Bygone radio traders

[stevehertz]

Originally Posted by G4XWDJim

Would that have been Stan Willetts in his second shop?

Wasn't Stan Willets in Hurst St in the centre of Brum?

[m0cemdave]

Originally Posted by Reelman

Anyone remember the small surplus shop just off Mount Pleasant in Liverpool?

Take a look at post No.22 in this thread, it may be one I mentioned there.

[Reelman]

M0cemdave,
That indeed sounds like the one I remember in Liverpool. You also mention Rogers in Southport, many happy hours spent there, actually was Nelson street. A friend's mother told me off for trying to persuade her son to buy an 18 Set there for £2! Would have been a good investment.

There was also "Jak's"? in Wesley Street, no components but had all the Sinclair kit, aircraft band converters etc.

Peter.

[Alan Stepney]

I was in Bognor Regis yesterday and saw that "Spindlers" has closed down.
It may not mean much to some people, but they used to sell a wide range of radio and electronics parts, before concentrating on domestic appliances and latterly, plumbing and then double-glazing products.

As an aside, for anyone visiting that area, the Bognor Regis museum has a good display of vintage radios and TV's

[MrElectronicman]

Originally Posted by Sparky67

The grey cells are stirring. I also recall visiting an ex-WD shop on a street corner along the A41 Holyhead Rd, on the right about a mile towards Birmingham from West Brom.
Great fun for a 15-year-old with some pocket money and a bike !!

I too remember that place, I had some pocket money, but no bike, so I took the Bus, got some strange looks from the passengers sometimes.

[Dave757]

Originally Posted by stevehertz

Wasn't Stan Willets in Hurst St in the centre of Brum?

Hi Steve,

I only remember Stan Willetts shop in West Bromwich. I worked in Dartmouth Square at the end of the 1980's, and Willetts was on the road back to the
M5 Jct 1, on the left hand side.(I can never remember the name of the road!).

Shops in Hurst St were The Radiocentre next to the Australian Bar on the corner of Bromsgrove St, Matthews Electronics was opposite the Radiocentre, but was mainly selling group amplifiers and associated equipment, and Norman Field had two shops, one on the same side as the Radiocentre and with similar lines, and the other one on the other side od the road near to the Locarno which specialised in HiFi equipment This was
in the 1960s.

Kind regards

Dave

[stevehertz]

Righto. I remember Norman H Field the hi-fi shop you refer to, as in the 70s I used to go to Brum (30m) and visit them to buy styli, cheap condenser mics by Eagle, cassette cleaning gizmos and all that sort of audio accessories paraphernalia. I don't recall any of their names but I can picture all of the guys who worked there - and they knew their stuff for sure. A far cry from now when in general they know very little about 'the science' of audio/video, only how much an extra 3 years guarantee will cost you cos they get a bonus on it. Those guys in Norman H Field could explain everything to you, even though they came over a little dour and seemingly jaded with the job. Probably low paid, highly intelligent guys. That'd do it.

[Sparky67]

Originally Posted by Dave757

I worked in Dartmouth Square at the end of the 1980's, and Willetts was on the road back to the M5 Jct 1, on the left hand side

I believe that's still called High Street way past Dartmouth Square right up to the M5 Dave. Did Stan Willetts' have a shop in New Street as well, possibly his original premises? I used to buy horribly expensive transistors and resistors and stuff from them in the late 1960's. Couldn't afford their transformers so they had to be salvaged. There is a Stan Willetts electrical and hardware shop shown on the web in Queen's Square - lots of changes recently but may still be there. Martin

[turretslug]

I also recall the mentioned R+TVC in Acton, I sometimes used to drop in in the mid-eighties to see what surplus junk, sorry useful bits and pieces, would tempt my money from my wallet. My best find was 4x Mullard LP1401 stereo decoder modules for £1- they obviously had a large stack that wasn't shifting as they'd been advertised for 2 for £1 previously. I had a very nice condition mono Troughline and I thought, heck, got to be worth a try. The spec sheet was promising, a bit of input/output buffering/interfacing, job done and still in use- it was complimented on sound quality by "golden eared" friends. A bit of level-shifting drives a lens-ended neon for stereo indication- I couldn't stomach the thought of an LED with a valve tuner! They also had quite a lot of other Mullard modules- I wish I'd aquired a few others for the R707 scene, etc.- hindsight, eh...

