Hi from Romford

[unrealdave]

Hi Guys

Just joined as I found this forum when searching for info on the ditton 66 speakers.

I am a big fan of celestion and have A3's as my main speakers (L & R) but have some older speakers including a set of 66's.

I understand they would benefit from recapping?

My equipment is mainly Arcam but I have a pair of Quad II's that I use with the 66's and occasionally my monitor golds (10").

My deck is a TT2 and CD is through an Arcam CD37.

My music taste is varied and I enjoy my 70's stuff - Floyd, stones etc but also like early stuff from the twenties right up to post war. I tend to play this stuff on old valve radios which I collect. (I have about 180 sets).

I have a LPAM transmitter and my neighbours like this stuff as well!!

I have included a pic of my earliest music player - see if you can date it?

Mono only :)

[tapid]

Hi David, As Noel Keywood once said about somebody who had 24 sets of speakers where do you keep them all (the valve radios ) ?
You must play the music loud if next door s enjoying it :lol:. 1930 s Marconi ( no idea ). Enjoy

[unrealdave]

Hi David, As Noel Keywood once said about somebody who had 24 sets of speakers where do you keep them all (the valve radios ) ?
Ask Mrs Unreal about the spare rooms!


You must play the music loud if next door s enjoying it :lol:

Not loud - LPAM is a low power AM transmitter - they pick it up on their radio's


1930 s Marconi ( no idea ). Enjoy

Nope

[tapid]

Whatever it is it looks great. The braintrusts will be along in a jiffy with some idea !. Briefly heard the 44 s few weeks ago, so can imagine how good the 44 s are.

[tapid]

or even the 66 s

[struth]

sterling telephone and electric company were taken over in 34 by gec, so before that i guess. lovely faceplate. probably post ww1

welcome to the site

[Edward]

Looks like a 3 valve receiver based on the following.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sterling_two_valve_receiver_type_r1589.html

Highly recommend that you send some pictures and whatever other information you may have to the Radio Museum.

[unrealdave]

sterling telephone and electric company were taken over in 34 by gec, so before that i guess.

Before that they were taken over by Marconiphone. Marconi never really took the home market seriously (bit like IBM and home computers) as they were involved with the big boys stuff. When Marconi decided to put a toe in the water of home wireless they farmed the work out. They used Sterling (and used some of their technology even using the same plug in feed back coil) and Plessey. They made the V1, V2, V3, V4 and the two crystal sets. (guess how many valves are in each of the V series Marconiphone sets?).

Plessey didn't exist before some executives chatting on a train decided to set up a company to get a share of the Marconiphone pie. They bought a factory once they had a contract. Marconi bought Sterling after a couple of years (IBM just wish they could have bought Microsoft and Intel when the realised the home market was lucrative!). They messed it up though and ended up selling the Sterling company and the Marconiphone name to GEC.

Once Marconi bought Sterling they stopped farming work out to Plessey, so Plessey had a wobble but survived. Marconi couldn't run the Marconiphone subsidiary and made a right pigs ear. (Mass production was H Fords specialty and Marconiphone never got the hang of it!). They sold to GEC and after they took over a GEC executive said - we've been sold a wrong un - or some such thing.


probably post ww1

WW1 was really the making of wireless. The 'R' valve came into its own but mainly spark gap transmitters and crystal receivers. (see the pic of a WW1 aircraft spark transmitter - displayed between a couple of REALLY early loud speakers).

Lots of guys after the war went home and carried on 'messing about' with ex military stuff. Home wireless proper in the UK came about in 1922 mainly with the BBC starting up.

For an interesting read on WW1 and wireless google Capt. H. Round and the Battle of Jutland, then the valves he developed and much more. Defo one of my all time good guys.

This is the RM entry on the Anodion 3

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sterling_anodion_three_type_r1591.html

As for sending stuff to the RM - I have tried and it is a nightmare. Much of my stuff goes in Havering museum for the occasional exhibition but I get fed up spending hours trying to navigate the RM system.

[struth]

Didn't know about Marconi link, but not surprising.
Great that folk keep these pieces alive.. Well done

[Roy S]

Hello fellow Romfordian!

[Edward]

David

Fascinating! Pity the Radio Museum are being so difficult to take something that is so evidently part of their mandate. Perhaps try the Institution of Engineering and Technology?

The father of a close friend started his radio/tv engineering career at Marconi a few years before WW2 and I'm sure he cut his teeth on Sterling equipment.

[unrealdave]

Pity the Radio Museum are being so difficult to take something that is so evidently part of their mandate.

To be fair if I had the time to go through and learn the lengthy, complicated process of adding bits I would be able to get a bit more adept, even start to sail through adding stuff. I just can't get over the first ten mins of trying hard to contribute. I get fed up.

Hi to all in Romford.

[Edward]

By the way does the receiver still work?

As a child I mucked around with crystal sets - lovely fun.

[unrealdave]

Yup - works fine

I like the early stuff - really simple circuits. I am not so good on complicated stuff :(

In vintage wireless from the 20's the only thing to go wrong are the valves, the intervalve transformers, resistors going OC or way out of spec, or bits of wire coming loose or joints getting crudy.

I keep a few spare valves and transformers and the old resistors can be re-stuffed.

There are only a few bits so not a prob narrowing down the problem.

Once you get used to setting up three different voltages - LT, HT and the grid bias you are usually away.

If I get lost I ask a mate!

[AJSki2fly]

Hi Guys


I have included a pic of my earliest music player - see if you can date it?

Mono only :)

Hello Dave

Welcome, Love the look and fact you've saved such an early receiver, it looks great. What does it sound like and do you use it much?

Cheers

Adrian

[unrealdave]

Hi – No I don’t use it much - I only use these type of sets occasionally. When I do I rarely use the early pip top valves as the have a short life and are difficult to replace. I tend to put 2 volt valves such as PM2 etc in as these are much more robust.

The set I use on a regular basis is the Ultra 22 from 1923 – see the picture I have put up. This sounds great and is AC mains so no messing around with various voltages. Also has a good early moving coil loudspeaker.
It is not HiFi but produces a sound that is well suited to early Jazz etc.

If I use a horn speaker there is limited bass but these were the first loud speaker that could include a room full of listeners. The first real mass produced speaker was the type G Bell used in his telephone handset in the 1800’s. Someone had the bright idea to put a horn on the end of the handset and the horn loudspeaker took off.

They soon realized they could move more air with a cone so attached a ‘reed’ to the coil at one end and the other to a paper cone. I have a few examples of these.

I also have some very early moving coil speakers that use an electromagnet (a field coil) as permanent magnets were not very strong back then.

I have also put some pictures up of some of the sets I had in Havering Museum. Mods - if they do not belong here please delete.

[AJSki2fly]

Very interesting Dave, and a great hobby. I used to use my parent 50's PYE valve radio in my bedroom to listen to Luxenbourg and Caroline as it picked them up better if I got the wire aerial right. I also used to record the Top 20 each week using a Grundig R to R as I was limited on pocket money to buy singles and used to save up for LP's. The PYE always had a nice tone to it.

[walpurgis]

Hello David. Welcome to AOS.

I'm sure you'll find plenty to interest you here.

Feel free to join in the chat.


Enjoy the forum,
Geoff.

[southall-1998_mk2]

Howdy! Welcome to AOS.

Have fun.

S.