You *can* find a donor body easily. CQ magazine partnered with the United States government in the 'fifties and 'sixties with a covert program which de-milled most of the ones released to civilian hands. A series of their articles suggested modifications to Signal Corps/RCA engineering tested designs, which the average ham could handily perform with a six pack of Oertel's 92, a hand drill, flat rock and cold chisel. Many I've seen were finally marked as destroyed by being painted lurid colors, oftentimes, from the looks of it, with a wire brush. Sporting mismatched aftermarket knobs in place of the originals is occasionally seen as a crowning sublime touch. Approach your wallet with caution should the proud first (octogenarian) civilian owner still possess it, as their great grandson may have looked up what a crisp original example sells for on the big online website. In any case, you should not pay more than a fraction of the price for one of these borgged-out examples. If the donor borg hasn't had the B voltage wrongly and fatally applied, swing back around after swapping out the necessary parts, back out the electrical mods made with tv tuners soldered into circuit using twist ties, fire it up and enjoy it the way Frankenstein did when his experiments writhed to life on the bench. Hold it in abeyance until you find another that looks ok, but has unworkable innards from (being in a flood/damp basement/smoke damage/Oertel's drinker didn't know about the B line) to get the cosmetic portions from. BTW, you are correct; do not run an original one off the dynamotor for long. A.they need maintenance first, B. original dm-28s are spendy, and C. they have a finite life cycle--when the armature is done, she's done. That being said, it's really neat to occasionally fire one up to hear it running just like it would have been originally. Keep 'em flying.
Were these radios used in aircraft? I know a lot of military gear was 28 volt, but having little knowledge on the topic I was just wondering? I do know why 28 volt DC and 400Hz AC was used on aircraft, weight savings from smaller magnetic cores (400Hz) and in the case of DC smaller wire gauge per watts delivered. Pretty sure that is not an old wives tale....
Yes ... This radio type was Installed in almost all USAAF (and some USN, some British and some Canadian) multi-engined transports and bombers used during the fifteen year period from before World War II through the Korean War
