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Vintage Radio
By RODNEY CHAMPNESS, VK3UG
Brian Lackie’s Wireless Museum
Many people are enthusiastic about vintage
radios and some amass a huge collection but
few people go on to turn their collection into
a museum. But that’s just what Brian Lackie
of Urunga, NSW did, after collecting vintage
radios over many decades.
B
RIAN LACKIE has been a collector
of early radio paraphernalia since
his early working days. He became
interested in radio when he was in
high school in the 1950s, although he
wasn’t able to pursue this interest until
after he had finished his schooling.
A correspondence course run by the
Australian Radio College in Sydney
helped Brian gain his amateur radio
operator’s ticket (VK2DLM) in 1970.
He became a builder after leaving
school and did radio service in his
spare time. He often worked in the
country, particularly in farming areas.
He was often offered an old radio or
two and remembers once being given
five Atwater Kent receivers.
Collectors were considered a bit odd
in those days. However, he accepted
these offerings and gradually the lower
floor of his home became filled with
multitudinous old radios – obsolete,
unloved and faulty; radios that others
didn’t want.
At that stage, Brian didn’t have any
particular direction in his collection;
he just collected because he liked old
radios and felt he needed to save and
preserve these pieces of our history.
He believed that he was the only one
with this interest and as collectors of
old radios were considered “a bit odd”,
he didn’t advertise his interest widely.
Then he went to an amateur radio field
day and met another collector, Lou Albert of Newcastle. Lou invited Brian to
come and see his collection and having
seen it, Brian was hooked.
He has enthusiastically collected,
restored and retained any item of radio
history he could obtain since that day.
But like most collectors, he didn’t display his “treasures” to advantage. Sets
were stacked everywhere, on top of each
other, jammed tight – there was no room
to even walk around the sets. As well
as radios, he collected publications,
leaflets, servicing equipment, components, valves, electronic novelties and
advertising signs – in fact, anything
that appeared to have anything to do
with our radio heritage.
Establishing the museum
This view shows some of Brian’s early horn and cone speakers. They date
from around 1924 for the horn speakers to around 1928 for the moving-iron
balanced-armature type cone speakers.
98 Silicon Chip
Brian could see that he couldn’t
share his passion for our radio history
if he couldn’t show people what he
was so passionate about. So around
20 years ago he believed he should
move towards establishing a museum
containing the most significant items
within his collection of many hundreds of sets. Time was a problem but
planning went ahead and work started
on a completely separate building on
his property in 2001.
The building took about six months
to bring up to the fitting-out stage. It
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All types of vintage radios are on display, ranging from very early (and very
collectable) sets to later sets. Some of these early radios are now quite rare.
had to have provision for display as
well as a workshop area for restoration work. Facilities were provided to
operate the equipment, like an aerial/
antenna system, an earth leakage protection circuit and for imported radios,
a 115V AC supply using a 240V to 115V
17A power transformer purchased for
the princely sum of $10.
Like most projects it took longer
than expected. It was officially opened
by Lou Albert on the 17th March,
2002.
Touring the museum
An inspection of Brian’s museum
can take hours, because there is just
so much to see. He has an encyclope-
dic knowledge of our radio heritage
so you only have to ask to learn a lot
about individual items or the general
philosophy of radio development.
Only recently, he obtained a large
number of newspaper cuttings from
the era around 1910 concerning Father
Shaw and his radio works. They seem
to paint a different picture of some
of the things that happened in radio/
wireless at that time to what we have
seen in some publications.
A David Jones single valve regenerative receiver, circa
1924. It has three basket-weave, moveable coils and
sold for fifteen pounds ten shillings – a large sum of
money in those days.
siliconchip.com.au
February 2006 99
Also in Brian’s museum is this early PMG sign which
dates from around 1900.
There are many books on various
aspects of vintage radio in the museum
that can be consulted to check that information gleaned from various sources
is correct. As with most subjects, it pays
to get as many publications as practical, so that various statements can be
tested for accuracy.
Interesting signs
Some readers will remember the
enamelled signs that were made early
last century to advertise various products. For example, one of the photos in
this article shows a typical advertising
sign (circa 1900) that was used at post
offices. In those times, trunk line telephone calls were booked in advance
– there were no STD phone calls then.
This enamelled HMV sign dates from around 1925 and is
still in quite good condition.
It may have taken the telephonist an
hour or two to be able to connect you
to the person you wanted to speak to
in the next state and it cost a fortune
compared to phone calls today.
Telegrams were also a fairly quick
method (for the era) of getting a message to people interstate. The message
was handed in at the post office counter and then sent by Morse code to a
post office near where the recipient
lived, where it was typed up and then
delivered by a delivery boy.
Another interesting sign is a goodquality example produced for His
Master’s Voice (HMV) around 1925.
