Attached are a couple of photos of a Healing 503 B 5 valve battery portable recently repaired to working order.
Full re cap and resistor changeover, now works very well.
Quite a strongly made wooden case, robust carry handle and generally very good quality construction throughout. Large 8 inch speaker gives plenty of volume and nice to listen to.
Surprisingly sensitive, the loop aerial inside the front cover swings up and out here at Bathurst can listen to many Sydney stations.
A quite lively radio which would have done well for the country user in its day.
The radio is in a presentable original condition, a good wipeover with a dampened cloth was all that was needed to tidy it up.

Nice job!

What did you do about batteries?

Thanks for your kind comments and must admit I'm rather chuffed with its performance.

A ripper of a set, as for batteries am using a couple of alkaline D's in parallel for the filaments.

With only 300mA filament drain these alkalines run a long time.

A mains H.T supply for the moment, the guy whom supplies the d.c to d.c inverters may have some ready by the end of this month so will contact him then.

Have an AWA 453-P almost fully done which will need one of these inverters as well.

Then I'll be able to take these sets out on camping trips and use them as they were intended !

Then I'll be able to take these sets out on camping trips and use them as they were intended !

Hope there are some AM stations left "out there".

I guess there's always an ABC station not too far away.

In many places the AM stations remain and the station owner simply takes out a second licence for FM, keeping the younger crowd amused. Digital, as far as I know, is years away unless you live in a capital city - of course not that many of us are in a hurry for it - once digital reception is in place around the nation it'll spell the end for AM and FM analogue transmissions, though this would create a niche industry involving the manufacture of small AM transmitters similar to those that some of us already have.

Couldn't you just use a signal generator for that?
I noticed some of collectors have all their antenna leads strung together like a big clothes line.

Couldn't you just use a signal generator for that?

Not sure. Can't say I've ever tried it. I also don't own a signal generator so it's not possible to try.

I also don't daisychain my aerial cabling as I keep my radio collection in clusters.

I've had a transmitter for about two years and have used it a few times to feed audio from my CD player. It has a large enough range to do the job at the moment.

There are commercially made Kits & units available. There is one from a well known society that technical people I know have suggested needs mods t fix up the modulation.

A big issue is the control of the strength of the signal being inputted and its effect on the modulation envelope along with matching of such things as impedance.

Some do not seem to understand modulation

Marc

Certainly hope digital radio never comes. Apart from the millions of radios that will be rendered obsolete digital T.V can be a pain for those living in poor signal areas.

Where I used to live even with the best aerial I could buy and much experimentation with aiming etc still ended up with pixelated pictures from time to time.

My neighbours had the same experience and they to spent money on new aerials.

Mostly weather related.

Who cares if there is 30 extra jazz radio channels to listen to ?

Most people settle on a radio station of choice and listen to that.

In any case there is on line radio.

Has USA, UK and Europe adopted digital radio? I don't know.

Who cares if there is 30 extra jazz radio channels to listen to?

Exactly! And what annoys me more than the fact that there are audio-only channels is the repeating of channels. Why does Channel 7 need to be on 7 and 71, for example?

The issue of blackspots is also up there at the top of the list. North Sydney and Gore Hill, for example, where people are line-of-sight to Sydney's three large transmission towers and cannot pick anything up because so much is transmitted from there the wanted signals are drowned out so they have to point their antennas at Knights Hill near Wollongong and pick up Prime, WIN and Southern Cross instead of 7,9 and 10.

I'll admit that digital radio does give a very good quality sound though apart from that there is no compelling reason to fast forward its adoption, given that the most popular stations are the older AM stations like 2GB and 2UE anyway. I've long thought that radio would take much longer to change over than television did, mostly for the above reason and I reckon its safe to maintain that view.

The UK has digital radio - we are using their system, DAB+, here and many of the brands of digital radio are British even though the sets are probably still made in China. I am not sure if they have gone all-digital or not though.

Thanks for the details on the UK radio scene, I fairly regulary go into areas where there is no VHF FM stereo and even AM needs a good radio/aerial setup.

A few years ago was gold detecting well out of Laverton/Leonora area in W.A.

Wished I had taken a radio with me as the car radio with its auto tune would not lock onto any stations.

It was with great difficulty I managed to manually tune into a weak, crackling ABC station somewhere so as to get the news and weather.

Used my Codan radio on ABC shortwave stations as well.

Digital radio in these circumstances would be useless.

The 503B is a great portable. I have 4.
1 Red, 1 Black, 1 Yellow with white grill, 1 Yellow with black grill.

Ben

With the concentration & lack of variety we have. I don't think CD quality Radio is achievable in the majority of moving vehicles.

In many black spots for TV etc. have a look at places like NY how many digitised stations can you cram down an optic fibre and you do not need massive powered repeaters & RF sections.

How many years has cable been going? You do not need a cable for ever station. I think Pickering may be right, some are wearing budgie smugglers to keep the hemispheres of their brains apart.

Thanks Redxm, did not know these 503B's came in different colours.

Daresay they would have been a popular radio in those days as not lacking in performance.

Fine Marcc there is internet streaming radio (which I have never used) already.

Quite frankly given the huge cost of installing new radio transmitters and the cost to the public of throwing out every radio they have think digital radio will be a long way off somehow.

Hate to sound grasping but whilst we are on the subject of things Healing.

Am looking for a Healing 502B which is the older octal valved version.

Need the front dial as mine is missing one or perhaps a complete radio from which I could swap parts.

Thanks