My Realistic DX-160 Shortwave Radio Arrives 

I had one of these when I was a kid, sold it to get money for college. Thanks for sharing this. Instead of buying new stuff, I find myself buying stuff I used to own 40 years ago and refurbishing it. Old age I guess :-) Thanks for sharing, brought back good memories.

I had a DX-160 in '74-75 on my tour at Adak. My 1st SW receiver. I persuaded the weather office (Navy) chain of command to let their electronics tech (Robbie) string a longwire antenna with multiple taps on the roof of our barracks and I was in business, logging stations all over the Pacific, just for starters. We were entertainment-deprived, having only Armed Forces Radio and Television Service (AFRTS) on the island, operating one channel each of radio and tv, the tv only 8 hours a day and in black and white. The radio was mostly 60s old fogie stuff, but with a few west coast radio shows for the average-age sailors (about 19). So plugging the lead in to our AM radios brought in Canadian and Alaskan radio stations playing Top 40 stuff that was much better for morale. But that DX-160 was an awesome little receiver, and made me a dedicated Radio Shack customer for many years.

I got this radio for Christmas back in 1978. I still have it and stills works great. Congratulations on your treasure find!!

I have a DX-160. My dad bought it for me for Christmas in the mid 70's. I spent many evenings listening to Shortwave stations into the wee hours. :-) TAB books used to put out SWL guides, that had stations & times listed which used to help. I remember my dad & I put up a long wire antenna, maybe 60-70 feet , that went from the corner of the house (using a mast) to a tree on the other end of the back yard (with insulators on each end). I remember we had trouble with the antenna wire snapping when we had high winds, because one end was around the tree. There was an old ham radio guy in town, I remember he had a huge diamond shaped antenna with a rotor on the roof, and we stopped and asked him about the antenna. He told us to put a clothes line pulley on the mast side, and a weight hanging down, so when the tree swayed the line would have slack with the pulley & weight. Wallah!... It worked, and never snapped the line again. I had to lubricate the pulley every year. I used to have QSL cards from a bunch of SW radio stations, the BBC, Radio RSA - South Africa, to name a couple. I also had a world map on my bedroom wall, with push-pins of all the countries I tuned in. I haven't really used the DX-160 in a long, long, time. I fired it up about a year ago and it still works. Years ago I made a better speaker with wooden housing, and it sounded better. I'm thinking of hooking it back up again, and maybe doing some mods. If you know of some good mods for the DX-160, could you share them? Thanks.

My dad bought one of these radios new and still has it to this day and working great. Interesting to note the side speaker was used as the squawk box in the Apollo 13 movie just with a nasa sticker over it.

I've always had a fondness for the DX 160. It was the radio that prompted me to eventually acquire my ham license. 73 from Alabama!

It is interesting how well this Realistic stuff has stood the test of time. I still have my DX160, plus a heap of classic stereo gear still in use, some 27mHz CB gear, even a clock radio from 1981 called a 'Realistic Chronomatic225' still running on my desk. It spent it's first 30 years alongside the bed before the wife decided to update it, so it came out to the workshop office. The more trendy replacement bedside clock radio's have each lasted about 2 years max... So since 1981 when I purchased it with my first paycheck, it has run continuously for over 324000 hours, all led segments uniformly bright, the radio still works despite the deterioration in the music content quality, and being mains frequency locked, the clock is still accurate. That great era before engineered failure came along towards the end of the 80's..

Great video. This was my first ham rig back in 1975 when I was just entering the hobby. My mom bought this for me and I loved this radio. I traded it towards one of my first transceivers when I got my license. Like you I have been thinking about buying one of these as I recreate what I envisioned as my "dream shack" back in the mid-70's. Enjoy!

One of my favorite older rigs . I loved Radio Shack .

As a shortwave DXers in the 70s I had a DX160. Great rig. Dead nuts on frequency. With my World Radio TV Handbook (WRTH) I was able to get QSLs from 70 countries on a simple wire antenna. Exhausting all SW stations I could hear, I decided to learn what the dits and dahs were al about and in 1980 got my novice KA1FXK.