I rather miss this type of shop generally- the stock was invariably random and ephemeral but one could sometimes score a steal- say ceramic tag strips, nice quality valve-holders, wire-wound resistors, big, non-polarised HV capacitors say, all priced on a "lets just clear them out" basis. Ex-MOD and industrial control panels were a goldmine- quality switches, fittings and bundles of useful wiring at scrap prices.

[Sparky67]

Another dealer I should have visited more often was Sheppards Surplus just outside Leominster - them with the tatty Supermarine Swift in the car park (a snip at £500,000 once on eBay apparently). Last time I was there it had become a country clothing and eqpt outlet. The time before there were WW2 RAF radios in amongst the other surplus gear outside in the back yard, all quietly mouldering away in the British weather...

Martin

[Dave757]

Originally Posted by Sparky67

I believe that's still called High Street way past Dartmouth Square right up to the M5 Dave. Did Stan Willetts' have a shop in New Street as well, possibly his original premises?

Hi Martin,

Yes, of course it was the High Street, - my memory's playing tricks with me!
I only worked in West Brom for a couple of years, and I don't remember any other of his shops.

Kind regards

Dave

[HT Spark]

When I first got to know Stan his shop was down Spon Lane, this shop was demolished in the mid 60's. Him and another electrical shop, Tommy Bibb, both moved into the upper high street.

Much later in the 1990's Stan moved to the precinct, they were all a good bunch. Stan used to sell 19 sets for 60 shillings minus the 807, that was an extra
12 bob. I brought a VCR139A of Tom for my first scope.

Both have now sadly gone.

[Nicklyons2]

A sad addendum to my earlier post#27 re M&B radio in Leeds. I found out only yesterday Brian, who was the owner, driving force and a great character passed away a few years back. After I left Leeds we sort of lost touch, sadly, but whilst in Leeds on another errand to collect radios from Brunel I set off to find his old warehouse. It is now a military surplus place (incl some military radio gear) but, fortunately, the new owners had known Brian and passed on the sad news.

[Radio Wrangler]

That's a pity, I used to call in regularly at M&B as a student on my way home via Leeds station and remember Brian well. I used to drop off the odd HP catalogue in later years.
I think the other guy who worked for him (usually in a white labcoat) was Tom Stafford?

There are still plenty of bits in the attic that came from M&B

David

[Nicklyons2]

David, if it was in the early 1970s I may well have served you, I occasionally helped out in the shop. 'Tom' was indeed the man in the lab coat; always known as Tom his real name was Terry Leeman. I haven't seen Terry for years, he was a radio ham with callsign G4BUU if my memory serves. Perhaps any of you out there who are hams could tell me if he is still around.

In fond memory of M&B and all concerned here are a couple of business cards of the time the first 'posh' one is earliest c.1970 the utility one followed c.1974

[Radio Wrangler]

Hi Nick. It's a small world.

I used to wander by some weekday mornings, some evenings depending on timetable 1972 to 1976. I used to go into the station through the side door and flash my bullseye ticket then hurl myself onto a departing DMU. It took some doing to drag myself away from the goodies in M&B's cave. Once I didn't notice a platform change and went to wakefield.

For definite ID, there's a period mugshot of me in the Hewlett-Packard Journal April 1982. Hair was a bit longer in the early 70's. My nephew and niece found a school photo and had a merry time laughing..."Uncle David looked like Harry Potter" Oh well...

