Restoring a Canadian General Electric Model 66 Gerry O'Hara VE7GUH Oct 2011

	Completed CGE 66 after fitting replacement speaker cloth and baffle board.

Quite often folks have a radio that means a lot to them for a variety of reasons, eg. they can remember it playing in their grandparents front room when they were kids, can recall that radio playing their favourite shows, or just that its seems to have always been part of their lives and want to preserve it as part of their memories and for future generations. This particular restoration was just that: the owner had memories intertwined with the set and it had been part of her life for as long as she could remember. However, as often happens with vintage sets, it had fallen into disrepair, being relegated to a bedroom, garage (or worse) as time went by, and since it 'gave up the ghost' many decades ago and no-one got around to fixing it and/or the 'aspidistra' watering ring(s) on the top became too annoying to put up with. And again, as often happens, this set had been pulled out of storage and given 'the once over' to 'smarten it up' - you know, get rid of the scratches and other blemishes by sanding down and slapping on a coat of Varathane (or worse, paint) or, as in this case, both. Well, that would be ok (sort of) if it was done well, but more often than not the process is expedited by using a power sander - usually the circular disc sort - leaving unsightly circular score marks under the new finish and, quite often, removing the thin veneer finish in parts. All in all, this can leave a rather rough-looking cabinet and one that makes for a tough cabinet restoration job at a later date. Add to that a chassis that has been fiddled with by a well-meaning (but lacking in knowledge) owner or handyman that has lost the knobs, a tube or two, and/or other parts and the result is a challenge… But SPARC likes a challenge!

So when this Canadian General Electric Model 66 was brought in by its owner who had 'had a go' some time back and now wanted the radio fully-restored, SPARC took on that challenge. This set was suffering from many of the above afflictions: the cabinet had been sanded down with a circular disc sander, leaving the tell-tale score marks and a few patches where the veneer was worn right through. This had then been given the brushed-on Varathane treatment, with the shoulders having a brown paint applied to effect some form of contrast. The chassis had certainly been 'worked on' (but did not work), tubes were missing, and so were all of the knobs and push-buttons… This set was going to take some time and considerable effort to restore…

This article is also available in PDF form.

Chassis

	Above chassis after cleaning and repairs.		Metal dial after cleaning and straightening.

The GE-66 chassis is a fairly straightforward AC-only set: a simple 6 tube design, with six pre-sets on the Broadcast Band, and also two shortwave bands covering 2 to 22MHz. The tube line-up is a 6K8 converter, 6K7 IF amplifier, 6H6 detector/AGC, 6K5-G first audio, 6F6-G audio output and a 5Y4-G rectifier.

The pre-set switching and tuned circuit assembly is mounted on a sub-chassis under the main chassis (photos, above and right - here after re-capping and cleaning). This sub-assembly must be removed to allow access to some components on the main chassis. This can be accomplished quite easily by removal of a few interconnecting wires between the two. The usual culprits of a dead chassis were replaced: all electrolytics and paper capacitors (and previous service replacements thereof), dial bulbs, and three tubes. All resistors were checked and found to be within tolerance. The mechanical bits of the push-button assembly was cleaned with WD40 and lubricated with lithium grease (applied sparingly). The electrical contacts were cleaned with Deoxit, as was the volume and tone control pots. An in-line fuse was fitted to the power transformer primary to offer some protecting in the event of a major fault condition developing in the future. The speaker was then re-wired and the scale plate straightened out to complete the job (photo, below).

The chassis was then re-aligned and soak-tested to check for any latent faults - it worked very well, pulling in many stations and with remarkably good stability.

Under chassis before ...

... and after. Note in-line fuse.

Pre-set switch bank assembly after cleaning and recapping.

Cabinet

Following stripping, a random orbital sander was used to remove the circular sander's score marks. This operation had to be undertaken with extreme care such that the veneer was not removed - a very fine-line as many of the score marks were very deep. Hand-sanding was then undertaken to remove the last vestiges of the score marks. Several small pieces of veneer were then replaced with matching patches before grain filler was applied to the surface. The grain filler was sander down with 600 grit 'wet-and-dry' paper, lubricated with lemon oil and the cabinet then allowed to sit for a few weeks prior to applying lacquer. Areas of the cabinet were masked-off and a dark brown-tinted lacquer applied to areas to be highlighted, prior to applying a slight brown tinted lacquer to the entire cabinet to obtain the desired overall tone, followed by many coats of clear, semi-gloss lacquer.

Cabinet on arrival - note score marks and blemishes in the Varathane vinish.

Top of cabinet on arrival - note circular sander score marks, (black) water damage and brown-painted shoulders.

Spraying underway in the SPARC spray booth.

Restored set in spray booth.

Knobs

	Reproduction knobs fitted to the set.

On receipt at SPARC, the cabinet had no knobs or push-buttons fitted. An extensive search through the SPARC stock failed to come up with anything suitable (the knobs are a unique, concentric design, and the push-buttons must fit through shaped holes in the escutcheon plate). However, the SPARC museum display has this model of set on display and this allowed a set of knobs and push-buttons to be replicated for this radio. The process is described in the article on the SPARC web site (under 'restorations' - 'Knobs!'). Essentially, this involves making moulds from the original knobs and then casting new knobs out of a special resin, milling holes/slots as needed in the casting and then painting. The end-result in this case were a complete set of knobs and push-buttons very close in appearance to the originals.

Reproduction knobs and push buttons straight out of their moulds.

Checking the concentric knobs for fit before spray painting.

Example of original knobs on another CGE 66.

Finishing-Up