[ARC5] BC sets and others.

[Robert Eleazer]

I have two of the BC band sets, both of which are in pretty good shape, only a couple of extra holes drilled in the case on one.  One is missing its BFO coil and I think I'll order one for it from Fair Radio.  And of course I have that extra BC band tuning dial as well as some spare 239 KHZ IF transformers from another BC set that someone had hacked up and added a transformer and power supply - I turned it on only one time and it started smoking, so that was the end of that.

I have found two different BC band conversions for BC-453's.  One tells you how to modify all the coils, including the IF transformers (but not the BFO).  The other just has you modify the RF section coils and leave the 85 KHZ IF alone - I wonder how the image rejection is on that one.

Geoff:  

Yes, in general, it seems that automobile radios of any era are head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd. Making even a decent AM BCB radio seems to be a lost art and making a really good one is almost unheard of.  My NC-190 is far better than anything you are likely to find in that regard, but of course it uses an external antenna.  Especially disturbing is the slapdash dial calibration on so many of them.

I wonder though, why was 262 KHZ  chosen for the older automobile radio IF's?  Somewhere lost in all my junk is a 262 KHZ transistorized AM radio IF; I would imagine those are especially rare. 

Wayne