[jerryhawthorne]

Congrats Mortz, guess the suerte was with you! Naw, it was just skill and cunning.
Jerry

[morzh]

Here are the photos.

Again, the cabinet has not been touched. Yet.
Also I suspect the chassis sits a little skewed, judging by the location of the centerline on the dial and the shadograph's shadow. Not sure why - thought the screws would straighten it automatically, but...OK I will try to adjust it.
   
Assembled.
   
Shadograph when tuned.
   
Shadograph when out of tuning.

[jerryhawthorne]

Mortz, that looks really nice! Are the lower knobs shafts centered the the cabinet holes? If so, perhaps the tuner mounts can be adjusted slightly to center the dial scale a little? As for the shadow meter, a slight bending of the bracket to move the bulb horizontally will center beam.
Jerry

[Ron Ramirez]

Congratulations, Morzh! Seeing your 18L brings back memories...the very first 1930s Philco I ever owned was an 18L which was identical to yours. It had a power transformer which was ready to give up...when you put in the dial lamps for the dial and for the shadow meter, the transformer would smoke. Leave out the lamp for the shadowmeter, and it worked OK. So then-young Ron left the shadowmeter lamp out. This was about 100 years ago, when I was younger and didn't know any better.

That set also served as my introduction to bakelite blocks. My remedy at the time? I pulled all of those old things out and threw them away, and installed terminal strips with the new capacitors. Again, I was much younger then and didn't know any better. Al Gore had not yet invented the Internet and we only had Antique Radio Topics and the Horn Speaker to keep us informed about vintage radios. And, yes, there was Radio Age as well, but I couldn't afford to subscribe to all three at the time.

Ah, yes, the not-so-good old days.

[morzh]

Thanks guys, it's fun to hear it play, especvially considering my AM 1160 Good Times Oldies station is the strongest one and today it is doo-wop, Credence, "Get back" etc....this is the right equipment to liosten to those.

Jerry,

I tried everything, and every trial is taking it out and then centering it.....First of the dial is too close to the escutcheon and sometimes I can hear it rub against it.....so I tried to move the dial a bit in (had to remember the position....tightening that screw is a RPITB, the dial moves every time) and then it would get stuck around 1400, so had to move it back.

The tuning cap is mounted on grommets so not much adjustment there, alas.
And yes, the shadow meter can be bent a bit but I am so much afraid to break something.....I adjusted it just a tad, and for shadometer that's enough, when it tunes in the shadow is practically in the middle, but the lighted slit for the dial is a bit off.
Also could be something due to the grommets the chassis is mounted on, one of them is oversized and does not allow much skewing teh chassis, although this did not help much in the first place, so....

I decided "best is enemy of good'nuff" and am gonna live it for now. It looks just fine and works great. And even without alignment the 1160 station is at 1160.

As you can see the cloth is not what I hoped it would be, but the situation is such that today I am beggar not chooser due to that cloth shortage, or as the Russian saying goes, "where there's no fish, crayfish is the fish", so I had to buy whatever I saw fit on eBay. One day when the right one pops up...and if I am still alive and able to work with radio and high voltages....then we'll see

Well, this is it for now for this one, or at least for the major part, off to the 38-15, then to 7G605.

[morzh]

Ron,

speaking of Radio age....when I was young I read the Soviet radio amateur magazine called simply "Radio". Great magazine, you could even say I learned my todays trade from it. Serious circuitry designer, serious discussions, and all kinds of stuff, from ham to computers to Hi-Fi audio, automation, tape-recording, phono...you name it - it was there.
Yes it was run by Soviet Government and the main purpose was getting young people to get patriotic as well as tech-savvy, but who cares - I got from it what I needed. Starting from 1980 I started subscribing to it, and did so up 'till the very day I left, 1989.
One issue had a photo of my Morse code coach, Valentina Isakova, the world champion in the sport, with all her medals....

A week ago rummaging through the eBay I found a guy who sells bound year-by-year full subscriptions of this magazine, and this was the warmest feeling, as he shows the fropnt page and one-two pages from inside, and I realized I remember those photos on those pages, and the name of some article, and the schematics....as if I got back to over 30 years back.
I had a really bad itch to buy that, but then you could download every issue for free on demand today.

And I did not find that magazine with my coach's photo on the fron page....do not remember the year.

Gosh.....oh, well.

[Mondial]

Looking at the photo of the escutcheon and dial, it looks like the dial and bright reference line are in the right position ,but the escutcheon is shifted to the right by about 4 or 5 mm. I wonder if someone remounted it on that position? I guess it would be easy enough to remove the 3 escutcheon mounting screws and see if it could be repositioned in the correct location.

[morzh]

Judging by the position of the tuning knob, it itself is about 2mm off to the left. Which is about how much the dial slit is off. So I think the escutcheon is OK, it is the chassis that is de-centered. Somehow I am not sure why. Could be that one grommet tat is wider and does not allow to shift the chassis to the right a bit more.

[jerryhawthorne]

Morzh, are the lower knobs centered in their holes? If so I don't think your tuning capacitor is setting level with the chassis. If they too are off, you need to level the chassis. A picture like the last posted taken straight on with the knobs off would be instructive.

Jerry

[morzh]

Jerry

As I noted right before your post I think (I looked from above) the shafts of the tuning cap is off center by about 2mm. Not sure why. Cannot move the chassis much. Maybe that one grommet that is wider than others (I inherited all 4).

[jerryhawthorne]

Quick and easy test Mortz, take and loosen the chassis mount screws on the left side of the radio (looking from the front) and slip a wedge of some type under that side from the back to essentially raise that side. Should not have to be raised more than perhaps 1/2 mm as the shift in location of the dial will be magnified by it's height above the chassis. Set it where your dial is centered. If all looks good, you will need to shim up the chassis grommets on that side a tad. This is where the really soft compliant chassis grommets are nice as they have a wide range of compression and you can "dial" chassis placement through adjusting the tension on them.
This should also help with your shadow meter alignment.
Jerry

[Arran]

To my eyes it looks like the chassis just needs to be shifted over a bit horizonatally, as the big tuning knob is also off to one side with regard to the escutcheon, and it is in line vertically with the control below it (bandswitch?) and the indicator. I think if it were a case of the chassis washers being taller on one side then the bottom controls would be cocked over at an angle somewhat.
Regards
Arran

[jerryhawthorne]

I agree with your idea as well Aaron. The real answer to the problem is to see how the lower three shafts align with the holes in the cabinet with the knobs off. If they are 2-3mm off center laterally it is a case of moving the chassis if not, a slight raising of one side should do it.
Jerry