MP3 kits to put in old wooden radio?

[[email protected]]

Hi, I have an old antique radio that i found in my aunt's attic.
Unfortunately the innards were gutted at some point so it is now a
shell with a old (brittle) speaker in it. I *do*not* want to
maul/deface this radio (the face of it and outside in general is in
fairly good condition other than its missing knobs) but i would like to
put a mp3 player in it and somehow put knobs to the player and maybe a
small LCD face plate (not sure about non-destructive ways to attach it)
on this radio. I am not all that good with electronics (never been able
to solder very well) and was hoping there was something like a kit for
these kind of things. If anyone out there knows of such a thing then
please let me know!

Cheers


-Gaiko


PS the radio looks *similar* to this
http://antiqueradio.org/art/philc08.jpg

 

[Uncle Peter]

Hi, I have an old antique radio that i found in my aunt's attic.
Unfortunately the innards were gutted at some point so it is now a
shell with a old (brittle) speaker in it. I *do*not* want to
maul/deface this radio (the face of it and outside in general is in
fairly good condition other than its missing knobs) but i would like to
put a mp3 player in it and somehow put knobs to the player and maybe a
small LCD face plate (not sure about non-destructive ways to attach it)
on this radio. I am not all that good with electronics (never been able
to solder very well) and was hoping there was something like a kit for
these kind of things. If anyone out there knows of such a thing then
please let me know!

Cheers


-Gaiko


PS the radio looks *similar* to this
http://antiqueradio.org/art/philc08.jpg

That looks like a Philco 60. They are fairly common; and even good
originals don't command a lot of money. . Most of the folks
on the RRA+P forum would probably suggest trying to find the correct
chassis for the cabinet, since often only the chassis is salvageable
after a radio was stored in a damp cellar or barn for several decades..

The speaker can be reconed, and repro knobs are available.

Pete

 

[Mark Oppat]

there arent any adapter kits for this at all. I have been at least hoping
to find a way to make a "universal" AM-FM-AUX chassis but havent come up
with anything adaptable that would get the dial to line up. The other
controls could be easily adjustable, I know.

If I were you, I'd try for at least a chassis for it. if its a Philco 60,
that will not be too hard to find, but you gotta restore it, and you could
tap off the vol control for an aux input. The osc coils in 60's are always
dead, too, gotta rewind them... not real hard to do.

mark Oppat

 

[[email protected]]

Thanks for the input, the link i put was not the exact radio i have (I
will take a look inside and give the exact model, its on a tag in
there) it was just there to give you an idea of what it was similar to
(ie cone-ish shaped wooden radio).

 

[Gary Tayman]

As the others have said, your best bet may be to locate another chassis.

About the only alternative I can think of would be to find an amp, possibly
from a kit, to build and install in the radio, then use the line output of
your MP3 player as a signal source. Of course this will not only require
soldering skills, but possibly metalworking skill as well, for mounting the
hardware. Then again, if your soldering skills need work, a good place to
learn is by building a kit.

 

[Dave McMullen]

I would suggest puting the cabinet for sale on ebay so someone with a
chassis could salvage a radio. Use the money to buy a repro radio with a cd
player and play mp3s from cd roms to your hearts content.

 

[Larry]

[email protected] wrote in @g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

please let me know!

Take out the old speaker and dispose of it. Go to a thrift shop or used
computer store and buy a nice AMPLIFIED stereo speaker set for a few
dollars. Just put the speakers inside the radio cabinet pointing through
the hole the speaker came out of, hiding behind the grille cloth.
Computer speakers already have 1/8" stereo phone jacks on them to plug
into your favorite portable MP3 player's earphone jack. These amplified
computer speakers work great for an MP3 player. Put both stereo speakers
up by the old speaker hole.

Load up your MP3 player from
alt.binaries.sounds.78rpm-era
alt.binaries.sounds.radio.oldtime

If you are stuck with Outlook Express, which sucks for downloading
binaries on purpose, go get Xnews from http://xnews.newsguy.com/ for free
and install it. It will ask you for your news server address, same as
Outlook. Xnews will download the list, then you click the Q field in the
list to que up the songs you want, click the blue rubix cube at the
bottom of the message list window and tell Xnews where you want all these
thousands of songs and radio shows. It will download until it's
completed the task.

Buy a BIGGER MP3 player. You're gonna need it...(c;
http://www.digmind.com/store/index_500.html
is the largest at 100 GB of hard drive space. I love mine. It connects
to the USB2 port on your computer and the computer simply treats it as a
Toshiba external hard drive....no RIAA license games or other protective
bullshit. Windows Explorer simply copies the files to the Xclef 500's
massive hard drive and the player will play any MP3 fed to it. It's also
an FM radio and digital MP3 recorder with virtually unlimited recording
time to the massive hard drive. Works great!

They'll recover from the Christmas demand and have the players available
again in January or February...it's that good.

I use mine with a stolen PC speaker amp board inside a 1939 Motorola
antique portable radio I carry to nursing homes. Sounds just as if
you're listening to it in 1939...(c;

 

[Uncle Peter]

Take out the old speaker and dispose of it. Go to a thrift shop or used
computer store and buy a nice AMPLIFIED stereo speaker set for a few
dollars. Just put the speakers inside the radio cabinet pointing through
the hole the speaker came out of, hiding behind the grille cloth.
Computer speakers already have 1/8" stereo phone jacks on them to plug
into your favorite portable MP3 player's earphone jack. These amplified
computer speakers work great for an MP3 player. Put both stereo speakers

I'll take the speaker if you decide to trash it.

Pete

 

[Richard Crowley]

gaikokujinkyofusho wrote ...

Hi, I have an old antique radio that i found in my aunt's attic.
Unfortunately the innards were gutted at some point so it is now a
shell with a old (brittle) speaker in it. I *do*not* want to
maul/deface this radio (the face of it and outside in general is in
fairly good condition other than its missing knobs) but i would like
to
put a mp3 player in it and somehow put knobs to the player and maybe a
small LCD face plate (not sure about non-destructive ways to attach
it)
on this radio. I am not all that good with electronics (never been
able
to solder very well) and was hoping there was something like a kit for
these kind of things. If anyone out there knows of such a thing then
please let me know!

http://www.pjrc.com/tech/mp3/ is a "bare bones" MP3 player
board which you can customize into whatever case you like.

 

[jakdedert]

there arent any adapter kits for this at all. I have been at least hoping
to find a way to make a "universal" AM-FM-AUX chassis but havent come up
with anything adaptable that would get the dial to line up. The other
controls could be easily adjustable, I know.

Gary Tayman's been doing this for car radios. No reason why he couldn't
do a table model....

jak