2/25/2015

eudora was unable to update the system registry

If you run Eudora 7 like I do, and windows 7 or later, you may get this error:
"eudora was unable to update the system registry"

here is how I fixed it.

Eudora is trying to see what the default email client is, and may want to change it, even if you tell eudora not to check, it still checks. Windows 7 has severe protection on the registry.

Open Regedit.
navigate to:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\mailto\shell\open\command

If you cannot, you will have to take ownership or give yourself or everyone full control of the shell key and several sub keys. 

you may have to hit f5 or try to create a sub key to get the open and command keys to appear. do not change anything. open eudora and it should no longer give the annoying message. If this does not work do not contact me for further help, it works for me.

1/21/2015

hallicrafters S-40A

A couple of weeks ago I went to a local swap meet that happens on the first Saturday of each month (only in winter), here in Phoenix. It is called the Thieves market. It's kind of a hipsterish, crafter, American pickers type of swap meet, where people bring "antiques" and other stuff you generally don't see at swap meets around here anymore. When we got to the swap meet and were parking I spotted this from the car.

I know it's not anything super neat and special but I figured "what the hey". I asked the guy how much and was shocked when he didn't want an arm and a leg for it.
I bought it, and since it was heavy I took it straight to the car. It even came with a set of Trimm headphones. I won't be able to start working on it for a couple of weeks as I am in the middle of completely redoing my computer/hobby room. But today (after checking it out carefully) decided to take a chance and see if it works. First thing I did was inspect it. I oiled the bearings in the tuner and other parts. I cleaned all the pots, and had to open the power switch and spray deoxit in it as the switch was not making contact.
It's not in this picture but when I opened the top there was a cord inside. Not sure if it was from this radio as it did not match the cord wires coming out the back. I didn't find any cracked or burned resistors. no blown or split capacitors. no sign of anything singed.
I was confused since the operating manual, and sams shows an 80 tube for the rectifier, but the hallicrafters service manual shows a 5y3gt. This one has an 80.

I replaced the power cord.
I brought it up very slowly on my variac with my dim bulb tester. Although it says it can operate between 105-125vac I kept it at 117vac. The lights came on the heaters lit, and nothing... no hum, no buzz, no hiss, nothing... :?

Oh right, ANTENNA! hooked up my random/long wire and there it was AM radio. I went through the bands and kept an eye on the electrolytic cap, and the transformer to see if they were getting warm, but they did not.

So the dang thing works just fine. Not wanting to tempt fate I shut it down after about 15 minutes.

I will start recapping it sometime in the next month.

10/18/2014

Cheap Small Portable Generators

There are many small very cheap 2 cycle portable generators that you can buy. They are sold under several makes and models:
Chicago Electric 66619 from Harbor Freight 800 to 900 watt
Triron 1200
Pulsar PG1202S
PowerPro 56101
TradesPro 836758
ETQ TG1200
Coleman CM04101
And many many more.

Many of these have one thing in common, they are cheap crap/utter turds. They all look pretty much like this:

But these turds can be polished.

If you buy one of the above generators (or one like them), before you start it up I recommend the following:
Replace the spark plug with an Autolite 65, or 64, or an equivalent type spark plug.
Gap the spark plug to between .028 and .031.
Torque the spark plug to 25 foot pounds or 360 inch pounds. The spark plug that comes with them are often cheap junk and not gapped correctly.
Remove the gas tank.
locate every connector that looks like these:
and make sure they are tight, use pliers to pinch them tight if not (the slot end, not the wire end), as they will vibrate off if you do not tighten them.
Inspect the fuel line, if it looks like smooth plastic and possibly has a mold seam, replace it with real fuel line. I would recommend replacing it anyways. Many of these use a plastic fuel line that will swell, split, or deteriorate in a very short time.
replace the fuel line hose clamps with good ones.
remove the fuel valve and replace the gasket pointed to in the picture below with a gasket or washer that holds up to gasoline. The washer installed is plastic and will not last long.
re-assemble the generator, mix up a batch of fuel at 40:1 not 50:1 the extra oil will help with lubrication and should not smoke any more than usual.

