Victor Borgia II from San Diego
Posted: Tue Jan 22, 2013 7:29 pm
Hi all,
I picked this machine up last weekend at a really good price as the seller needed to get the machine out of his home as he was moving. A little history on this machine from him is that his family is the original owner and it has been with them since 1926. First his grandparents bought the machine and had it shipped to California. When they passed away, the machine stayed with his aunt until 30 years ago when he took possession of it. He was not a collector and didn't know much about the machine except that it did work. I tried the radio section and we tuned in a couple of stations.
The finish, veneer, external pot metal parts and plating on the machine is in real good shape and it looks like it was well taken care of. The only thing that I found wrong with it initially was that the speed control did not seem to have any effect on the turntable speed. I checked the governor and found that the speed indicator pad was stuck in position at a very low speed. Cleaned it up and the unit played very well and I was very happy to find that it had a brass reproducer on the unit.
Well, I opened it up to check the internals and found that a 50's type 5 tube radio chassis had been installed next to the original tube radio. They removed one of the variable condenser tuning assemblies to fit it in and installed a 12 inch speaker into the horn (explains why the grille cloth color looked off) The rest of the power amp and radio are there so I might try to find a parts chassis from another Radiola 28 and see if I can get the original radio and horn speaker working. It looks like the work was done nicely as they placed some gearing on the tuning condenser plates and drove the new radio condenser plates making the unit appear to be functional. It looks like from the wiring they used that it was done some time in the 60-70s.
The last thing I checked was the pot metal under the hood and found that the record - radio selector switch that rotates a mechanical valve to allow sound from the reproducer or the speaker was broken and the gearing removed if it is gearing. If anyone else has a picture of what this section looks like, please send it to me so I can start to repair this one.
I am not sure if the electric pickup works yet but I will find out after I get the original power amp working again.
Brandt
link to more pics
http://s1179.beta.photobucket.com/user/ ... Phonograph
I picked this machine up last weekend at a really good price as the seller needed to get the machine out of his home as he was moving. A little history on this machine from him is that his family is the original owner and it has been with them since 1926. First his grandparents bought the machine and had it shipped to California. When they passed away, the machine stayed with his aunt until 30 years ago when he took possession of it. He was not a collector and didn't know much about the machine except that it did work. I tried the radio section and we tuned in a couple of stations.
The finish, veneer, external pot metal parts and plating on the machine is in real good shape and it looks like it was well taken care of. The only thing that I found wrong with it initially was that the speed control did not seem to have any effect on the turntable speed. I checked the governor and found that the speed indicator pad was stuck in position at a very low speed. Cleaned it up and the unit played very well and I was very happy to find that it had a brass reproducer on the unit.
Well, I opened it up to check the internals and found that a 50's type 5 tube radio chassis had been installed next to the original tube radio. They removed one of the variable condenser tuning assemblies to fit it in and installed a 12 inch speaker into the horn (explains why the grille cloth color looked off) The rest of the power amp and radio are there so I might try to find a parts chassis from another Radiola 28 and see if I can get the original radio and horn speaker working. It looks like the work was done nicely as they placed some gearing on the tuning condenser plates and drove the new radio condenser plates making the unit appear to be functional. It looks like from the wiring they used that it was done some time in the 60-70s.
The last thing I checked was the pot metal under the hood and found that the record - radio selector switch that rotates a mechanical valve to allow sound from the reproducer or the speaker was broken and the gearing removed if it is gearing. If anyone else has a picture of what this section looks like, please send it to me so I can start to repair this one.
I am not sure if the electric pickup works yet but I will find out after I get the original power amp working again.
Brandt
link to more pics
http://s1179.beta.photobucket.com/user/ ... Phonograph