Fisher 400 Tune O Matic

drbacklash

Active Member
A friend who knows I mess around with vintage Sansui equipment gave me a Fisher 400 Tune O Matic this past week. I plugged it in, turned it on and got it to play on FM. I'm not too impressed with what I heard so I don't know if its supposed to sound that way (i.e. low end equipment) or if it needs some TLC. I never worked on tube equipment before I don't think I'm going to start now.

What information is available on this unit?
 
If you haven't done so, please read the Sticky about Tube Unit care. That's a great place to get started.

On the FM, there is some maintenance involved with it as well such as cleaning the tuning capacitor's fingers and fins. I'd not concern myself with performance until this sort of work has been done and re-evaluated.

Cheers,

David
 
"Tune-O-Matic" as in preset tuning? The Fishers with the presets were solid state units (although the earliest SS Fishers used a tube or two in the FM front end).

EDIT: such as this guy (image, obviously, borrowed from Oak Tree Ent.) :)
This is technically a "400T"

Fischer_400-T_Stereo_Receiver_web.jpg


EDIT^2: The early SS Fishers (and most other early SS hifi gear) were intrinsically pretty mediocre sounding -- they weren't low-end, though; list prices for the early SS Fisher gear greatly exceeded the selling price of the still-available Fisher tube receivers ca. 1965-66.
 
These are full of caps and to get the most out of it, would need to ge to a tech. In fighting form they are quite good for an early SS receiver. Engineering and construction are 1st rate. There was the 450TX and 500TX above it. The 400TX is all solid state and 2nd or 3rd generation Fisher SS depending on how you count the 600-T that was a hybrid.
 
The picture posted by mrh is exactly what I have so it is a solid state 400T. Just doesn't excite me like the vintage Sansuis. I remember the Fisher name well from the 60s but I could never afford anything beyond a $35 transistor radio until much later.

Thanks guys for the info.
 
Just to be clear, that is a 400TX. The T series does not have the varactor tuner allowing for the presets. Not sure if the preamp and power amp stages are the same.
 
Interesting... the Oaktree photo montage shows a tag labeled 400T...
It clearly has the Varactor presets, whatever it is.

Fischer_400-T_Stereo_Receiver_collage.jpg
 
Fisher was terrible with their model nomenclature and consistency especially in their US SS era. The TX series was the varactor with presets, the T series was the nonpreset series that came before it. Thene there is the 600-T that was not actuall a SS receiver as it was a hybrid. Sort of like the early Sony lineup. What the front and back said was not necessarily what the actual designated model was.
 
There was never a "400-TX". The receiver pictured is a 400-T. As has been mentioned, Fisher wasn't terribly consistent in model nomenclature.

There is more than one model with the Tune-O-Matic tuning without an "X" in the model number, starting with the The Fisher 390.

50 watts RMS/channel.
 

Attachments

  • IMG_NEW (Medium).jpg
    IMG_NEW (Medium).jpg
    90.2 KB · Views: 110
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom