I love those old console radios. Once upon a time they were the centerpiece of every households parlor. I will always have room to add just one more of them at my house.
This radio was sold by the "Farmers Union Cooperative" stores in rural America. Back then, made in the USA was a HUGE thing for the COOP, I can recall the COOP stores and gas stations all over the midwest as I grew up, being a farmers kid I spent many joyous days at the COOP meetings where all the farmers got together and talked of farming, while the kids went to another room and watched old 16mm movies of the three stooges and movie cartoons. This was back in the 50's
Throwing this thing away is a damn crime. That could be a damn fine unit when restored. I would look in to fixing that speaker too. I certainly would not put a Chineseum speaker in it.
It's not true that the speaker wouldn't work merely because of age. It might not work for other reasons, but not because it's not flexible. I wasn't saying that you are ever going to make AM sound great, just that putting a chineseum speaker in it would be a shame. Also, while there is an upper limit to how good it can sound, there really isn't a lower limit. If the speaker sounds tinny, that will make AM sound even worse.
There is an easier way to make knobs through duplication. This is especially helpful if you are missing a knob on a machine with multiple knobs. Buy some silicone and resin. Suspend your knob on a string in a prescription bottle and fill with silicone. When the silicone dries, pull it out and you have yourself a mold to make knobs. Just put the mold back in the prescription bottle and put the resin into the mold. Very cheap, very easy. No 3d printing needed.
Funny, I’ve done the same thing, put the field coil mounted on the side and installed a permanent magnet type speaker. Works! I thought I was the only one doing that. Also shortwave is still alive and well with a good antenna, especially at night. I restore old radios...fun stuff.
Old Radios & Phonographs -you could go to a PM speaker and install a filter choke -approx 8-10 hys -not critical if heavy enough or cheap and dirty a 10-20 watt wire wound resister 2000-2500 ohms . I’ve done both
Quick research shows this as a "CO-OP Deluxe Teledial" radio announced in Sept 1936 for the 1937 year, sold for $88.95, the buttons on the dial is for automatic tuning. CO-OP = Pennsylvania Bureau Farmers Co-operation Association. ~Jack, VEG
I listen to short wave, Radio Romania, Radio China, pirates playing rock music, the Buzzer, Hams, still lots to listen to. Get WWV here. Lovely radio with an RF stage too.👍
the way to fix that speaker is to recone it. if memory serves you get a new voice coil with the reconing kit. the dial on the front you wondered what it was is some type of mechanical tuning. not sure how you would set the different buttons but when you push the button in and turn the dial it should have a mechanical stop that would stop dial rotation at the station it is set for. you could probably then fine tune with the knob connected to the tuning condenser. it has been many years since i saw one of these old radios. the wires in series with the output transformer and mounted on top of the field coil is called a hum bucking coil. it indeed is there to prevent hum from the field coil getting fed to the speaker.
Before replacing the speaker with a permanent magnet one, the continuity of the flexible leadwire to the voice coil should be checked. It might be just the enamel wire corroded at the solder joint, or the flexible leadwire is broken, both are quite common issues. Finally, since the field coil can be easily removed, it should be relatively easy to rewind the voice coil, if it's opened inside. Too bad that Chicago is 'a bit' far from you. This thing should go to Bob Andersen. Or finally, you could do a full restoration video, complete with cabinet restoration. It would be really cool! I like your resurrection videos a lot, but I would happily see a full restoration from you, as something new.
Wow, this old radio is 10 years older then my father. Which makes it 82 years old & it’s still working! You wouldn’t have any Chinese crap today, last 82 years. Xoxo 😘
Farmer owned cooperative "CO-OP" There are still around mostly fertilizer dealerships , grain elevator, probably fuel, LP gas, lubricants. At one time you could even buy a CO-OP Tractor in the 1930's, tractor and farm equipment tires, livestock feed etc. Basically any thing you might need for the farm.
I really liked this one, to bad that specialized 150 watt current monitor met an untimely demise. These videos are really great, thank you for creating them.
Glasslinger has excellent videos on cabinet restoration on vintage 1930s radios He has a complete machine shop with power woodworking tools and a spray booth to apply lacquer. He would definitely love this radio!!’
Yes , I think this relics are better managed by Glasslinger . He will restore everything on this radio to lock like new . . No offense to Shango066 intended !
It was definitely a Wells Gardner product, they seemed to like tube layout diagrams drawn in perspective. It looks like it's not in bad shape other then the dead lacquer on the cabinet, even the chassis is spotless. I would bet that the speaker could be repaired since it looks easy to take apart, it's likely just a bad connection to the voice coil, maybe the Litz wire to the coil broke off? Teledial style tubing mechanisms were all the rage in 1937, and early 1938, the original Grunow ones came out in 1936, and were such a hit that many manufacturers came out with copies, including Philco. The way they work is you press in the button and rotate the dial downward. Since this was a budget radio made as a private label set, they used that horrid Tenite plastic for the buttons rather then brass like Grunow used. Anyhow they slowly fell out of favor as slide rule dials gained in popularity, then they went nuts over motor driven tuning. It's hard to say whether someone stripped the knobs and those tubes out. Two of the tubes that were missing are dead common, 5Y3s are practically everywhere, 6F6s almost the same. As for the 6G5 magic eye, nine times out of ten those are dead to start with, since they were not required to make the radio play they were rarely changed. The knobs may have been made out of that same crappy plastic as the pushbuttons, or they may have been made out of wood as on an Airline radio, in which case they may have broken apart or disintegrated long before the Co-Op radio was dumped.