Put gas in the tank, wait about 5 minutes for the carburator bowl to fill, and start the engine, with the choke full on, move the choke over to run, and connect a 200 watt load to the generator wait 5 minutes. Using a volt meter check the voltage (under load) it should be 120 volts AC if not adjust the screw in the recess shown in the picture below (the red arrow). If the engine sputters when doing this adjust it as close as you can to 120 volts AC and the engine still runs smooth. let it run for several minutes and monitor the voltage, adjust again if necessary.
The green arrow points to the fuel valve.

Drain the gasoline if the generator will go unused for more than a couple of months. You will have to remove the gas tank and fuel valve to do this. If you do not, the gasoline can turn in to varnish and clog the fuel valve, line, and carburetor. Leave the fuel valve open while it is being stored and the gas cap loose to allow the remaining gasoline to evaporate.

10/09/2014

Raleigh Super Sensitivety All Transistor

Got this one off of someone at www.antiqueradios.com. It is made in South Korea and is from the mid 60's. It runs off of 4 D batteries or an external AC adapter.
It did not work when I got it, I opened it up and found that the wires going to the batteries had broke loose. I re-soldered them and it worked. I changed out all the electrolytic capacitors anyways as they were 50+ years old and some may have been leaking. It has a very long almost 7" ferrite antenna and is quite sensitive. I think it may have been manufactured by Gold Star as the general design is very similar to other radios made by them at that time. Probably OEM'd for some other company. I mostly just like the design.

10/07/2014

RCA 36X

Picked this up at an Arizona Antique Radio Club swap meet. Many of the radios there were priced a bit high but this one was reasonable and had been completely restored.
 It had one major problem, it didn't pick up anything but static and crackled when the tuning knob was moved.
I found that the plates in the tuning capacitor were either slightly corroded, touching, or had tin whiskers. I carefully cleaned the plates with fine grit sand paper, and now it works perfectly. This is now the oldest radio I own circa 1941.

10/04/2014

hallicrafters S-120 Goodwill find

Picked this up recently at Goodwill for very cheap. I cleaned off the hobo sweat. It hummed at power up. I recapped it but it still hummed.
 I did some poking around and found that the floating ground was miss-wired.
It's really just an updated S-38 and performance is about the same.


8/16/2014

Harman Kardon hk 680i


Picked this up Thursday at goodwill. Tested it in store and noted the left channel out.

It's a Harman Kardon hk680i.
Top

Bottom

Got it home, opened it up and did a thorough look through. Did not see anything unusual until I looked at the bottom.
Yes those are 2 traces cut with a dremel tool. I jumpered the cuts but that did not make a difference. The left channel stayed just barely audible. Right was normal. removed the jumpers as this could have been a factory mod or maybe something done after market to fix a problem. There was nothing in the service manual about it.

Some research brought me to a thread on Audiokarma regarding the hk690i and that they have problems with dirty switches and pots. Deoxit did not help, but when I took some of the stereo apart I found a broken wire. Re-soldered that and viola it works. HOWEVER in taking it apart I broke the memory presets led circuit board that a previous owner had already broke and "fixed".

Re-soldered that and put it back together but now it has a new problem. It randomly looses lock on station goes to static and the tuner display does random stuff. I will maybe try and figure out whats wrong with it later. Definitely can't sell it as working. It sounds good contrary to some reviews on Audiokarma of it "sounding thin".


I later removed the memory presets LED board and the stereo works just fine but there is no LED indication as to which preset is selected. big deal.

This stereo has some interesting features.
An adjustable FM muting pot on the back, and a stereo separation adjustment labeled "Blend" that goes from Mono to Stereo. Kind weird to see on a stereo from the early eighties. I would expect it on something from the MPX days of the 60's.