Random radio photo

This is the first set I ever owned. Bought at about age 13 from a neighbour who lived a couple of miles behind our farm. I took our IHC B414 tractor and a utility trailer down the concession to pick it up.  It's a "Columbia" branded set which I could never find any information on. Purely by accident I came across the identical set many years later in a friends garage and it was branded as DeForest, and had a model #. It appears to be a Canadian DeForest built in about 1931 and sold as a Columbia. I still have this one.

Nice looking radio. Is that the original finnish? If not, someone did a wonderful job on it.

Bill Cahill wrote:Nice looking radio. Is that the original finnish? If not, someone did a wonderful job on it.

H Bill,

Yes, that is the original finish. Actually, with the exception of a couple of electrolytics under the chassis to replace the two that I clipped out of the power supply, nothing on this set has ever been repaired. Except for those two filter caps it is completely original. It does work although I do not play it except rarely.

John, I hope you intend to rebuild the set. I wouldn't like to see it damaged, and, you know what often happens.

Bill,

I only play it when I have my bench set up so that I can make sure it's not drawing any excess current and only for a minute or so just to make sure it still works. My plan for the set, because I know the history back to the first owner is to leave it alone, completely original except for those two caps I subbed in. They are reversible and cannot be seen anyway. I think it is a very unusual set, and while not valuable in monetary terms I think it is quite rare.

cheers

John

Very pretty radio. I haven't caught the console bug myself, but I do appreciate the styling.