves are 6Q7G, 6C5G, VT-66, VT-175, 6L7G; others are either illegible or the valves (sorry, tubes) are enclosed in metal jackets. IF transformers are made by Aladdin, Chicago USA. Chassis wiring is messy in my opinion. The chassis is presumably of american origin, although clearly designed or modified for UK operation as it has long wave. Station markings on the dial are also intended for the UK.
The wooden cabinet is very large (74x37x32cm) and is well made but has some 'rustic' finishes, e.g. the wooden pegs at the rear of the chassis, designed to keep the chassis in place and screws visible to the left of the controls. Something isn't quite right somehow.
I've removed the chassis and cardboard tuning dial to see if there is any more info - there isn't.
I enjoy a mystery like this but extensive googling has turned up virtually nothing. The only information I could find relating to Challenger as a radio brand was on the radiomuseum website; in November 1933, the Co-op was going to register this brand name, but the idea was dismissed due to objections from another company located in Bradford. The article doesn't mention if this company was also in the radio trade.
It also has a Wylex dual mains plug - never seen one of those before either.
So, there you have it. What could it be? A department store's own brand? A Co-op prototype? I'm sure someone will know and I'd love to hear your ideas.

Cheers,

Seth

[Radio Wrangler]

It has amateur bands marked on it, though not the 15m band.

Now when did we get that one? Ah, 1947 IRC. I don't suppose that helps much - the style of the insides says 1930s.

I think there was a 'Challenge' brand operated by John England, the catalogue firm., or was it Grattan? Gratten were based in Bradford, though. It might not have been an actual manufacturer that objected to the Coop, it could have been some retailer operating a house brand label.

I notice it's also a 'left-handed' radio. Dial and tuning knobs on the left, speaker on the right.

Virrry iiinteresting.

David

[paulsherwin]

The tuning scale is late 30s.

Can I see some Catkin valves in there? https://www.valvecollector.uk/documents/catkin.htm
(No, don't think so, they're American style screening cans.)

The cabinet looks rather home made, though it might be a short run design or even a prototype.

[ms660]

I wonder if this lot were anything to do with it:

https://americanradiohistory.com/hd2...2challenger%22

One or two other ads in the small ads columns in WW if you search.....no pics that I could see.

Lawrence.

[Radio Wrangler]

That looks like a direct hit, Lawrence.

The shortwave coils in the photos look interesting. Few turns, very thick wire. They're using a large capacity broadcast variable with low inductance values, methinks... hence the rather wide tuning ranges. A case for safecracker's fingers if ever there was one!

David

[Glowing Bits!]

If, as Paul mentions, the scale is 30s, chances are that the set may possibly be British made, Bush in the 30s used American parts for some of their sets, this was discovered when stripping a chassis.
The valves are likely to be American given their designations (valve codes).
During the 40's, the UK did import sets from the States, I don't know if that happened in the 30s though.
Just worth mentioning the above, it is an interesting set indeed.

[Hartley118]

An intrguing mystery:

* I see lots of complexity, but no IF transformers. Is it a TRF? - the well-screened RF tuning compartments might suggest a TRF circuit

* Station names suggest it's British.

* TV sound and indeed vision are marked on the highest frequency band, though I guess that the video output might have been disappointing. Suggests 1936 onwards.

* Energised speaker suggests it's probably pre-war.

* Octal valves in a British set suggests 1937 onwards.

Those observations all support Lawrence's 1939 finding. Maybe the development of Challenger was sadly cut short by WW2.

Martin

[sabaman]

Gosh, yes Lawrence, that must be them. What superb detective work, I'm very impressed, thank you. I guess Challenger never made it to the big time. I did find what appears to be a serial number 444/4003 - shown in the attached photo. I'm guessing it was no.3 in the '444' range. Thanks to David, Paul, Glowing Bits! & especially Lawrence for their interest & help in finding information on this small manufacturer. I guess a lot of enterprising radio firms came and went in the 1930s hey-day of radio, with brands disappearing into the ether & forgotten in time.

Seth

[sabaman]

Hi Martin,

There are a couple of IF transformer cans but they're difficult to see in the photos.
I think you could be right, the onset of the war may well have curtailed the development of Challenger.

Seth

[paulsherwin]

There can't have been many broadcast TRF receivers of that complexity ever made. I wonder how the performance compares to a superhet with an RF stage. It must have cost a lot to manufacture - maybe that's why the company didn't survive, though it's possible all the engineers disappeared into the radar programme in 1939.

[sabaman]

One of the small IF transformers, hiding behind a valve.

Seth

[Glowing Bits!]

I'd second Paul's comment, GE sets were imported from America in the early 40s to keep up with demand during the war, they were bundled with a line dropper for 240v.
So far, it looks like this set is made up of American parts in this country, most of the USA stuff is live chassis, not tranny operated.
It's worth noting that 'Derwent' is another brand that faded into oblivion, it may well be the case with this particular set too.

[turretslug]

Interesting indeed- the lack of obvious IF cans kinda knocks the other assumptions about a set like this sideways- my initial thought that the two metal octals behind the gang capacitor would be something like a 6SK7 IF strip but there's not to support that otherwise. The 6L7G was pitched as an externally-fed heptode mixer for superhets, so again a slight puzzle for a TRF, though it was also used as a noise gate and compander.

This thread reminds me of the recent Moreton-Cheney thread- perhaps another small start-up reaching a little too high?

D'uh!- spotted that IF cans are mentioned several times.... 60MHz (5m) was quite a stretch back then, though a few other posh sets of the era went for it, presumably so that "TV sound" could be included in the advertising blurb. That S3 range would also cover the 11m (26MHz) broadcast band, but it's not mentioned on the scale- when did this band start to be used

[G6Tanuki]

As Arte Johnson would have said, "Vairy Interestink!".

3-gang tuning capacitor and the number of valves would suggest it's got a RF-stage, so it should perform reasonably well - with fewer problems with 'image' reception on frequencies above 10MHz or so [radios with a single signal-frequency tuned-circuit were generally horrible in this respect].

That it includes a LW band would suggest it's not a wholly-US import, as LW wasn't ever used for broadcasting in the 'states.

Looks like it's got a push-pull output stage, so it should be a bit louder than the usual single-6V6/EL33 found in most table-radios.

All in all, a most intriguing radio! I'm thinking it was possibly put together by one of the proliferation of small 1930s/immediately-post-WWII manufacturers in the UK, but clearly with some US expertise [the use of US valves would also suggest a small manufacturer who was able to circumvent the BVA 'resale price maintenance' cartel that inflated the price of valves supplied by UK manufacturers].

[McMurdo]

Never heard of Challenger. I've had a good google and found a company at the same address in Lancaster Gate called 'Degalliers Limited' advertising the 'finest available american cabinets, table, console, and radiograms'.

[winston_1]

Many years ago a friend had a radio with TV sound on it. Problem was it blotted out local TVs when used on the vision frequency. Of course the local oscillator was only 465kHz from the received signal so it radiated within the vision passband.

[AC/HL]

Googling radio model 444 finds a couple of images, but the link is corrupted, so no further on.