[ARC5] BC-AN-229 Follies, part 1

[Ben Hall]

Good afternoon all,

Happy Veterans Day!  To those who served...I thank you greatly.

With the day off, I decided to take a closer look at the BC-AN-229 
receiver.

The unit has been modified for ham use in an ugly fashion:

1)  The usual extra holes in the case.  I can't tell what these were 
for.  Too small and too few for cooling.

2)  The dial has radio station call signs scribed on them.  KING, KDMO, 
KJR, KIRO, and KVI.

3)  Front SO connector removed.  Some wires just left dangling.  (!)

4)  The Antenna/Loop switch has been removed and the antenna wiring 
messed up.  Best I can tell, former owner removed the loop wiring, 
grounded one end of the input loop transformer and connected the other 
to the output of the ANT Trim capacitor.

5)  The front panel 1/4" jack has been removed.  Wiring for it removed too.

6)  Filaments wired for 6.3 volts.  Not a real nice job either.

7)  The "unfiltered B+" and "filtered B+" have been connected together 
and the later wiring removed.

So I started to check the unit out and started making repairs:

A)  A fellow listmember sent me a front panel connector from a parts 
unit.  Thank you much!  The unpainted aluminum ring has been painted in 
black wrinkle to match the rest of the set.

B)  The Antenna wiring has been put back to stock.  Because I don't have 
an A/L switch, those wires are hanging for now.  I have a plan to adapt 
a wafer switch to work here.  Awaiting some aluminum tubing to do this.

C)  I started checking the metal-can capacitors.  Not a single one 
measured good, all leaky.  One of the two-section 0.1uF units has an 
unused section, so I tried to reform it.  Still leaky.

Replacing the metal can capacitors presents a conundrum.

The five units that are on the inside of the chassis can be replaced by 
adding terminal strips and modern caps.

The five "top mount" caps present a challenge.  For those not familiar, 
there are five "top mount" metal can capacitors where the can is above 
the chassis and the terminals stick thru to reach the inside of the 
chassis.  Replacing these with terminal strips will be ugly and add lead 
length.

So...my initial plan is to rebuild these "top mount" can caps.

As as test, I removed one of the units I can easily replace with a 
terminal strip as a test unit.  It still tested leaky - around 20k ohms.

Cut it open with the Dremel with the abrasive wheel, removed the guts, 
and installed a 0.5 uF modern cap.  Easy.

I hope the top-mount units are as easy.

In the past, when I've tried to do the same thing with a soldered lid 
metal cap, I had to fight to get the lid unsoldered, then the "guts" 
were potted in an icky tar-like substance.  Yeech.  I gave up.

:)

thanks much and 73,
ben, kd5byb