1955 Cadillac AM radio

[rickr]

I had the radio rebuilt and the speakers reconed.Reinstalled it on Christmas Eve. day.Happened to find an AM station that was playing Christmas music from the old days. Was great to hear he old songs on this old radio,and it sounds very good. Has the old "tube sound" people go on about.Also have an old FM converter and would like to use with this radio. However do not know if the converter works or not. Does anyone recall what AM station the radio is to be tuned to in order for the FM converter to operate?
Thanks in advance!

 

[drmitch]

Hi Rick, I used to have one of those converters but I forget the tuning. Found something you might want to see.

Pardon Our Interruption...

 

[filterflo]

Hi Rick,
If I recall, the AM dial must be tuned to the 1200-1300 KC range for the FM converter to work. I have a couple of those for my older cars but mostly prefer to listen to AM when Im driving. I have an older TUBE Motorola FM converter that Ive never installed yet. Its very interesting!

 

[rickr]

Nice stove Donnie! Not for me however. I only cook with gas!
Hope somebody will save this classic however. Looks like a very nice one,and available for little $$$ in the Midwest.

 

[rickr]

Thank you Jimmy. I will give that a try next weekend. Would be great to have a tube type converter with a tube type radio.
I do not like listening to AM radio. All we have here on the AM band is the nasty crap.

 

[sudsmaster]

I restored a six volt positive ground factory radio for my '50 Plymouth. It works OK, but isn't particularly loud. It does, however, look great, with its chrome grill against the green thatched speaker mesh.

For more modern tunes, I used some special converters that turn six volt positive ground into 12 volt negative ground. I had to mount four of these in parallel as each one is only good for about 20 watts of power. But they enabled me to use a Sony AM/FM/Tape unit mounted discreetly under the dash, with a six CD changer hidden in the glove compartment. Nothing like cruising down the road with Harry James belting out big band music on a summer night.

And the old tube radio still works... I just don't use it much.

 

[sudsmaster]

PS-Here's a shot of the motor after I completely rebuilt/painted it... ready for installation in the car. It was taken about 10 years ago...

 

[rickr]

Great looking dashboard. Love the radio!

 

[peteski50]

1955 Cadillac

I love this Cadillac - would like to go for a ride.
Peter

 

[tolivac]

I loved those older tube car radios-when I had some-was just getting started in electronics-was able to buy those old radios from a place in Rapid City SD-car junkyard-for 50Cents each!!Was fun to play around with them.Was able to buy vibrators as well.Also worked with lots of "hybrid" car radios as well-got from the same place-these came later-like the later 50s' and early 60's.After that radios went solid state.The hybrid ones had tubes for the RF and IF sections of the radio-these were special ones that ran off the 12V DC car supply without using a vibrator or transformer and rectifier.The transisters were used for driving the speaker-you can tell a hybrid radio-It makes a loud "thump" when you turn it on-the transisters energizing immediately and the wait for the tubes to warm up before you heard the station.I didn't have the cars they went into-sadly my "collection" was lost in the flood.Miss those-and their prices were right-Don't imagine you could get those vintage car sounds for 50Cents each today.they were so much COOLER than todays car sets.-and yes their "tube" sound.Did tap into one and used its amp section-that one had Push-pull 6V6's was great!Used it as a radio or an amp.Ran the radios from an old TV transformer(the filament windings)and a rectifier and filter cap.

 

[kenwashesmonday]

There is usually a screw on the bottom of the FM converter to tune it to a spot where there is no local AM station. I believe they usually work around 1400/1500kc (that's 1500khz for you kids).

See if you can hide it under the dash so you can reach the knob. You can tune it without seeing it.

Glad to see you restored the original radio!

Ken D.