Funny how we use EBay to get the things we wanted but could never get in our youth. My first CB radio was a Robyn SX-101 and I really liked it but it got stolen out of my truck. back in the 1970s. I recently got one from EBay, still in the original box and styrofoam that looks and works like it is new off the shelf!

Love the radio, always been partial to Realistic and Hallicrafters radios. Still have a s120 from my 1976 High School Ham radio club !! Did not have much money for the club then so we used an E.F Johnson transmitter and the s120 as a receiver. Those were the days !! weren't they ?

I have 2, replaced all caps and transistors. Did alignment, units work as new. I noticed a couple solder joints that were a little bit suspect went over them well. radio is so much fun to play with I feel like im 15 again. Welcome to the club

Great looking..and sounding receiver. Never had anything quite that fancy, my father bought me a world band receiver, from one of his gas credit cards. Guess I was around 11 or 12 years old,hand that until I joined the Army and once through boot camp took it with me to my first duty station in Ma, Thanks for the memories.

Watched the video, it really took me back to when I was in high school and saved all my money for one of these. Good solid rig, I must've heard about 70 or 80 countries on it!

I have had my DX 160 since the mid 70s. I have it next to my bed so I can listen in to world at night. The newer digital model radios are easier to dial in but they aren't as much fun to operate as the old analog 160. The only repairs I've done to it has been to replace the illumination lights for the face. Got those off the wall displays at radio shack. Still going strong.

Just got one of these today from my local radio club donation pile. Opened it first to check the dirt conditions inside and after a quick brush clean; I turned it on and it fired right up. I will clean it up and update some components as needed but will try to tamper with it as little as possible. Just like you, this is something I dreamed of in the early 80's and very glad it will sit in my shack next to my ICom 7300.

Thanks RadioHamGuy for the video. Yes I have a DX-160 here with speaker that I bought at a swap meet. It's been sitting in a corner here in the shack and hasn't been turn on for about 6 years. You peaked my interest again so I will get this radio out and connect it up. Conditions on short wave isn't great but I will give it a try. Thanks again for bring an old boat anchor to life.

I owned a DX-160 in 1976! Had a ball listening to it and even used it to learn morse code for the US Novice Amateur radio exam. VE3EEI

I had one for years, very hot front end with an FET preamp. Very nice!

My dad had one of those! He then gave it to me when he got his Sangean. I remember playing with it as a kid. It kept my interest in radio up until I could get a ham ticket. Enjoy that radio. I am glad to see that they are still being used and are not scrapped.

When I was 12 ('72), The Realistic DX-150 was on the market. Man I wanted one of those BAD. It was about 10 years later that I got the DX-300. The DX-160 looks and sounds like a solid radio.

Cool vid. I have a DX 302 Shortwave receiver I bought in 1980, still have it and it works great

Wow! I remember saving, and saving, and saving in High School to buy one of those. Loved that radio!

Very nice little radio. I got one for Christmas 1979. It was a nice transition rig between my CB hobby and Ham Radio. The following Christmas I got an HW-8 so I never used the DX-160 for operating. Like you, I bought one recently just for the memories! Thanks for posting!

It is fun to get things that look brand new from the 70's. Also it is great to be able to sell things for a reasonable price on eBay rather than 25 cents at a rummage like it was pre-eBay.

Thanks for the video. I had a chance a few months back to pick one up for cheap but turned it down for less then favorable reviews. Now I wish I had it.

Nice rig I just bought a realistic r300 for 20 bucks and I love it,nothing beats the old rigs. 73 terry

Nice! Somthing about the ones made from the late 60's to the earlier 80's,,,they are my favorites!,,,I own a Panasonic 2600 and I wouldnt sell it for the world!

