[Eric T]

I have a friend who wants to buy her husband a restored Grundig from the 40's or 50's era. 
Can anybody recommend a reputable source?

[Paul Philco322]

i have a friend in Massachusetts. Not sure if he would ship, he is a Clock Repair expert but he may sell something from his collection. Google-Ross Hochstrasser Clock and you should get his shop website, you could email him. Ross is a boat anchor guy but has many German sets, understatement.

You can tell him i suggested him that way he can get mad at me!

Paul

[Eric T]

Thanks, Paul. I've heard you talk to Ross on Tube Talk a lot. Impressive fellow.

[Paul Philco322]

He is the man as far as I am concerned with European sets, he still has quite a few as i have seen them at our club swapmeets. There is another fellow up here who sells fine europeans, his name is spanish or portugese if my memory is working at all. Cannot remember his name. Ross knows him.

Paul

[Arran]

 You probably won't find any Grundigs from the 1940s, they were most definately a post war company and didn't get into the export business until they teamed up with Majestic in the mid 1950s, so most of their products are from about that time up until the early 1970s. I try to stay away from German sets as a rule, one Achilles heel most have is the piano key bandswitch assembly, whoever thought up the idea to use the bandswitch mechanism to turn the set on and off should have been shot as it eventually wears out the contacts. Of course they are also a dirt trap so they have all sorts of problems with dust and crud getting into them.
The Grundigs from the 1960s at least also had a habit of using polystyrene in the slides when they should have used phenolic, which can be destroyed by the wrong solvents getting in there. If they had built these assemblies like Philco did in their 1942 to 1949 sets they would never have these problems, thicker contacts, and slides made out of phenolic, they did it right the first time. I have a Telefunken with a failed power switch and, if I feel motivated enough, I will retrofit the set with a normal on-off tone/volume type switch that properly designed radios have.
Regards
Arran