I have a Grundig "Transistor 305" portable radio. It uses germanium transistors. I've had this thing for over forty years and although I don't use it often it has been a nice radio. In 1971 I replaced the transistor in the FM detector circuit and I have had no problems with it until just recently. Last month I spent three days in the hospital and I brought the Grundig with me. I noticed that after it was on for about a half hour it would start to cut out. I turned it off and then later turned it on again, and after a period of time it happened again. After several similar episodes I stopped using it. I wondered about some type of interference from the hospital but that was wishful thinking. In any case being in no position to test it I decided to just put it away. Yesterday I put it on the bench and took a look at it. Sure enough after a brief time it cut out again. I injected a signal, (my finger on a small screwdriver) onto the wiper of the volume control and ascertained that there is nothing wrong up to the speaker. So now I need to get into the IF's and detector. My problem is my old signal generators are not working and all I can come up with for 10.7MHZ. is a CW signal out of my MFJ249 SWR meter. The MFJ puts out a clean signal however it is CW, and it's amplitude is not adjustable. I don't think that an unmodulated signal would be a problem in this application but I don't know what the amplitude of the MFJ is and I would hate to blow up an otherwise good IF amplifier with an excessive signal. I''m admittedly a bit rusty having not trouble shot an IF amplifier/detector circuit in many years so does anyone have a feel for how I might signal trace this radio with what I have on hand? Thanks very much for any advice. Lenny
- posted
12 years ago