The buttons surrounding the dial are mechanical station presets. The volume/tone holes are probably for preset controls, as well, for each station, as transmitted output varied in reception. Perhaps the CO-OP moniker was due to smaller independent manufactures pooling their resources during the Depression years, producing an impressive product to compete with the "big guys".
There I was admiring that old rust stained light bulb, one of the stars of many a Shango resurrection video. I was worried that in the position it was in, it may accidently be stepped on. Next scene, the meter got it. Whoops.... Wonder if that "this is a test" station was a local traffic advisory station that wasn't broadcasting any current traffic alerts? We have something similar in one of the states near me. Oh, I must be living under a rock too. Had no idea Peter Fonda died.
Co-Op was a house brand, built by several of the Chicago independents over the years. Yours is a Wells-Gardner A3 chassis, and can be found in Rider Vol 9-17. You can look it up on Nostalgia Air under Wells-Gardner. Should be quite a performer with 13 tubes.There will usually be the letters W.G.M.C. in the lower corner of the tube layout label or on the patent label on the chassis.
I watch your videos as soon as they appear with great interest, and admiration what you make work! Yes, that coil on the field coil in series with the voice coil is a hum bucking coil. Amazing that the radio only wanted a good speaker and disconnecting some bad capaci-doodles to play. Here in Norway we don't have much analog broadcasting left, they closed down national FM broadcasting too and we are left with crappy DAB
I no longer listen to any broadcast radio. I receive all my radio by internet radio, no fading, crackle, just relatively clean audio from anywhere in the world. Love it!
Wells-Gardner for sure. I can hear it screaming: 'Restore me!!' I would love to see Thomas Johnson taking care of that majestic cabinet; that is some devine wood.
"Great Day...this is a test, this is only a test!" Very good timing that this was discovered near the end of the video! 😁 Seriously, great job as always, Shango066, very instructive and entertaining, thanks! Now, to "phototwarbulate" my own SW tube radio!😁😉
Resurrect...resurrect...resurrect...yay!!! Best videos ever. I would love to restore that cabinet and put it in my office. My stereo lithography printer would make perfect new knobs. But like so many of us....TIME.
The push buttons around the dial are similar to the car radios that had push buttons for preset stations. These look like they are wood and can be remade from dowel rods from any home improvement store
Very instructive, thank you again. I did the same speaker swap with my 1930's Relton Radio just through intuition back in the late '70's and it worked fine. Used an old Magnavox 10WR speaker.
Very neat radio! I had a Crosley Dynatrol similar to that- minus the presets- my Dad got for me when I was about 12, it worked well and was handsome. I listened to shortwave at night, I thought it was very special. I ordered a 200 made in US watt rough service bulb on Ebay a few days ago so I can plug in my newly acquired Pilot stereo console. Those bulbs are not easy to find, I guess they were killing our planet- it cost me ten bucks on Ebay. Great video - very enjoyable .
"Co op" mean co-operative. Its a British idea I think. The customers own the shop and get annual dividends. In the UK called the "divi" They do show, funerals and financial stuff. The big oco operative was the Manchester co-op.
I have a 1934 RCA Victor. Center round dial, yellow-orangish back plate. It only gets static. Beautiful wood cabinet...large, about 4ft tall. For now it is part of the living-room furniture.
Never used to have any fear at all of electricity, even 240vAC here in the UK. But as i get older, i don't think my heart would take the shocks i got in my 20's and teens.
Outstanding (entertainment) and highly educational 👍😁 I haven't been this impressed since I got out of the shower dripping wet. Thank you for the Radiometric Time Travel 🎬❤
Co-op was a store that catered to rural customers. They sold “branded” radios . I have a post-wwii Detrola product branded co-op. The set was indeed manufactured by Wells-Gardner . Their RCA patent license code was WG-24. W-G built many branded radios and many were quite good. The tuning system was “tele-dial” which was supposed to work similar to a telephone dial. You stuck your finger on the button that corresponded to the preset station you desired and the dial would stop turning when you reach that station. A big fad in 1937-38 . Then it went away. Those buttons were likely made from an early plastic called tenite. It was an “organic “ plastic that would decompose. It will take some ingenuity to make the buttons look good again. The 6k6 is a weaker beam power tube than a 6F6. If you can’t find a 6f6 use a 6v6 . This should sound ok with lower heater drain. I have a soft spot for old radios with shortwave bands plus this one has a 3 gang tuning cap and therefore a real tuned RF stage. Shortwave is still not dead . You need at least 50’ of antenna wire suspended in open space and you have to learn what time to listen to which frequency. . Plenty of weird fun stuff on shortwave . If you can’t find the Riders page under coop try to ID the Wells-Gardner chassis #. I’m am sure that it’s out there if you know what to look for. Glad you brought the set back to life. The person who threw the radio in the trash was a vandal
This is only a test, this is only a test. Yep. Post-apocalyptic radio running on auto-pilot for eternity... or until the power runs out, lol. Awesome video as always! I love these old radios. Thanks so much for the upload and the effort!
