Best find or buy

[photoman125]

Back in the very early 90's I would often go round clearing workshops of retired tv engineers( for hobby only not profit), this was prior to everyone having pcs so word of mouth was via an advert in Television magazine.

I had a 'phone call offering me a 1950s TV and some valves FOC. The address turned out to be an old mill, they slid the doors open and there was a treasure trove, a large Philips projection set, boxes upon boxes of valves, circuits, radios. Luckily I had borrowed a large twin axle trailer, I ended up with that full to overflowing, the car full in every space possible, test gear everything.

Sadly just before we moved I had a major health problem and everything went, I won't tell you how little they went for. I would give my hind teeth to be doing it again but the price of petrol and the demise of Television magazine, not to mention things being sold on Ebay it's something that wouldn't happen nowdays.

We often travelled round the country, caravan in tow often returning loaded to the rafters, I made a lot of friends, many no longer with us. Some must have thought it strange that a youngish married man would choose to restore old radios that were around long before he was born

So what was your best find or bargain buy?

[Paul Adams]

Probably my best bargain buy was at a local car boot, where upon I purchased a Hameg HM205-2 scope, leads and case for just £10.00 and an AVO M2005 multimeter for just £1.00 all from the same seller.

I did think at the time that these items were probably not going to work when I got them home, but when I did I had the delightful surprise of finding out that they both worked flawlessly.

And most recently at another car boot, an AVO 8 mk 5, with just corrosion in the battery compartment, now sorted and all working for a mere £1.00.

Paul.

[robjkmannering]

Car boots tend to yield the best finds for me. Over the last few months I have found-
Hacker RP25 £1, about 20 Roberts sets from Rambler, RIC 1 and 2, R505s, R600s, RFM3s total £14 spend, KB Lyric, Bush Longplayer, Emerson 888, Dynatron Tourist, Dynatron Nomad and many others for £1 to £2 each.

I also found a Pioneer ER420 valve FM tuner amp (£6) and about 300 NOS polystyrene caps, some gold plated test pins, assorted valves. The list goes on!

My wife despairs but the profits have paid for half a holiday.

Rob

[Nickthedentist]

Mint Garrard 301 in box. 50p at the Scouts jumble sale in Merton Park near Wimbledon.

That was in about 1988. I didn't buy it, and forked out £2 for an SP25/IV instead

[chipp1968]

Back in the mid 80's I had the urge to cycle to the local junk shop. There was a round Ekco there £16! I dropped my money all over the floor I was so hasty to remove it from my pocket. I had to persuade my Dad to pick it up later for me. It had no knobs, but then I found they were inside.

[Outrun_uk]

Good condition Sony F1 with (sadly unrecoverable) tuner/timer unit and battery charger unit for £5 at a car boot. Working initially but has what looks like a capstan lock fault now.
Related to my videogame hobby, a mint condition copy of Radiant Silvergun (rare Japanese game on the Sega Saturn) for £1.49 from Cash Generator, never known luck like that since!

[gingpeakin]

I found a Polish OP3 radio

http://www.vq5x79.f2s.com/greenradio/Mil_Wireless.html

in a house clearance shop in Colliers Wood in the 90's. They didn't think it worked so I got it for a pound.

I got this for 2 quid as well - don't know much about it but it's got a pair of PEN 45s in the output stage.

Ging

PS sadly the shop has now closed

[Station X]

A Trio/Kenwood R-1000 Receiver FOC from Freecycle. As is common with these receivers, the display driver chip was faulty. I managed to buy one before they became unobtainable.

[barretter]

A pair of Chartwell 15ohm LS3/5as on the local flea market for £30. The previous owner had soldered his speaker leads to the input terminals so they had to be replaced and the boxes were a little worse for wear, but they work absolutely fine and the crossovers are original and in mint condition.

[arjoll]

Dare I mention 5x Garrard 401s and 2x SME3009s free 4 years ago when RBG were clearing out their stores in Christchurch? The 401's are a bit rough and I haven't had time to do anything with them, but I'm hoping to get at least two good turntables out of the haul (one for me, one for dad to play some old 78's).