David

[Radio Wrangler]

Photos don't seem to be attachable to PMs so here goes!
My hair was a bit longer than this when I visited M&B regularly

I don't look like this any longer. The wild hair still puts me in the Ken Dodd/ Albert Einstein league though


David

[MotorBikeLes]

Stan Willets, #306 et al. I got to know him mid to late '80s. He had a load of Grundig accessories, and I agreed to buy them for £1. Problem was it took 2 journeys (Granada estate) to get it all home. I probably sold about £20 worth, used black chipboard HiFi cabinet "add ons" to make TV stands, saved about 100 leather straps of early cassette recorder cases (later sold at 50p each) and had the biggest, "blackest smoky" bonfire of what was left. He visited me one day with a Grundig stereo 2X4 (video 2000) VCR. It was the German market version with the full UHF stereo receive/record system, but no good for UK use. The UK stereo version had all the "off air" decoder bits missing, and he wanted me to modify it for sale in his shop. I had (still have) the full Grundig Microfiche service info so the German circuit was to hand, and I worked out which bits of circuit needed to be disabled/by-passed, then which cores needed adjusting to get the sound right. For one, I unsoldered the can's mounting lugs, unscrewed the core with solder still molten a couple of extra turns, then it could be tuned in. (My Phillips 5519 could output 5.5 sound, but it was easier to receive German satelite TV). Probably 6MHz fiters as well.

I was hoping to do a batch for him, but he wanted me to provide a mugs guide for his engineers so they could do it. (Not suggesting his engineers were mugs, but I had the circuits and the time). He understood the situation, and a fair price was negotiated, and he went away, converted and sold them, no doubt for a decent margin. When he visited, he always wore a dark suit, so we used to refer to him as The Undertaker, a career I am sure he could have managed. I liked him.
Les.

[Backtoreality]

Originally Posted by Focus Diode

Sadly Aitken Brothers are no longer with us, at least at their High Bridge premesis. I had a look for it back in March on a rare visit to Newcastle City Centre only to find it no longer there. Don't know when it closed.

I spent many happy hours in Aitken Brothers from 1969 to 1987 buying the components for various PE and EE projects starting with a couple of OC71s and the passive components to make an audio multivibrator. In the early 1970s I went in and asked the taller of the two brothers if they had two EF50s which I needed for a "Sensitive Two Valver" described in one of my dad's old 1954 (I think) PW magazines. He said he'd have a look in the basement and after quite a while returned with two boxed VR91s. I enquired how much they'd be and he looked at the price marked at 10/-. He looked at me and the price a few times (I was about 13-14) and said "Well they say 10 shillings so that's 50p each. We'll call it a pound for the pair." I went home happy with my purchase not realising that it would take until the early 1990s before I would get the B9g sockets for the valves.
I still have the magazine valves, sockets and now I have the passive components too but I still haven't built the radio! Wish I'd bought the mains and output transformers that I still need.......
I think they closed sometime in the 2000s selling mainly disco stuff as mentioned in the earlier post.
David

[Backtoreality]

Having just read through all 16 pages of posts I can't remember any mention of Modern Radio in Bolton. My youngest son has been at Bolton Uni for the last 3 years and the shop frontcaught my eye when he started but it was only in July that I actually managed to get in there. Yes it is still open!

When I entered it was like walking back in time. A counter with adverts for Roberts radios on the front, loads of component labelled drawers behind and "out the back" storage. When my turn came I asked Suzanne if they had an OC 45 transistor. She asked the other lady who came over and got a drawer out and searched through their stock of old transistors. I spent over an hour looking through components, chatting to the two really friendly ladies and left the store with a collection of NOS transistors, B7g valve holders, chokes, potentiometers etc. FYI the OC 45 transistor was the only one they had and cost me £1 " for the cheek of asking"

They do have a website and a presence on ebay but I suggest if any of you get the chance to go to Bolton you must call in to the shop. It's an absolute pleasure! http://modernradio.co.uk/
David