Just found the radio I listen to in the Navy

djnagle

AK Subscriber
Subscriber
As a Radioman in the Navy, when ever we were over seas, I always took the midwatch (midnight to 7am) and listened to this radio. It covered the AM band and I listen to music from all over the world. I just found one for $250 that has been totally gone through.

http://www.penan.net/dx/r-390a.htm

 
Cool unit! Is that the frequency display in the middle?

When I was a kid, my dad was heavy into CB.
I remember reading about "DX-ing" in some of his mags and later used to tune in ham stuff on a scanner just to hear people from all over talk about whatever.

Neat hobby, but internet radio kind of made it accessible to all without much effort.

'Kind of like the "old days" of going across town to rent a movie for a night in.
Now, we have 40,000 movies and shows ready for instant viewing on 3/4 dozen devices in the house...
 
As a meteorological technician, plotter, and observer in the 60s in the RCN, we had something similar and quite probably the same receiver. The sparkers, the RPs, and the meteorologist were using this type of receivers, although the sparkers being the primary user.

In between hourly ratts for maps plotting, I also used it to listen to different AM channels at night time while at sea. My favourite had to be Radio Luxembourg , and a couple of pirate radio, Radio Caroline and Radio London.
 
As a Radioman in the Navy, when ever we were over seas, I always took the midwatch (midnight to 7am) and listened to this radio. It covered the AM band and I listen to music from all over the world. I just found one for $250 that has been totally gone through.

http://www.penan.net/dx/r-390a.htm


wow!! you found a collins r390a that has been gone through.i hope you bought it as that is a score and a half.its been on my want list for a very long time and i will eventually get one.enjoy.
 
Cool radios, I have a couple of them and a couple of the R390A's..a 51J-4, R388, 51S-1, 75S-3A and a 75S-3B, 2-75A-3's and three 75A-4's...one KWM-2 and four KWM-2A's, 30L-1...love Collins gear....

The R-390/URR was a better sounding receiver for BCB DX and SWL'ing than the R-390A/URR as the former had tuned circuits for the differing IF bandwidths versus the mechanical filters in the A version, and seemed to have a smoother pass-band audio response, but the A version was more selective due to the steeper skirts of the mechanical filters...

I also have an NC-183D like Radioactive's signature pic with its' matching speaker (those receivers are capable of truly high fidelity AM reception when hooked up to a good wide range speaker due to its' decent 6V6 push-pull amplifier), a CAA RCP ground receiver (kind of like a bandswitching early HRO for the predecessor of the FAA) and an HRO-60T...along with Hallicrafters R-274/SX-73, SX-16, and my sole Hammarlund, an HQ-180AC...

I have two Drake receivers, a fully loaded R4-C (with a T4XC) and a TR-7A with the Gilfer Shortwave mods done to it slaved to my TR-7A...

There's more, but you get the idea, I love these old rigs....I use 2 antenna multicouplers to feed up to 12 receivers at a time...with a Johnson TR switch inline with my BC-610 or 32V-2 and a muting circuit I built to mute any receivers I wanted to use with either of the two transmitters....

But, all my old Elmer AM'ers on 3880 have all turned to silent keys and it's probably been a decade since I fired up the BC610 and made any transmissions...I even made a few AM mode 75m contacts with Louis Erath, the founder of LWE speakers...I really learned a lot from them, but every time I listen in on the 75m AM window all I hear is static...Koby, Bill Ross, Sulphur John, Otis Nonken, Ashtabula Bill, John Mohn, Boraxo John, Ozona Bob....and more that have just slipped through the cracks of my mind, all gone....it's been years since I've heard the sound of Johnson Desk Kilowatt cutting through the static being driven by a Johnson Viking....

.
 
Nice, Is this actually a Collins unit or one of the later ones. My R390A is a 1967 EAC unit which means it was built by Hammarlund. what have they done for the 3TF7 ballast tube. If it is still there you will want to replace it with it's solid state replacement as I have done on my R390A much better. I have always got a kick out of the Veeder-Root mechanical display. Here is the download to the best tech manual for your R390A the Y2K manual. It is free. http://hilltoparmyradios.com/1948_R390A-Y2K-Release-1.PDF If you really want to be astonished in the back look for the diode out binding posts through an isolation transformer run that into an good audio amp The R390A will sound like an old console radio.

RickB, I remember Ozona Bob, his Viking 1 and his 30+ minute key down rag chews. Now that I have retired I am going to put the My Viking 1 transmitter on the work bench and get it going again. I will match it up with my very most favorite receiver the R388/URR.
 
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Nice, Is this actually a Collins unit or one of the later ones. My R390A is a 1967 EAC unit which means it was built by Hammarlund. what have they done for the 3TF7 ballast tube. If it is still there you will want to replace it with it's solid state replacement as I have done on my R390A much better. I have always got a kick out of the Veeder-Root mechanical display. Here is the download to the best tech manual for your R390A the Y2K manual. It is free. http://hilltoparmyradios.com/1948_R390A-Y2K-Release-1.PDF

Most all of the R390/URR's I have seen have been Collins manufactured, while most of the R-390A/URR's have been made by other contractors, the A in the rack in the shack is an EAC model.

If you really want to be astonished in the back load for the diode out binding posts through an isolation transformer run that into an good audio amp The R390A will sound like an old console radio.

And, because of the gentler slopes of the R-390/URR's LC tuned circuit filters and less ripple the straight 390 has a bit of an edge over the mechanical filtered version here, too.

