Hello Everyone.
Recently I purchased a "Restored" 50's era Telefunken Allegro Model 5083W. This unit still has all Telefunken Tubes to maintain originality of the stereo. Line filter capacitors were replaced with modern electrolytics and a few other capacitors to maintain good operation.
I am interested in the history and experience most of the older generation has had with tube radios as far as reliability. I realize not all radios are created equal but I grew up in the Solid State era. In my lifetime I have seen most of the equipment I grew up with still in operation today with an occasional weak capacitor etc. but otherwise still going strong. My curiosity towards the life of a Tube Radio is not specifically the radio chassis itself but more about how often or soon the radio may develop an issue during regular use resulting in tube replacement etc. Obviously I don't expect a tube radio to be more reliable than a modern solid state unit but there are still plenty of them around so maybe I am wrong or misinterpreting the life expectancy and reliability of these devices.
So do they break more often than solid state? If a EL84 amp tube goes out does the radio need biasing with each tube replaced? Should I even be worrying about this stuff or will this thing outlast me? lol
If / when a tube requires a replacement do I need to try and keep the original Telefunken NOS replacement tubes to maintain my radios value?
Thanks for clearing this up because I plan to use my radio every day for a few hours and I tend to raise the volume beyond what most would've in the 50's...lol
Thanks for helping me with this tube reliability question.
Recently I purchased a "Restored" 50's era Telefunken Allegro Model 5083W. This unit still has all Telefunken Tubes to maintain originality of the stereo. Line filter capacitors were replaced with modern electrolytics and a few other capacitors to maintain good operation.
I am interested in the history and experience most of the older generation has had with tube radios as far as reliability. I realize not all radios are created equal but I grew up in the Solid State era. In my lifetime I have seen most of the equipment I grew up with still in operation today with an occasional weak capacitor etc. but otherwise still going strong. My curiosity towards the life of a Tube Radio is not specifically the radio chassis itself but more about how often or soon the radio may develop an issue during regular use resulting in tube replacement etc. Obviously I don't expect a tube radio to be more reliable than a modern solid state unit but there are still plenty of them around so maybe I am wrong or misinterpreting the life expectancy and reliability of these devices.
So do they break more often than solid state? If a EL84 amp tube goes out does the radio need biasing with each tube replaced? Should I even be worrying about this stuff or will this thing outlast me? lol
If / when a tube requires a replacement do I need to try and keep the original Telefunken NOS replacement tubes to maintain my radios value?
Thanks for clearing this up because I plan to use my radio every day for a few hours and I tend to raise the volume beyond what most would've in the 50's...lol
Thanks for helping me with this tube reliability question.
