[R-390] FRR-59/URR

[Francesco Ledda]

Ditto.  My WRR2 has not failed since 1986! My FRR59 has not failed since
1992.  Not bad!

-----Original Message-----
From: r-390-bounces at mailman.qth.net
[mailto:r-390-bounces at mailman.qth.net]On Behalf Of Keith Densmore
Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 8:50 AM
To: Craig Anderson Ext 1365; r-390 at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [R-390] FRR-59/URR


Having owned and refurbished 4 of these critters over the last 30 years,
I partly agree with Craig, and partly disagree.
They are definetely not for the faint of heart, to service
properly they must be bolted down. Once that is done
however, the drawers swing out, seperate,  and  tilt for easy
servicing. The trick with doing a repair on a radio of this
nature is isolating the faulty section. Same applies to any
complex radio, R-390's  included. Once the section is
isolated repair is straightforward. Front end alignment is
easy to do on these sets.
Once repaired and aligned, I have never heard a better
sounding SSB radio.
Like all sets, they do have some weaknesses too but when
you weigh in the quality of construction, these are beautiful sets, if you
have the room for them.
IMHO.
BTW, the set on ebay that sparked this discussion is mine.
I did the original repair and alignment about 20 years ago
and it has not failed once in that time.

73,
Keith
----- Original Message -----
From: Craig Anderson Ext 1365 <Craig.Anderson at saintpaul.edu>
To: <r-390 at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Tuesday, February 20, 2007 8:54 AM
Subject: [R-390] FRR-59/URR


I actually owned two of these behemoths back in the late 80's.  One of
which I purchased from Rick Mish at Miltronix.  The FRR-59 makes the
R-390A look like a crystal radio in its complexity since it uses 64
tubes and uses a tube based frequency synthesizer.  Trying to get the
thing to work was a nightmare.  The documentation is hard to get and the
thing is so big that it is difficulty to work on.  It is not a
particularly good radio anyway.  I think this was the contract that
finally killed National.  I talked to an ex-Navy technician who had
worked on these and he was not impressed.  Their reliability was less
than stellar.  No comparison to the R-390A or R-1051.  The two best days
of my life...the day I acquired and FRR-59 and the day I finally sold
them both!



W9CLA



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