RickB, I remember Ozona Bob, his Viking 1 and his 30+ minute key down rag chews. Now that I have retired I am going to put the My Viking 1 transmitter on the work bench and get it going again. I will match it up with my very most favourite receiver the R388/URR.

That was the standard operating practice for our group back then...i.e., you make a transmission...not just a wham-bam-thank-you-ma'am quickie, but a real transmission of substantial content....which is still quite different from 99% of the SSB contacts I've had in all my years as a Ham...

Bill Ross, K5LLK (SK) and I used to go to the Hamfests out in Midland and Odessa so we'd always stop by to visit with Bob and go have a bite to eat with him at a restaurant he liked...we'd visit his "shack" and see all the gear and his turnstile 75m antenna up on the Black Diamond telephone poles...

I still try to get in on the Collins Collectors Net on Sundays, 14.263 MHz, when conditions are decent and mostly to exercise my S-line or KWM-2/30L-1, but that's about all the Hamming I do now...except maybe for 10m FM repeaters with my FT-990/Alpha 76A....worked a few European stations through the New York repeater recently...

I've also got an R-388 out in the garage that needs it's VFO rebuilt...never got around to it since the 51J-4 replaced it in the rack...

But, I really, really miss the "good ole days" of AM'ing and my friends...my Barker and Williamson BC-610-I was gone through by John Mohn before I got it so that it has a 50 Ohm SO-239 antenna output alleviating the need to have the companion antenna matching unit, man, that guy was a freaking RF genius...he also worked out at Southwest Research Institute in the RF labs....the last time I saw him he was in a nursing home and didn't hardly remember who I was or even know why he wasn't at home...he passed several years ago, now....
 
Hope you bought it, sir...that's a deal & a half. Don't own one but have had a chance to play with one for a while...what a machine!
 
Yep, $250 is a great price for one in such nice shape that has been "gone through", I know it will bring you many, many hours of listening enjoyment, as mine have, and rest assured that you have a piece of history that will never, ever be duplicated!

Edit:
I blew up your photograph and see that you do have the A version, which in the grand scheme of things, is the more desirable version with its' mechanical IF filters and a bit of simplification of the circuitry due to them...but, both versions use the 3TF7 ballast tube....I need to pull my non-A out of the rack and do something to replace its' ballast, but, damn, those things are so freaking heavy!
 
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The R-390A is the radio all the others are judged by... In civilian use, it should last you the rest of yr life, no problems.
 
So, you start at the top of the heap for an entry price of peanuts, what next. You will never know the thrill of starring at the bottom, blowing goobs of money, fixing, modding, having thing blow and wiggling through stacks of unused units. I feel sorry for you.

That is an amazing grab, they were still around when I was in the Navy and remember the graveyard shifts. We would volunteer for extra duty during the day when the ball games or something else we scheduled and I loved listening to what is now old time radio programs. New stuff may arguably be better but it feels like complete junk nest to these old anchors. I hope you really enjoy it for years to come.
 
Gosh a BC-610 now there is a true boatanchor transmitter. Nice thing about them if there is a hurricane you just chain yourself to one and you ain't going anywhere.
 
Gosh a BC-610 now there is a true boatanchor transmitter. Nice thing about them if there is a hurricane you just chain yourself to one and you ain't going anywhere.

Yeah, the KWS-1 I have out in the garage isn't anywhere near as heavy!

There are stories of BC-610's left behind after WWII that were utilized as AM broadcast stations as their 300+ watts of AM power could be run 24/7 and not give up...a 250TH modulated by a pair of 100TH tubes will definitely warm up my house in the dead of winter.

One of the things I like about the 390 series is that the front panels are heavy, engraved aluminum....which means you can strip them to bare metal and repair small nicks, scratches, etc., repaint them, and fill in the lettering with white paint and have them looking like new...the knobs are also all metal and can be refinished with Rustoleum 777 (if I remember correctly) Satin Black (which can also be used on the counter and meter covers), and you can really make a unit look like new again for not too much effort or outlay of cash.

There were a few of the EAC units made that I have seen that had black front panels and thought that maybe one day I'd do that....but, I really like the gray.

It also looks like yours has a set of replacement meters which is interesting, my units have the original radioactive units due to the radium paint used in them....
 
Great post guys! One can always quickly recognize the "A model" from the non-A by observing the antenna trim pot at the center top of the "A model" unit above the nomenclature tag. The non-A units did not have it located in this space.

What a great buy here. These receivers are worth considerably more than $250 these days. Regarding the rare 3TF7 tube most R390a owners squirreled away a bunch of spares back in the day. Same for the hard to find 26z5w rectifier tubes.

I continue to be pleasantly surprised that there are numerous forum members here that own these wonderful receivers. Appreciated and still in use after over 60 years.
 
R390A. when I read "antenna" in your post I realized I don't know what type of antenna to use. Any suggestions???
 
Sorry I was late getting back to answer you. On the rear of the receiver there are two antenna jacks; J103 for a short, unbalanced whip antenna and J104 for a balanced 125 ohm long wire dipole antenna. This jack requires a particular double wire coax the number of which I cannot recall at this moment however it is called out in the TM manuals. Most operators nowadays would use the UG970/U adaptor to convert the balanced J104 jack to SO 239 or to female BNC rather than the milspec setup. In some instances J103 also works very well with a longer wire also. This jack requires a Male C connector if I recall correctly. Experimentation will usually give favorable results.
 
djnagle check out the new TM that RickB mentioned or get the three original TM's that are associated with these units. Best regards.
 
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