Co op were a supermarket in the uk that in the old days were formed by the CWS.the co op wholesale society.noticed it offered 234 volts as well as the normal US voltage so maybe available for England too. Great video 👍
The teledial preset buttons are identical to the Truetone D-698 "Dial O Matic" from 1937. Each button on the teledial has a metal switch that you move right to unlock, then press the button and move the switch left to lock in the preset. The bezel around the dial that is stamped CO-OP is not original. You can tell by the holes for the knobs. The Truetone had a simple brass ring around the dial. The dial graphic may also not be original. It almost seems like someone raided this radio for parts for a Truetone restoration, then substituted parts they had available.
Showed up in my feed Friday evening - had to save to my playlist! Congrats getting it working as well as you did! Awesome restoration project for you or somebody else! ☺
30:03 - Shango says he's gonna plug the audio output tube in and it might drop the B+, then the B+ starts dropping like a bomb and he stops talking because he's trying to figure out if it's all going to catch on fire, LOL Unintended comedy is always the best
Good afternoon Shango getting to this video a little late is that radio was completely done over restoration that would definitely be a keeper you have a great day Shang take care buddy
Retrochad the hell out of this. Shango, you make the best videos! Again I know this is an older video, but all your vids rule. Shango for President ‘24!
Wells-Gardner made some very good quality private label radios. I believe co-op was sold through a regional chain of stores. I've got two 1937 Airline sets using a similar chassis. Nice sets. Yours has a very appealing telephone dial with nice markings. Well worth restoring!
It's more than likely that the radio chassis was made by Welles Gardener for a chain department store other than Sears Roebuck. The May Company would come to mind and it's probably their house brand for radios .
Frankly,I never heard of a "Co Op" brand radio before.The last free radio I got was a Philco 42-1008.I haven't gotten around to it.the chassis is under my workbench;the cabinet,record changer and speaker is in the corner gathering dust with my heater setting on top of it.
The VOA/Marti Greenville NC transmitter plant is still operating-broadcasts to Cuba,South America,and Africa.The plant has the capacity to broadcast to anywhere in the world 38 antennas that can be switched onto our transmitters.2 500Kw,6 250Kw and one 50Kw sideband.I am at the remaining Govt SW broadcast plant.I can't give the frequencies here-you can look them up in a copy of Radio World.Bookstore or library.Great that Co-Op radio can still work-one mans trasjh indeed turned into a nother ones treasure.Fix her up!
I think this must be part of the British Cooperative society or co-op established (according to Wiki) in 1844 in Rochdale or Co-operative Wholesale Society (CWS). They went worldwide including the USA. I still have a co-op supermarket down the road. Edit.....Or maybe it isn't? Edit again...Not the co-op down the road, (it is there I looked), the co-op radio. Maybe it was a pure US co-op.
I'll repeat what others have said in that dial is a teledial preset system. CO-OP was a company that bought/made farm equipment and other things for farmers. The main point was that they were a buying co-op that tried to get a good price on things farmers needed. Also everybody and anyone made and sold radios back then.
There are shortwave radio transmissions still on the air. Maybe not as many nowadays but some still out there. I don't think fcc.gov is up to date on their website for shortwave licensing info.
@ 38:22 - Iz that XEPE? EBS inserter hung up? Sounds like you had a great day testing, except for the lamp! Bet you could sell the shattered base and shards on fleabay!
This radio appears to be a rebadged Grigsby-Grunow Teledial Radio. Look up Grigsby-Grunow in the service info online. Also those pulley looking things that you were wondering what they did, they are the volume and tone indicators that show you how loud the volume is or whether or not the tone control is on the treble, or bass side or if its flat. A lot of higher end "hi-fi" sets from the 1930s and early 1940s had those indicator markers for the tone and volume controls.
To help recover from the great depression in the 30s, a lot of protectionist policies were put into place to discourage people from buying foreign things. The overtly made in USA indications were put there to say "By buying this, you are supporting jobs for your fellow Americans".
Test test test testing this is only a test. Nice old radio btw, I have several 30s field coil radios, build wise its an interesting era between the old trf and the later permanent magnet radios when capacitors became cheaper than iron, that extra winding in the field coil is most definatly a humbucker to reduce noise. I have a giant old push pull that uses a pair of 41 or 42 outout tubes from late 30s giant oil filled 4+4uf main filter 1000v rated that still works. Push pull done with a pair of uy76s if i recall, have to get that out and finish it off.