Very nice rig, good purchase.Got mine last year off E-Pay also.Was hard to put it away, but both my Dx-300 and 302 I enjoy better.Got the dx-100, 150B, 160, 200, 300 and 302.The 160 is a big time drifter, as are all GRE radios except the 300 series.I use a Pioneer 8 ohm speaker which help a lot with audio quality.The 150 & 150 A have the internal speaker which are less cumbersome.Cleaned and lubed the pots and waffers, and works very well.Great video, and good luck with the analog rig...

Oh, I did have one of those, I worked at a Radio Shack store in high school and got a discount but had to save for a while to get it. It was a fun radio, I wish I would have kept it but sold it to my uncle after a few years since he was really interested in it and by that time I got a Kenwood 440 radio that covered all the same freqs on rx.

I have one as well. Joy to mess around with. She drifts for a few minutes, but once warm she rocks! I like the mystery of not knowing the exact freq I am on. Brings back fond memories.

Wow, thanks for this video, it sure brought back a lot of happy memories. :) The DX-160 was my first shortwave receiver many, many moons ago. ;) When I bought it new in the late 70's there were more shortwave wave stations on air compared to now. The radio also inspired me to gain an interest in ham (amateur) radio, of which some years later I became a ham radio op. Although not all that active these days, I do have the occasional "rag-chew" on local 2-metre's. (hi hi). Great work on the vid, looking forward to more of the same in 2014. P.S. Also watched your excellent vid on "Building a Multi-band HF Antenna."

Yep.....have one just like it. Also from e-Bay several years ago. I need to finish the set-up of my shack and put my HAM license to use. Thanks for the great vid.

I want the realistic patrolman 9....I use to go to the radio shack in San Pedro California...in the 1970s....when I ditched school I would sit with the guys at the store...it was great...it was a expensive radio in that time 😮

Thanks for the offer, I did fine an online version that works fine for me for the manual. Thanks for the advice on the tuning, I did finally figure that out, the alignment was off on mine but after I did my alignment now, it is calibrated and works great as you say for tuning each band segment.

Congrats - I did the same thing - bought my 160 a few years back and it has been a wonderful unit. I always had wanted one and it finally was something I was able to latch on to for a nominal price. Performs beautifully with a dipole antenna and I love mine.

As A Kid I remember Seeing This Unit BRAND NEW At My Radio Shack

Great to see this classic radio working, and what good audio quality! I like the 'bloopers' section at the end.

I owned one of these for years...finally sold it at a local swapfest....I miss it but I hope the new owner enjoys it.

thanks so much for the tour of the 160 I always wondered about this short wave receiver thanks again!

What a nice and old friend ! I wanted to have one when I was a young shortwave listener...about 40years ago.Yours are in very good condition. May you have a good time with your new friend ! 73.¥

I like the way you narating the show by using microphone so I could listen it very comfortable. Your show is very informative by using zooming so I enjoy the show very very much. I also like your unit Realistic DX 160. Warm greeting from Indonesia.

this was an excellent tour of the radio. thank you for sharing.

This is a very nice radio, Realistic was a good brand and made to last. Also a good review you made.

I did not use a scope, I had a signal generator and tuned each coil for max on the S-meter and by sound level. That worked fine and really improved my radio, for some reason it was off a ways, either by aged components or maybe someone else tried tuning on it at one time.

10 years later and I can still find this video very useful 👍 thx. 😊 I just got a Realistic DX-160 from a Ham guy. About a month ago, I'm learning 👍👍😎

Great, great video. I inherited one of these awhile back (in great shape) and my goal is to pull in the kind of signal you are getting. Amazing.

I bought one of these back in 1972 and had many happy hours DXing with it. The last few decades it just sat around collecting dust so I finally threw it in the trash a few years ago as outdated technology. I had no idea people still wanted these things.

A longwire antenna is a good choice for this radio. Or any wire hooked up to the back that you can string up around the room or even better out a window and up to a tree, not critical, the most problem is getting the wire away from noise sources.

Brought back memories of the Radio Shack store I used to visit and drool over this receiver that I couldn't afford and my parents wouldn't let me buy in the '70's. Got an Astronaut 8 out of my bargaining though!

