Conion C100 resto

[jimmyjimmy19702010]

No change. Remember, the paper cones were dyed from the factory. UV exposure has just pulled the dye out over time and we're just putting it back (only this time, we're only re-colouring the outer surface of one side. How would that change the sound? Coating it with paint would have to have more of an affect than a little ink.

I've recoloured all my black speakers over the years and they all work great.

 

[caution]

It's been way too long since I posted anything but I've been busy every day on it, knocking one thing after another off the to-do list. The dial window got new heat stakes, melted those down this weekend and added some E6000. All front chassis wires rerouted/glued/ziptied. A second backlight had to be designed from scratch for the VU meters since the first one didn't fit. Serves me right for not waiting until the case was back in my possession!

I've got a lot of picture-sorting done but still have more to go through. At this point all I have left is rebuilding the pin for the spare tape drawer, and getting new trims made. I actually gave the pin rebuild a shot already, but after plastic-welding a new pin on there that I made, it sheared off again, although the drawer worked for a bit. I think the head of my pin wasn't rounded enough and kept catching on a section of the groove it runs in. Probably the worst designed part of the unit.

So, tonight I try and drill a tapping hole for a 2-56 screw with a head just big enough to run the slot mechanism, we'll see if that works or if I have to resort to fabricating a metal plate I glue to the back with a flange that accepts a screw. Really don't want to have to do that, since I don't exactly have a machine shop.

The trims are still a work in progress, I may not finish the artwork for a while, it's very tedious, so I may be forced to use the bent-up piece I got back from paint. There is a slightly nicer piece on a second unit I purchased that I've been using as a reference (and not much more, it was a smoker's box and not much was in better shape, except for the dial glass and beat switch.

It looks GORGEOUS so far though!

 

[caution]

OK, I'll start with pics of my attempts at a pin and a backlight...
The gizmo store had a box of these cheapie wired joysticks for $2.50, which seemed like a good starting point for the pin.
Un-twisted the cord and voila, some extra wire now too

 

[blu_fuz]

^ So the blue pin didn't work?

 

[caution]

First, the one that didn't fit. Will use it on a future box
I drilled evenly spaced holes into diffuser plastic from a laptop screen, then glued them into place.

The second one I made came from a 300-LED reel of LED's I got from China on ebay for a few bucks. I got three different whites - cool, warm and "pure" which looked the best so I used that. The reels had the LEDs in sets of 3, using 150-ohm resistors, which was meant for 12V. I wanted to re-use my 4-LED, 330-ohm setup for 15-18V I had calculated, so I had to remove all the resistors and rewire them to be in sets of four instead. Tedious, eye-crossing work but I got what I wanted! Glued two of the pieces of strip together so the lights were alternating, giving me roughly the same spacing.

 

[caution]

^ So the blue pin didn't work?

Nope, even with being welded it wasn't strong enough.

 

[blu_fuz]

Damn.


The LED chip layout looks pretty good. That's all I use now on my LED mod boxes. So handy.

 

[caution]

Yeah man it sucks! Nothing a little more MacGyvering won't fix

Some pics of the beat switch, handle regreasing, heat staking, and the case.

 

[Lasonic TRC-920]

Just read this whole thread start to finish. DAMN that is a lot of work. But to bring this radio up to BRAND NEW and beyond is well worth it.

The security of all new cap's. The updates with the LED lighting and tweeters. All the plastic's repair.

Simply outstanding.

Your fabrication skills and the fact that you aren't afraid to find a source/answer to the problem is inspiring!

This Beast is going to rip the street from one end to the other!

 

[caution]

Thanks bud! Yeah this thing is rockin! I finally got it back together tonight just before midnight, after being in pieces for FOUR MONTHS, I had to play it loud for a sec. Or two. Haha My neighbors will forgive me!

But yeah, so holy sh*tballs are the VU backlights bright. Might have to dial that down. The tuning cord is catching on some wire probably on the lower half, the stereo wide switch is in need of even more Deoxit, the door springs were made with the assumption they'd ride up against a piece of the frame (they don't), so a little more bending to do there, but yeah, tweets sound great, and the TRAY IS FIXED! I MacGyvered the hell out of it after I got home, I slowly and oh-so-carefully tapped my hole with a pick, then the tiniest bit I had, slowly, by hand, with a Dremel, then used a 1/16" diamond coated cylinder drill bit to avoid wander, then once the hole was deep enough and going the right direction I moved to the 5/64" bit, which I took about a dozen slow and careful punches at the tray.