Second place is probably my Apple haul from 2010 after the Darfield earthquake. I heard through some contacts about a guy who had an Apple IIe to get rid of. Turned out to be 2x Apple IIe, one of them with an RGB card, Apple IIc, a couple of Uni Drives, a Drive II, generic floppy, Monitor, a generic green monitor, lots of software and a few cables (serial for the IIc etc).

All for the cost of a drive to Christchurch.

[ben]

Revox B215 cassette for 15 Euros, fleamarket in Mallorca. 4 years ago-ish. Best holiday of my life, that one! Would have got the matching tuner from same seller, but no room in luggage.

Strathclyde transcription devices STD-305M TT off freecycle. Needed some work on the deck but the condition was excellent.

Recently got given a Braun PS500 turntable along with a load of other stuff. Not yet plugged it in!

[KeithsTV]

A Farnell SSG 520 signal generator for free with the accompanying IEEE interface unit and the manuals from a company I used to work for. The sig gen had a fault which took a little time to diagnose and find but as it was faulty and 15 years old it was written off by the accounts department.

Another find was a Gecophone BC3250 from my grandparents. On a visit back in the mid 60s my grandfather said he had an old radio I could have but fortunately he couldn't find it as my brother and I would probably have wrecked it. When my father was clearing the house after they had died he came back with this radio. I did get it working back in the early 70s but it was damaged in a road accident in 1974 while transporting it back home. It has stayed with me through house moves and will one day appear at the top of the to do pile.

Keith

[davegsm82]

3x CV4004's with big box anodes, boxed, brand new in pristine condition from a boot sale, 50p each. Unexpectedly sold on for a few hundred quid.

Also glad I found the GEC BC5441 smashed up after a boot sale, otherwise I wouldn't have ever built the radioputer.

Dave.

[Refugee]

A skip full with valve cinema amplifiers in 1982. I took as many as I could get into the car iI had and gave many of them to friends. I still have four of them.

Vintage quadrophonic player wanted.

[Mike Phelan]

Huge pile of passive components in drawers, from freecycle.
Loads of LEDs, caps, resistors, diodes and crystals with weird frequencies.

[ianj]

I bought a huge immaculate motor driven tuned Saba 125 Frieburg radio for 40 quid from a house clearance shop about 12 years back.Have you seen what these leviathons go for now?

[Tim]

Not counting stuff I have been given or otherwise obtained for free.

My Avo mk3 VCM, £5 from work.

[vinrads]

A friend of mine ,a budding Lovejoy called , I asked him to look out for a round Ekco .
A few weeks later Lovejoy called clutching an Ekco A22 in black and chrome how much I asked ,sorry I am keeping it but will you give the once over for me this I did.

Fast forward about two years Lovejoy came a knocking clutching the A22 what's wrong I asked ! nothing came the reply do you want to buy it, we need to get the deposit together to put down on a new house, how much I asked fifty pounds came the answer it seemed a lot of money twenty years ago but a good investment I am sure you will agree. Mick.

[Lloyd 1985]

I was given an Ekco AC86 by a guy on eBay!
This was back in 2007, I'd just lost the bidding on a battery version of the AC86 (B86?). A few hours later I got an email from a guy asking if I wanted one of the same radio, I thought it was probably a scam or something, but went along with it anyway. After him asking me how to pack it up for posting, he decided it would be easier if he drove it to my house, we arranged a date and time, and sure enough he turned up with it bang on the time we arranged! He wouldn't take any payment for it, even though we had both seen the one on eBay go for just over £80. He didn't even want a cup of tea! He said it had been lying around in his garage for many years, and just wanted it to go to a good home. I couldn't have asked for a better set, it had a full set of valves, and most of it's original knobs. After a clean and polish I had a very nice radio, and a few replacement caps later it became a very nice working radio

Regards,
Lloyd

[yampy187]

A pair of celestion ditton 44 speakers off the scrap pile at work. Boss said They had to go because they looked old