Sounds like a lot of good memories there with that radio, great to hear! I always wanted to buy a new one at that time but wasn't until now that I finally get to play around with one, lol. Yes, Bob is a good mentor and helper with anything like that, great to hear that story.

A comprehensive video! Perfect. Enjoyed every minute of it. Thanks for uploading.

Cool, thanks for the vid! Buying a DX160 this weekend and appreciate finding this vid to know what to expect.

A very worthwhile solid state general coverage RX... often available for little money.

i also remember back in the 60's when i wanted to get into the radio hobby but couldnt afford it, now my kids went off on their own and now i buy the stuff i always wanted and am having radio fun.,

Thanks, I have always loved this exact unit too. Enjoyed the video !!! Remember the old, "Sky Buddy" era rigs ? Heath-kit had a basic c.w, transmitter, running side by side. THAT REALLY WAS "WORKING" A STATION, the "golden days" of ham radio and the yellow/redish glow of all the tubes against the back wall.. Thanks & 73, kj4ww

Looks like you also have the black plastic RS multimeter of the same vintage on the bench against the wall. I have one of those too. I enjoyed this presentation. Thanks.

Fantastic video, thanks for all the information. I'm getting back into CB. I want to get into HAM. When I was a kid I was into CB but was never able to afford HAM. I just picked up this radio at a great price and look forward to playing with it. I want to pick up some HAM stuff and will be looking at some what of a budget to get started. I'm a bargain hunter so should be able to find something out there. Whatever it is, it will come to a good home, pretty excited about getting into one of my favorite hobbies. Thanks again...

Fantastic, very very beautiful this radio. Congratulations.

Good video. I could almost feel your nervous excitement as you unboxed it. Glad it worked out well for you.

Enjoyed the video. Brought me back to the 70's when I would spend hours on my dx-160.

I had one of these back in the day. It's a bit fussy with stability, but it does quite well. The main reason I wanted one was for the 1750 meter band (165 - 190 Khz) Very few radios I could find will tune that band.

Thanks and yes, I really am enjoying that radio, it is just a fun radio for some reason and it sure looks nice also with all those bands on display.

I would have hit the floor if I had one of these great radios back in the day, but I got started with a DX-100 which was a wee pig but I heard the world! I recently got a good deal on an SP-150 external speaker and I use it with my Icom IC-718 amateur rig presently. 73 DE N2NLQ

Radio was so exciting for me at age 11 and 12, I sure have a lot of great memories. And this radio was one of them, so I finally got one, lol.

Late 80's I owned one of these as a kid, I love SW and still do to this day, I now have a SdrPlay and an AOR AR-DV1...but I loved my DX-160 I live near the coast (NE UK) and I used to listen to ship to shore from the North East oil rigs...I heard some interesting conversations!!! Nothing was digital/scrambled then.

Thanks for posting. Reminds me of my teenage years. Love your accent!

Thank you for the prompt reply. Much appreciated! I wanted to hear it directly from someone with experience and a true love of radios. I'll get right on to finding that electronic spray cleaner. Best of wishes for 2013 and beyond!

Nice video. Had one of these years ago and was a good performer. Great on SSB too. Mine drifted also after many years, but once it warmed up it was fine.

I bought this a display model from Radio Shack in 1980 - it lasted until around 2005 when all I would received was static on any frequency. solid radio for quite a while.

I had a realistic 150a first real shortwave radio I had , built some simple kits before that bought one for 80 dollars in 1978 brings back pleasant memories

Picked one of these up at a yard sale for 20.00, including a few extra speakers. It was a clean unit so I could not pass it up even if it might require some repair. Turned out it was electronically and mechanically fine and I use it everyday now to listen to talk radio while on the computer. These, like most boat anchors, are great. I guess you would call this a little boat anchor.