The area I was drilling into was about 3/4 of a plastic cylinder, actually less because the inner wall of the tray along this isn't completely flat, the mold left a divot there, so I had to angle the drill slightly back, you can see in the final twists that it started to deform the back wall of the column, but I only drilled as far as I had to, I actually put the screw in once and tried it, but it was too high up, and by too high I mean about a millimeter taller than I had my plastic pin, so I took the screw out and re-drilled it a tiny bit so I could get it a bit lower, and even four turns was too far, I had to back it out just a small amount and BAM! I hit the sweet spot, no scraping on the top of the head, it just glides effortlessly open and closed. Love love love it! I may threadlock it to be safe.

And finally, I sanded down the surface where I welded the tray cracks and cut out the liner from the sticker pattern I thought would look cool, and it went down beautifully. I carefully lined up the solid long edge and tacked it down with a toothpick, then pulled the rest of the backing off and let them dangle as I slowly worked them onto the tray. Absolute perfect fit, except a few tiny air bubbles.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VsPbwi2nKp4

 

[blu_fuz]

Go to bed!

 

[Lasonic TRC-920]

EXCELLENT work!

Love the checker board in the tape drawer!

Really looking good

 

[blu_fuz]

I do have to say that I think your cassette tray spring is sprung too tight. That could be putting too much pressure on the screw/plastic post.

 

[caution]

Interesting... it's the original spring, and doesn't feel too bad, but yeah, it pops out pretty quick, could use a gear oil wheel

 

[SLO]

Lookin dam good caution, dam good I say...I like the checkered pattern man, reminds me of a pair of VANS slip ons

 

[retrohead]

definately a good box to restore,im still kicking myself since 1998 after missing out on an english c100 for ten quid

 

[jimmyjimmy19702010]

definately a good box to restore,im still kicking myself since 1998 after missing out on an english c100 for ten quid

Nah, ten quid was a lot of money in '98!!

 

[docs]

Top notch caution, I echo Lasonic TRC-920's comments. McGyver at it's finest!!!

 

[caution]

I've been known to get a little MacGyvery from time to time yes

So I had to tear it back apart, the Deoxit treatment I gave the stereo mode switch fell away and was getting very little bass on stereo and just a bunch of popping on stereo wide.

Pulled the stereo switch off the board and opened her up for a deep clean. That cleared that up, but I still hear crackling on the line. I knew that a dirty aux switch had given me trouble like this before so I pulled that off as well and did a disassemble/deep clean.

Nope. The crackling was still present. Next up: loudness switch.

Nopers! So, I decided to try cleaning the mode switch, since it was the only other switch in the audio path that I hadn't cleaned.

Nope again! Up to this point the only place I could affect the crackling was at the balance and volume pots, but that occurred when I turned them as well, and I had already pulled those apart and gave them a deep clean, so I was suspicious the pots were just really worn out, although the carbon tracks looked fine.

After removing and disassembling four switches and two pots, and resoldering the bass and treble pots (bass pot did have solder cracks at the board), I could still hear crackling. Although I applied Deoxit to the switches. So, I ran over to Guitar Center and bought some Faderlube for the pots, and doused them in that. Voila, no more scratching on the pots!

But the crackling. It remained. And no it wasn't the headphone jack, cleaned that too!

One more thing I did was replace both amp chips. I wasn't getting strong bass output and was worried that there was an imbalance in the amp chips. At least one of them had been replaced at some point in the past with an ECG1606. I also replaced what SHOULD be an 11V zener at the spot that gave me problems on another board. There was a tiny burn spot and was getting 14.3V instead of 11, and although it still worked, I popped in a new one and got a better reading of 11.5V.

But the crackling, where was it? I had cleaned and replaced just about everything that made sense, and so I started doing a wiggle test and more visual inspection. The problem turned out to be some crud left over from resoldering the pots, some solder flecks suspended in old flux had gotten onto the points where the output cable runs from the amp board to between the volume and balance pots on the control board. Once I cleaned that out of there I was clean as a whistle and thumping properly

 

[JustCruisin]

Man, you are going to know this unit inside and out!