People tended to know organisations
by their signs and HMV was always
known as a quality producer of radio
and record playing equipment. There
was a lot more brand loyalty in those
days.
Radio gear
A beautiful display of polished
horns and slightly later speakers can
be seen on a high shelf. They date from
around 1924 for the horn speakers
to around 1928 for the moving-iron
balanced-armature type cone speakers.
Another photo shows an early Stromberg Carlson 9-valve TRF Model 633
coffin style receiver from 1927 with its
floor standing cone speaker (not complete) in the background. On top of the
receiver is a Browns horn speaker on
the left and a Ferranti on the right, with
a more modern air-cooled transmitter
Fig.1: the Loewe 3NF envelope
contained three triodes, four
resistors and two capacitors.
Right: the Loewe 3NF triple-triode valve, circa 1926. It’s probably one of the
first integrated circuits ever made!
100 Silicon Chip
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The museum features
a good collection of
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transmitting valves, all
displayed in a large
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This rare set is a
Stromberg Carlson
9-valve TRF Model 633,
circa 1927. Its floorstanding cone speaker
(not complete) is in the
background.
valve alongside them. The receiver
even has a meter so that the filament
voltage can be checked.
Also on display is a 1924 “David
Jones” one-valve regenerative receiver.
The price was fifteen pounds ten shillings, a large sum of money in those
days. It has three basket-weave, movable coils which could be moved in
relationship to each other to obtain
best signal input and regeneration
control. It was a very simple set and
featured very neat wiring using square
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Use this handy form
Enclosed is my cheque/money order for
$________ or please debit my
busbar. Listeners in those days didn’t
get much for their money.
There are a variety of other sets on
display, from an early cathedral style
wooden cabinet set to several coffin
cabinet styles, several AWA “Empire
State” receivers from the 1930s, and
many Bakelite and wooden cabinet
sets from the 1940s and early 1950s.
Brian has tended to keep the older
sets on the lower shelves in the museum, with later and smaller sets on
the higher shelves. Quite a number
Bankcard
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February 2006 101
A selection of very early vintage radios and small kitchen (mantel) receivers.
of these sets have not been restored.
It does take a long time to restore
hundreds of sets. One of the sets still
awaiting restoration and display is
Brian’s favourite, a rare Traeger 36/40
Flying Doctor Radio.
A glass case houses Brian’s collection of early receiving valves and a
few transmitting valves. Note the blue
coloured Arcturus valves. Supposedly the colour somehow magically
improved the valve’s performance and
life! Valve design and manufacture
advanced considerably from the time
of the valves in the display.
One extremely interesting valve in
the museum collection is a 1926 Loewe
3NF triple-triode, complete with four
resistors and two capacitors all within
the one rather large envelope, which
measures 160mm in height and 45mm
in diameter. This would have been a
glass-blower’s work of art.
Perhaps this triple-triode valve with
its components could be considered
one of the first integrated circuits ever
made. The supply to the valve consists
of filament current of 0.3A at 4V and
a high tension (HT) supply of 135V.
You may wonder why were three
valves built into the one envelope
when the valves of that time were not
particularly reliable. The reason was
that the German government of the
time taxed radios on the number of
valves used in them. One valve envelope attracted a third of the tax that
three valve envelopes did.
Information on this and other Loewe
valves is contained in the book Saga
of the Vacuum Tube by Gerald F. J.
Tyne, published Howard W. Sams &
Co. Inc, USA.
A receiver of the 1920s using this
valve would have required very little
extra circuitry to make a complete
receiver – see Fig.1. In fact, other than
the power supply, an input tuned circuit and a pair of headphones were all
that was needed as far as the electronics were concerned. If the plate of the
first valve had come out to a terminal
on the valve base it would have been
possible to use regeneration and thus
achieve even better sensitivity from
the receiver.
Summary
Like any museum, nothing remains
completely static as new items become
museum pieces. I had a fascinating and
instructive time being shown through
the museum, seeing equipment and
parts of our radio heritage I didn’t
know about.
Brian Lackie’s Wireless Museum
is at 60 Yellow Rock Road, Urunga
NSW. Phone (02) 6655 6135. It is open
most days from 9.00 AM to 4.00 PM.
Admission is free, to foster interest in
SC
vintage radio.
Photo Gallery: Peter Pan BKM (1948)
Manufactured in 1948 by Eclipse
Radio, South Melbourne, the Peter Pan
BKM was a 4-valve reflex superheterodyne broadcast-band receiver housed
in a modern (for the time) bakelite cabinet. The unit pictured here is housed
in an “amber” cabinet, which was one
of the less common colours used for
these radios.
The valve line-up was as follows:
6A8-G frequency changer; 6B8-G reflexed IF amplifier/first audio amplifier/
detector/AVC rectifier; 6V6-GT audio
output; and 5Y3-GT rectifier.
Photo: Historical Radio Society of
Australia, Inc.
102 Silicon Chip
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