Hi there, all your videos are really interesting - and entertaining too! actually saw this a while back and loved the look of the dx160, and now, mainly due to you (ha!) I'm actually waiting myself for one to land on my door!! Thanks again for posting great videos, love your channel

This is a wonderful machine. I have a hole bunch of communication receivers and this one is one of the best (Kenwood, Realistic dx200, yaeshu and more ) After I removed changed R2 to 4k5 ohm and made a digital frequency display and did the alligment job. Super selective and sensitive. Installed a notch/cw filter for perfect cw and ssb sound.

Loved your video, I got mine from an estate sale with some old tube McIntosh equipment! I'm probably going to sell it as I'm not in to short wave but I did try it out and it seemed to work well. You certainly made it seem interesting though!

I bought one off of Ebay but I believe I paid to much. From what I hear a lot of people were complaining about the audio being to "tinny". I fixed that by shoving two wash cloths in the speaker box and now it has good bass.

I know this video has whiskers on it but still envious! I hope everything worked out with this rig! I would LOVE one of those SP-150 for my ham radio setup!

You need the service manual for that radio, the complete instructions are covered for alignment there. I found mine on a website by searching for dx-160 service manual. I don't have the site handy at the moment but you should find it that way.

Great old SW radio loved the video, thanks so much!

I can remember back when I was in High School working 7.145 MHz, the Novice band. It was the only crystal I had in my lafeyette 90 watt transmitter and a Heathkit receiver.

I really enjoyed your vid on the DX-160. I recently acquired a near mint unit on Ebay, so that I could return to @ 1975-76 when I bought the DX-160. Many many hrs logged on it, and I QSLd the world, it seemed. I loved that unit then, & I do now. Enjoy that baby. I have subscribed, to hopefully see a mod vid, and your other vids.

Nice video, very informative. I looked up the 1976 RS catalogue and this rig sold for $159.95. What a shame they don't sell good stuff like this anymore. Nowadays, all they sell is CRAP! That's why they are teeter-tottering on the edge of abyss.

Really like the 70's Radio Shack gear

nice radio! i got the last one in 1980 as a demo model from the store. i got it as a graduation present from my mom. i also have a 150b that is in great shape and apperently is fairly rare because of the short time frame it was made. i guess that at least 5 versions were made on this set.from what i have seen on the internet. and catalogs. good luck!! love these sets!! ed.

Nice video, thanks. Great fun going back in time with you with this 70s radio.

Thanks, yes, I am doing some cap changes now for audio improvement and will also want to try a better external speaker. Having fun with it so far.

I remember that receiver in Tandy store back in mid 70s in the Uk , they said all realistic and radio shack products in Uk, I nearly bought on e but instead bought a yaesu frg7 . Great video. 73s mark g8rde

Excellent BLOOPERS. the best part of the entire video

Nice receiver! I'd like to have one like that...but I need a portable like my DX-390. I saw the DX-160 in the 1977 Radio Shack catalog page 137 for $159.95 on the Radio Shack catalogs website

when I was 12 years old the 160 was my dream radio in 76. I never actually used one until 2005 when I rented a condo at a ski resort for 2 days and this radio was there with a 30 foot longwire antenna pretty cool experience almost 30 years later.

Great advice and thanks for the info on the sticker, I did not know that was a date code. Good to know that!

I remember wanting that same radio the first time I saw it in the catalog, but the $159.95 was a little rich for a 15 year old kid ;-)

congratulations on your new toy...i love that radio...enjoy it..

super cool radio Larry.hey thanks for the shout-out!!! looks like you got yourself a very nice radio there.i hope your new radio gives you much joy for may many moons.it sure sound sweet with that original speaker,and it looks really great condition. enjoy your new treasure my friend. 73,davy KB3YJO

I actually bought one of those units brand new in 1976. (actually it was the 160-A). I sold it along with a mil surplus Angry 5 rig (ANGRR-5) (which I now kick myself whenever I think about it) a few years later when I became a professional musician.

Did not know anything about Ham radio until today, watching your videos. Very interesting hobby, thinking about picking it up.

Very interesting, sir. Thank you for sharing your experience with this radio.

I just bought one on eBay still in the box. A friend of mine in high school back in '76 had one and I've kind of wanted one ever since.

Great review thanks!