[terrylett]

The surgery was a complete success and the patient is alive and well.

I got up early today and out of boredom I decided to go with my "AC cord bypass plan".

I fished the new polarized cord through the hole I drilled, soldered the hot wire to the AC input prong that had a wire attached to the switch, soldered the neutral to the other prong, tied the internal cord knot and used a little rubber sealant to keep the knot stuck to the hole. I will also tie a cord knot outside the chassis and seal it in place in a little while to help insure that the cord isn't going to move.

My soldering was tight and there was absolutely no crossover globs on or anywhere around each prong.

I popped the tubes back in as well as the huge dial lamp and put everything back in the case.

I put the radio on my 12" X 12" X 1/4" rubber mat and plugged it into the iso trans.

Turned it on (with a rubber glove and one hand out of paranoia) and it worked perfectly. I had to snip the loop and external antenna connections a day or two ago just to be able to get at everything so I knew I wasn't going to grab many stations but good 'ol WLW AM 700 came in loud and clear and doesn't stay on the entire dial range when tuning so I'm confident I will have good tuning and reception when I reattach the antenna connections.

The volume control is a little crackly but that will be addressed.

I snipped the original torn up AC cord on the back cover and plugged up that hole with sealant. I just have to drill out a hole on the back cover to position and pull the replacement cord through.

I'm confident that the chassis "floats" and that once everything is reassembled there will be no 110V charge parting my hair.

Things may be judged a little like a cross between voodoo and hillbilly engineering but it actually presents itself pretty well.