Newbie with an 800B

[Day Radebaugh]

Hello:

I'm Day Radebaugh from El Dorado, Kansas, and was happy to find this site.  30 years ago, when I was a starving student, I lived in a house in Baltimore that was in the process of being sold.  They had an old Scott console (with a phonograph, as i recall) which i bought for $5.  I couldn't keep the cabinet, but kept all but the phonograph.  It's been stored inside ever since.

So now I'd like to have it restored, and I would build a new console to contain it.  Do you have any suggestions about how to proceed?  Anyone you know of who could tackle a functional restoration of this unit?

Thanks for your help.

Day Radebaugh

[David C. Poland]

Depending on the cabinet, the amp/power supply sat behind the speaker or to one side of the speaker..

[Dave]

Here's close for you in the Braemer "behind bars"

Day Radebaugh said:

Getting ready to have a cabinet built for my refurbed 800B.  It will have one horizontal shelf, on which the tuner will sit.  Below that, I'll put the speaker.  Because of room, I'd like to install the amplifier section a bit below and behind the speaker magnet in its own little cubbyhole.

Does anyone know why the amp couldn't live within, let's say, 6" of that honking big magnet?

Thanks

[Day Radebaugh]

Thanks very much.  I'm looking forward to housing this unit in my music room, and will post a picture when done.

[Day Radebaugh]

Moving forward on building a cabinet for my 800B.  I have mocked up a configuration, using old scrap wood, so that I can get the unit up in my music room and operating.

My current plan has been devised to reduce the overall height of the unit to satisfy some decorating criteria.  Thus I have the speaker at the very bottom of the proposed cabinet, pointing forward into the room.  The amp will be sideways, behind the speaker.  The tuner unit will be stacked on a little shelf, just above the amp, and also pointing sideways.  If the speaker points North, then the tuner controls face East, and the long axis of the amp runs West-East.

Would there be any issues of RFI or magnetic interference with such a setup?  I see in the pix of original 800Bs that the amp sort of just sits willy-nilly behind the speaker, so it didn't appear that there would be problems.  How much cooling space would be required above the amp?

What makes this a challenge is the enormous voice coil of the speaker.  Is there a shallower speaker that can be substituted?

A pic of my speaker is attached.

Thanks

Day Radebaugh said:

Thanks very much.  I'm looking forward to housing this unit in my music room, and will post a picture when done.

[David C. Poland]

Recommend you use the original speaker (usually a custom teal color Jensen, but there were others supplied by Scott during the production run.)  Finding a proper substitute is no slam dunk !!

Consider these points

-The Scott speaker has  field coil - part of the high voltage circuit. That field coil  provides a specific resistance and wattage requirement for the radio to operate correctly. (Late production had a power resistor instead of a field coil under the bell cover)

- the speaker is coaxial, but the tweeter functions only on FM (& maybe phono) by complicated switching.

- The Scott coax speaker is designed to handle 6L6 output tube's high volume capability.

- The output transformer on the amp properly matches the 6L6's to the speaker voice coil impedance.

- the speaker plug includes a jumper to forward AC power to the power on/off relay.

[Day Radebaugh]

I believe I'll stay with the old speaker.  

I have the unit up in the music room, and operating, listening to the local FM station.  It's coming in fine, although the volume control is quite noisy.  Once you get it to the volume you want, the volume control is quiet, but there's a hum coming from the unit, which I take to be just "old radio".

There's a slight smell coming from the unit, which is probably hot dust, and doesn't appear to be getting worse.

Attaching pictures of my setup which I just cobbled together with old wood, to get a sense of how it runs in the room, and how I can configure it.  It will give you guys a very good laugh, but it has been a worthwhile exercise, to test drive this unit.

This is pretty exciting, and I appreciate your help.  Any suggestions on the noisy volume control?

Day

David C. Poland said:

Recommend you use the original speaker (usually a custom teal color Jensen, but there were others supplied by Scott during the production run.)  Finding a proper substitute is no slam dunk !!

Consider these points

-The Scott speaker has  field coil - part of the high voltage circuit. That field coil  provides a specific resistance and wattage requirement for the radio to operate correctly. (Late production had a power resistor instead of a field coil under the bell cover)

- the speaker is coaxial, but the tweeter functions only on FM (& maybe phono) by complicated switching.

- The Scott coax speaker is designed to handle 6L6 output tube's high volume capability.

- The output transformer on the amp properly matches the 6L6's to the speaker voice coil impedance.

- the speaker plug includes a jumper to forward AC power to the power on/off relay.

[Day Radebaugh]

Quick update:  I tuned the unit a bit more carefully, and the hum disappeared.  I must say that I'm well impressed by the sound of this radio, about 70 yrs. old.  I didn't perform that well when I was 70.

As you saw by the pix, this setup doesn't have a high wifely acceptance factor.

[Dave]

6364E16E-F589-47EA-899D-3AC44EC020A8.jpeg

This is my custom cabinet. At minimum bottom of speaker should be 6” off floor. So your cabinet is now 21” tall. Construct a shelf of sorts so that amp resides just behind speaker. If you make cabinet deeper front to back, the amp could sit right off the floor. Your total height will be 21” plus tuner with at minimum 1” clearance under a 3/4” top. This brings you to the common 34” cabinet height. Otherwise I’d use one metric, the 6” the speaker really needs to be off the floor. Then you make cabinet longer to house the tuner and keep the cabinet basically 21” high and obviously longer than otherwise necessary.

As David said, don’t change the driver.

[Day Radebaugh]

Dave:

I've looked at your cabinet over these past months, and I think it's particularly well done.  Thanks for the suggestions.

Day

Dave said:

6364E16E-F589-47EA-899D-3AC44EC020A8.jpeg

This is my custom cabinet. At minimum bottom of speaker should be 6” off floor. So your cabinet is now 21” tall. Construct a shelf of sorts so that amp resides just behind speaker. If you make cabinet deeper front to back, the amp could sit right off the floor. Your total height will be 21” plus tuner with at minimum 1” clearance under a 3/4” top. This brings you to the common 34” cabinet height. Otherwise I’d use one metric, the 6” the speaker really needs to be off the floor. Then you make cabinet longer to house the tuner and keep the cabinet basically 21” high and obviously longer than otherwise necessary.

As David said, don’t change the driver.

[Dave]

6E06AD6A-0C86-44E4-B032-5393426A05FA.jpeg

Day, for your perspective, I mounted amp from previous pictures, below in the cabinet. A German Radio now resides atop. Perhaps you have something to display that would justify 34” in cabinet height.

Have you had Radio electrics restored ? If not, it would be on “borrowed time”, and that could end anytime.

Dave

[Day Radebaugh]

Trying to keep the height to a minimum, thus the odd configuration, and I think I can achieve that as I've set it up. Radio was restored by Kevin Frattalone and Tom Anderson at Antique Sounds.  

Are you buried in snow there in Traverse?

[Dave]

Actually we could use more snow. I prefer it over kicking sand and playing bingo in Southern climes. More time for electronics !