Classic Hifi Care

Ms. Catalina arrived yesterday for restoration.

The young family is stoked to have it playing.

It's an all tube AM/FM/FM Stereo/Phono with solid wood
and 3/4 inch plywood making up the cabinet.

It has a V-M 1297 stereo changer with a nice Astatic 718/Euphonics
stereo cartridge. I just happen to have a new stylus for it.

Two way speaker system: 6 inch woofers and 3.5 inch
tweeters with capacitor cross-over.

Output tubes are 50C5, one for each channel.
I'll be curious to see how it sounds with these
low power tubes.

I went over the cabinet yesterday, and it cleaned up
well and looks nice after the Howards Walnut and 0000 steel wool.
Inside the cabinet, I found a jukebox strip and a MilkBone(R) dog biscuit as
bonuses !

Last night I pulled the platter off, and cleaned the mat.
I was pleasantly surprised how nice the mat came out.
I'll clean off some of the old glue on the platter and mat.
Will re-glue the mat with Elmer's wood glue.

Today, organize the work table and start the dis-assembly
of the V-M changer.
I hope the plastic On/Off switch is not broken. At this age,
that is not uncommon.
Gary at The V of Music has the common ones that were used.

Do you have any idea who manufactured this stereo, Mr. Mogul? They should have lots of fun with it. It's a cute little stereo.

electra225 wrote: ↑Mon Oct 17, 2022 2:00 am Do you have any idea who manufactured this stereo, Mr. Mogul? They should have lots of fun with it. It's a cute little stereo.

Greg, From my perusing the web, it appears that
Wells-Gardner made the chassis.
Apparently they did this for numerous sales outlets way back when.

https://antiqueradios.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=387057

Wells-Gardner made good stuff. I wonder if there might have been a Truetone and/or a Firestone model, maybe even an Airline model with very similar features. WG made a lot of equipment for those retail brands. I'd bet it will sound fairly good, even with fairly small speakers. The parts list pasted on the cabinet looks a lot like Sears Silvertone.

Interesting, your photo of the console reminds me of a model that Gambles sold when I worked there as a kid. Wells-Gardner manufactured a lot of stuff for the Gamble-Skogmo company. And yes, their products gave little trouble. We had very few service calls on the Wells-Gardner branded components.

Bill

Bill, I forgot about Coronado and should have included it with the others.

50C5/35C5 and the 35EH5/50EH5 will basically exchange with each other. My understanding the difference between them is that the EH5 takes less grid voltage to drive it to full power. The C5's are rated at 1.5 watts, the EH5's at 1.2 watts. I have had good luck subbing the EH5 for a C5 in radios. I even read an article recently, can't remember where right off hand, but may have been ARF, that stated that the author of the article was amplifying a .5 volt ceramic cartridge with the 50EH5 with good results in a "one-tube wonder" type of player. I am going to try a set of EH5's in the little Magnavox record player I'm working on just to see what it would do there, if anything. The 35C5's in it sound really nice with a 12AX7 pre-amp tube.

Back on Topic.

I've got the console's V-M 1297 changer dis-assembled,
cleaned and will lube.

I'll put it back together tomorrow for a manual run.

The plastic switch feels OK, so far.
King's X crossed for luck it won't break.

The idler was hard as ceramic, but I've got
a new one here from Gary at V of M.

Nice work, Mr. Mogul. When you do a restore, you go all the way, which is the correct way. I've only had to do that once, for the most part the VM changers I have encountered have not been horrible.

Bill

William wrote: ↑Fri Oct 21, 2022 12:38 am Nice work, Mr. Mogul. When you do a restore, you go all the way, which is the correct way. I've only had to do that once, for the most part the VM changers I have encountered have not been horrible.
Bill

Hi Bill,
I don't think this one would have been bad either.
I just had an inspiration to do the whole deal.

It may be that I needed a Zen concentration to get
more relaxed from the week's challenges.
And taking apart a record changer can be helpful,
especially when I'm pretty sure I can handle any
problem a V-M demonstrates.

Anyway, it's fun to send progress photos to the young lady
owner, who really loves to see her hi-fi coming along.

We here on the forum enjoy your progress too, so keep it coming please.

Bill

I enjoy your photos and descriptions of going thru a changer, Mr. Mogul. I am trying to get up the courage to try one some of these days. I'll need really good instruction, really slowly.

electra225 wrote: ↑Fri Oct 21, 2022 2:36 pm I enjoy your photos and descriptions of going thru a changer, Mr. Mogul. I am trying to get up the courage to try one some of these days. I'll need really good instruction, really slowly.

Greg,
There is an awesome V-M 1201 restoration post by Ed over at ARF.
I have it bookmarked. Let me know when you want it.

The low number 1200 series is the mid to late 1950's version,
but the basic cycling mechanism is the same.

And Jordan Pier has a pretty good U-toob video series on the 1297,
which model was produced from the early 1960's to the late 1960's.

The V-M 1297 is all back together.

I had a "wth" moment when first testing
it and the tonearm would not clear
its rest post.

The tonearm height adjusting screw on these is real
different than the early 1200's.
Instead of backing out the screw, you have to
turn it clockwise, which pushes a riveted tang
outwards. This then allows the tonearm to lift
higher when the tonearm lift pin engages the
tang.

I put in a new idler, the motor mounts were fine,
and I have the stylus for the Astatic cartridge.

Surprisingly good, I did not have to adjust the
tonearm end of record pickup function. Hurrah!

The young family picked up the Catalina console today.

They said is was way beyond their expectations, which
is what you want to hear !

Dave1138 did the tuner/amp, and I detailed the cabinet
and serviced and cleaned the V-M 1297 changer.

The knobs and escutcheon cleaned up nicely, and
I gave the family a Firestone Christmas album.

They are stoked to have the console for Christmas-time.

Good work, Mr. Mogul, and a nice touch with the Christmas album.

Bill

Hi-Fi-Mogul wrote: ↑Sun Nov 27, 2022 12:51 am The young family picked up the Catalina console today.

They said is was way beyond their expectations, which
is what you want to hear !

It may not be a high-end device, but we all know that sometimes low-end can sound better than they should, and it certainly is a handsome design. Now you've given them Christmas music to enjoy it with! Aren't they lucky that they found somebody who would do a good job.

Chris Campbell

Thanks for your comments Bill and Chris.

I forgot to mention that the 50C5 output tube
stereo amp was well matched to the speakers.

The output was good at volume halfway up,
and very nice at about 6/10.
With the new stylus, it sounded very good.

I forgot to take a photo of the console all back
together, but the family took a "selfie" with me
with it.
That was pretty cool.

The 50C5 gets a bad rap due to its modest performance in a small radio. The tube can sound really nice if the right speakers are used. You gave younger people memories that their children will talk about. Nice work, Mr. Mogul. I was the last man to the party. I missed the later activity on this topic.

electra225 wrote: ↑Mon Nov 28, 2022 1:49 am The 50C5 gets a bad rap due to its modest performance in a small radio. The tube can sound really nice if the right speakers are used. You gave younger people memories that their children will talk about. Nice work, Mr. Mogul. I was the last man to the party. I missed the later activity on this topic.

Thank you Greg for the kind words.

I picked up a neat Sears portable that is in the G.E.
Wildcat style from around 1970.
I'll be posting on that soon, as I was inspired today
with good weather to get a lot of work done on it.

Hi-Fi-Mogul wrote: ↑Mon Nov 28, 2022 4:05 am
I'll be posting on that soon, as I was inspired today
with good weather to get a lot of work done on it.

You're working outside?

Chris Campbell