stereofisher
11-16-2005, 05:27 PM
Just got a nice version of this radio today off Ebay. Cosmetically its a little nicer than my first one. My Uncle got one to use in the Adirondecks in the 60's. No radio worked during the day. It developed in the late 50's by Conrad Jutson at GE. He fixed radio equipement for the British Navy before coming to the states.
GE put Jutson in charge of developing a radio that outperformed the best tube radios of the period. Its very heavily made. My first one only needed a cleaning and a touchup on the IF's to get a lot of volume out of it. Pretty good for a radio that 35 years old.
The P780 is an eight transistor AM only model. They did produce a AM-FM version thats hard to find. The "P" stand for portable in the GE line. It uses 6 "D" batteries and run for 500 to 700 hrs on a set of the old flashlight batteries. Who knows how long a set of alkalines will last? I have the first set that I put in March of this year (2005).
I never took one apart until this year. Had one in high school. Mom tossed it when they sold the house in the 70's. The IF's are huge. Has four of them with a three gang tuner. Its heavy with a big chrome face. The speaker is a heavy 5 inch mounted to that nice chrome face. The case is made out of ABS plastic with dimples on it to cut down on the finger prints. You can hook up an outside antenna to it. I'm sure GE sold a bunch of them during the Cuban Missile Crisis back in 1962. One of the things I like is it was designed in Utica NY at GE's Radio Receiver Dept. and made in Rochester NY.
I keep it on my nightstand. Great for listening to AM740 from Canada and 1520 from Buffalo as well as Yankees Baseball on CBS Newsradio 88. You can find out more by going to Sarah Lowery's web site. She collects radios and her site is great place to find model numbers on radios I know of but dont know the model number. Visit her at: http://www.transistor.org/feature/jutson/feature.html A fun site :yes: I will try to post a pic. I have a new cam and I am not sure how to reduce the pics on it.
Eric
GE put Jutson in charge of developing a radio that outperformed the best tube radios of the period. Its very heavily made. My first one only needed a cleaning and a touchup on the IF's to get a lot of volume out of it. Pretty good for a radio that 35 years old.
The P780 is an eight transistor AM only model. They did produce a AM-FM version thats hard to find. The "P" stand for portable in the GE line. It uses 6 "D" batteries and run for 500 to 700 hrs on a set of the old flashlight batteries. Who knows how long a set of alkalines will last? I have the first set that I put in March of this year (2005).
I never took one apart until this year. Had one in high school. Mom tossed it when they sold the house in the 70's. The IF's are huge. Has four of them with a three gang tuner. Its heavy with a big chrome face. The speaker is a heavy 5 inch mounted to that nice chrome face. The case is made out of ABS plastic with dimples on it to cut down on the finger prints. You can hook up an outside antenna to it. I'm sure GE sold a bunch of them during the Cuban Missile Crisis back in 1962. One of the things I like is it was designed in Utica NY at GE's Radio Receiver Dept. and made in Rochester NY.
I keep it on my nightstand. Great for listening to AM740 from Canada and 1520 from Buffalo as well as Yankees Baseball on CBS Newsradio 88. You can find out more by going to Sarah Lowery's web site. She collects radios and her site is great place to find model numbers on radios I know of but dont know the model number. Visit her at: http://www.transistor.org/feature/jutson/feature.html A fun site :yes: I will try to post a pic. I have a new cam and I am not sure how to reduce the pics on it.
Eric