Hacker Ranger RP 70 Radio

[SteveCG]

I've just got one of these but it does not have a battery inside it (Phew, no corrosion !). I can see from the battery compartment it is one of those now obsolete types, but is it a 6 Volt or a 9 Volt one? - that is my question.

[ms660]

PP9.

Lawrence.

[ukcol]

... and the PP9 can still be found without too much difficulty.

[SteveCG]

Thanks Gents.

[SteveCG]

An update:

Tried the radio on 9V. AF stages work, the Local Oscillator works, but no trace of any IF noise with the volume turned fully up.

The set uses Lokfit transistors, so it could be a faulty IF transistor - although a prod around with an Avo seemed to show the transistor biassed on as one would expect.

The other possibility is an open circuit detector diode - however this must be inside the rectangular IF can. Unfortunately for me I don't have the circuit diagram - guess who does not have the 77/78 Radio-TV servicing book - so I can't tell whether I can externally parallel a good diode without trying to remove the IF can (something that does not look easy to do without damaging it).

Perhaps a kind soul could look up the IF can pinout and help me please?

[ukcol]

An instant download of the manufacturer's data is available here:

http://www.service-data.com/section..../1/rp70-ranger

your £1.99 goes toward the cost of running this forum.

[SteveCG]

A further update:

A modulated 470 kc/s sign gen proved that the detector and IF stage were actually working. A revisit to the mixer? BF194 transistor voltages revealed an issue which was that the 220 Ohm collector resistor was open circuit - it had a hair-line crack (which required a magnifying glass to see it) and indeed it fell apart when soldering a test resistor across it. The radio now works...

I have read that this was one of the last models to be made by Hacker and is regarded as a paired down 'basic' model. How do others rate it?

[paulsherwin]

It's a very basic MW/LW set from the late 70s, a time when any radio with pretensions to quality would have FM. There was still a predominantly elderly audience who had never come to terms with FM at that time though, and they trusted the Hacker name and would pay a premium for it. Roberts made similar AM only radios for the same market: http://www.radiomuseum.org/r/roberts_rambler.html

As you've found, there are lots of lovely Lockfit transistors inside, though these are easy enough to change if necessary.

[Paul_RK]

Originally Posted by paulsherwin

It's a very basic MW/LW set from the late 70s, a time when any radio with pretensions to quality would have FM. There was still a predominantly elderly audience who had never come to terms with FM at that time though, and they trusted the Hacker name and would pay a premium for it.

I take in some respects a contrary view - FM necessitates a telescopic aerial and so is more or less useless on a portable radio when it's actually being carried, and from Hacker's publicity material, and the inclusion among early options of a version with a colourful webbing shoulder strap, the intention seems to have been to reach out toward a younger market. The early dropping of the strap option may signify that they didn't have much success.

I'd not call a nine transistor radio "very basic", in build quality terms it hardly differs from other Hacker models of the period, and as such it seems to me a fair attempt at marketing a well-made smaller portable radio at an affordable price. It is the smallest radio Hacker ever made, though, and that imposes limitations on audio performance.

The Ranger began as a Hacker Radio Ltd. set, continued in production through Hacker Sound days at Maidenhead, and then went on to be built at Bournemouth. Interestingly its circuit board was used in the last days there for the RP82 Herald, which had a cabinet (shared with the Consort) almost the size of a Hunter. At least four different 'speaker types were used during the production run, first a 5" Audax which required part of the base board to be cut away, then a 4" Goodmans with much the largest magnet of the lot, and later a 4" Audax and an anonymous 4" unit. There's not much difference otherwise between the generations of Rangers, though perhaps quality slipped a little as time went by: early sets, for instance, use a brass tuning spindle and bush, later ones a plastic spindle which leans visibly in the direction the cord pulls it.

The Lockfits are indeed proving a bit of a liability, but the vast majority saw out their first thirty years or so without trouble, and Hacker like any other manufacturer might have settled for that.

Paul

[paulsherwin]

I didn't mean to imply that the Ranger is in any way substandard, simply that it was made for a particular demographic. It has a lot of transistors in the AF amp, but this just reflects the general move away from transformer coupled designs and the falling cost of transistors. Lockfit was just the standard Si encapsulation at that time and most manufacturers used it.

I don't think you're right that Hacker and Roberts were targeting the youth market with their 70s AM only models - if they were, they were absolutely bonkers. The ILR stations had launched in the previous decade and these were predominantly FM services, though many were still simulcasting on MW at the time.

[Paul_RK]

Bonkers? I don't know, perhaps a little misguided...

[paulsherwin]

Interesting. I was in my teens and 20s in the 70s, and I wouldn't have been seen dead with a Hacker or Roberts set at that time. Their image was very much of a radio which your fuddy duddy maiden aunt might buy, used left permanently tuned to Radio 4 LW (or the Home Service as they probably still called it). My friends cared about music and always tried to listen to FM stations - I remember everyone looking forward to the rollout of the R1 dedicated FM network.

Young people bought Japanese sets, sometimes Philips/Pye or Grundig, or Hong Kong no-brands if they were hard up. Hacker and Roberts weren't on the radar.

[Paul_RK]

I wasn't far removed in age, acquired my first Mini-Herald second-hand when I was ten, and was quite dismayed at the change of style from Sovereign II to Sovereign III... ah well. Didn't particularly aspire to a Ranger, I had a Sov. II by then, and I can't say I noticed any owned by friends either. Cricket enthusiasts brought pocket radios to school, those of us into popular music mostly just listened to John Peel at night and/or Alan Freeman on Saturday afternoons, then an all-male grammar school out in the sticks hardly provided a full cross-section of the nation's youth.

Financial troubles were already severe at Hacker when the Ranger appeared, so perhaps it was a more or less desperate attempt to increase affordability and widen the market to increase sales, and with hindsight it didn't work nearly so well as Roberts' cost-cutting measures and diversification into imported products.

Paul

I'm glad it works now, a handsome set. I was born in 1960 and would have loved one of these when a teenager, mind you I did listen to Radio 4 even then! All I could afford where 10 year old Hong Kong specials (usually free) some had FM, handy (and OT) hint never tune the IF of an FM radio by ear.

[ms660]

The royal appointment logo in the ad might be to attract a certain type.

Lawrence.

[SteveCG]

For your interest:

Mine is the model with the blue finish and the strap as seen in Paul_RK's attached thumbnail. Somebody in the past has cut the strap - rather clumsily in my opinion - back and it is quite faded. When I first saw that I thought the bodger had been present, however looking inside I saw the way the strap was 'manufacturers' mounted - and also its original vivid colours. Yes, it has the royal appointment logo as well. It has a Goodmans loudspeaker whose large magnet made getting the pcb out not the easiest of things to do.

[SteveCG]

Further info:

It has a brass tuning spindle, which is not vertical and has not been judging by the wear pattern of the tuning knob on the scale.

Its serial number is 33287, with the address for Hacker being given as Maidenhead.

On listening to it more carefully it has some audible distortion whose cause I'll have to track down at a later date as I'm moving onto another backlogged problem !!