Radio Road Which tuner to get and getting the most from it. Thank God, for the radio!

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Sherwood tuner arrives

Posted by Thermionic27609 (A) on April 30, 2009 at 11:19:00

The Sherwood S-3000 II arrived in the mail yesterday, and I had a chance to go through it last night. This one is SN 938268. Dates on tubes and other components put it in late 1959.

First, it was FILTHY beyond just about anything I've seen in electronic equipment. The grime came off in layers. I was told by the seller that it sat for years in the storage room of a McIntosh dealer. But under the grime, it actually looks pretty good.

The tubes were all original, most branded in a very fancy script: "Sherwood by Sylvania." I don't think I've ever seen tubes marked quite that way. The 6AB4 is a Sherwood-branded GE tube, and the rectifier and eye tube are Amperex.

Tube complement is: 6BS8, 6AB4, 12AZ7, 6AU6 x 3, 6EB8, 6BN8, 6V4 rectifier, and EM80 indicator. All tubes tested in the good range except for the triode section of the 6EB8 which was in the '?' range. The eye tube tested weak, but it works well enough.

The power supply can is original, so I brought it up to power slowly using diodes and a variac. It survived. No internal capacitors seem to be leaky. Switches were very noisy and had to be treated with Deoxit. (Last time I bought contact cleaner, I got the small bottle of 100% solution, and I'm finding I prefer it to the spray--or treatment with 100% Deoxit followed by a flushing spray.)

The only thing I saw that concerned me was that a lot of wax had leaked out of the power transformer, but I can't detect any power transformer problem. The fuse wasn't blown and the rectifier tube tested like new. It gets hot after being on a while, but not unusually so for tube gear.

I cleaned the tube pins, installed them, and turned it on. It worked fine from the get-go including the "Interchannel Hush." In fact, it gets excellent reception even on distant stations that give some of my other tuners a little trouble. As many others have noted, it's very easy to listen to--very non-fatiguing sound.

I bought this to play with based on the reviews I've read on here, and I'd say it's worth the $25 I paid for it... I've got the board to build one of Bob Fitzgerald's LM4500 MPX units, and I'm thinking these might make a nice pair.

I do like the Interchannel Hush feature, a much more useful circuit, IMHO than something like Scott's "Sonic Monitor."

David

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