Pborten: Wow! Congratulations on finding what I believe is one of the earlier Fishers to surface here at AK. Oh, and welcome to AK. I'd love to see some photos. Incidentally, the Expander loop should only affect the phono input. The Expander was designed to restore the dynamics to older records and was not used in the tuner signal chain. Your radio has a separate problem.
The R-3 chassis wasn't used contemporaneously with the "Wilton" cabinet. What you have is somewhat older and is probably much rarer, too. Fisher kept renaming your particular model. I believe yours is the original
1954 Futura model in the
Tempo cabinet which appears identical to the later Wilton. The wood used in the Tempo cabinet is supposedly Korina! The Wilton was merely walnut.
The
Futura series debuted in the 1954 model year with the R-3 chassis (available in the
MR-10 "Mayfair", $549.50;
TR-10 "Tempo", $569.50 or
PR-10 "Provincial" $569.50 cabinets) as a new line of consoles slightly less expensive than the Electra series.
In 1955 it became the
Custom Futura series with the J-10 chassis (available in the
BJ-10 "Brittany" - formerly the "Provincial,
CJ-10 "Covington" - formerly the "Mayfair" or the
TJ-10 "Tempo" cabinets) all priced at $429.50. AK member Relaximus has a beautiful example of this series in the Covington cabinet.
In 1956 it was again renamed as the
Medalist II series with the R-20 chassis. The cabinets, model numbers and the price carried over from the previous model year.
In 1957 the series name,
Medalist II, remained unchanged but the cabinets were renamed; the model numbers were finally changed to reflect the R-20 chassis and the price shot up to $479.50. The "Brittany" became the
R-20P "Provence"; the "Covington" became the
R-20S "Stratford" and the "Tempo" became the
R-20W "Wilton".
The Medalist II series continued unchanged into 1958 but with only the Provence cabinet available. The price remained $479.50. The model number was the R-20. The letter code that follows the model number specifies the wood/finish (M=Mahogany; P=Fruitwood).
For reference, these are the 1957 versions of the three Futura/Custom Futura/Medalist II cabinets with their different names; the oldest (1954) at the top of the list. There were hardware (drawer pulls, handles etc.) and wood/finish changes over the years, but the cabinets remained substantially the same.