Some would consider this probably the finest radio construction ever.
To think the Germans went to so much expense/craftsmanship during difficult times!
I know a Queenslander who has one - a rare piece today no doubt!

Dismantled unit pictures:-
http://www.laud.no/ww2/e52b/e52b1.htm.

Many of the German radio's during the War demonstrated thinking outside of the square. The Ship receivers were TRF as there was no superhetrodyne oscillator running that could be picked up (& they knew how to do that).

By using a standardised modular construction, it did not matter if Siemens, Telefunken, or any one else made the module or the set, they were parts interchangeable so you could either fix it (if you knew how), or if it was damaged, rat a module from another set in the full knowledge it would fit.

I doubt our lot had that luxury?

Had you heard of the E52? The one I know of has not been recapped or fired up. Do you have any model numbers for those TRF units?

I would have to search the Radio Club newsletters to find the photos of the Marine one and I am not going to be able to do that currently due to op.

The Germans pioneered ceramics & the Marine one had a huge amount of ceramic in the circuit in the way of caps & the turret tuner was largely ceramic. Same modular construction idea as said.

Really a work of engineering design excellence.

Marc

The E52 had parallel arrays of what looks like tubular ceramics to increase the surface area thus reducing thermal lag in order to minimise drift. Clever for the time!

I lived in Wangaratta for a short while in the mid 50s. Do you know Esmond St? I remember there was a vacant field across from the house.

The town has expanded and crossed the three mile creek so everything east of it is now Tar & Cement.

Extracted from “Vintage Radio Club of NE Victoria” Newsletter. (I am one that puts it together)

This German Navy TRF receiver operates in 10 bands from 15 kHz to 21MHz. The receiver front end coils are housed in a large 10 position turret tuner. The valve line up comprises a B442 tetrode RF amplifier, B415 regenerative detector, B404 audio amplifier and B403 audio output. The high quality of the German workmanship certainly gave rise to a good deal of discussion. This receiver was one of the highlights of the meeting.

*Carrying this further from the discussions, there was considerable advanced thinking in the design, as it was realised well in advance that factories could be destroyed. So the design was such that parts could be made in several locations and irrespective of where, they would fit and indeed interchange. Rather more thought, than the allied approach of making them like SCR211 etc; in various factories and various forms, with very little of the mechanicals etc. being interchangeable.

The fact that this was a TRF at a time when the superiority of Superhetrodyne was known, is neither backward, or without good cause. A Superhetrodyne has an oscillator and the Autodyne in particular was rather “dirty”; The Germans knew this and used this to their advantage. Oscillators on receivers were detectable, and the Germans had the sensitive directional equipment required, to do just that.

The other thing here is the greater use of Ceramic, The Germans did a lot of pioneering work with it, especially in the area of using it for capacitors.*

The Germans built a lot of their other fighting equipment with the same engineering principles. I watched a documentary once that mentioned the class of pocket battleships that Hitler built, one of which was the Admiral Graf Spee, were fitted with 11 inch guns when built to keep costs low and try to avoid displeasing opponents to Germany's disregard for the various arms treaties that existed at the time, but could be easily retrofitted with the same 15 inch guns that would be fitted to the mightier Tirpitz and Bismarck as Germany's gumption gradually increased.

Germany also made regular use of radar to guide the guns of their capital ships as early as the Battle of Jutland in WWI. Germany exceeded the Empire with regard to technology and automation because they pretty much had to. They didn't have the economy to support a fleet with the numbers of ships the Royal Navy had so they had to adopt a programme of outbuilding in quality and sophistication, a move also made by the Japanese in WWII.

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A valve a day keeps the transistor away...

I once read an article touching on the relative quality of British and German military radio. Unfortunately I don’t remember where I saw this but will keep looking. However the basic argument was that Britain, through its amateur radio movement, had a ready supply of people able to operate and maintain their radio equipment. On the other hand totalitarian Germany of the time did not allow such an amateur radio movement wishing to keep radio communication under the tightest control possible.

The upshot of this was that German equipment had to be of the highest quality to minimise the need for maintenance and adjustment in the field, and allow the use of operators with no radio knowledge at all.
This can’t be the only reason for quality of course – there are other reasons for high quality of construction – wouldn’t make sense to skimp on equipment used for targeting in a capital ship. Another point is that the British made use of and trained radio operators without any prior knowledge of radio. An example is Spike Milligan who was an artillery signaler, a job which required skill in operating equipment to quickly and accurately send adjustments required by forward observers of fall of shot to the gunners. A good (and hilarious) read is “Hitler and My Part in His Downfall”, and sequels. It is hard to believe that the Germans could not find and train such people. Perhaps the military radio collectors could comment.

From what I see, the problems were at the top especially with their whole doctrine.

One classic I noted was their response to the Russian T34 Tank. Despite being a quality assurance nightmare, it was vastly superior in many ways to anything in the field at the time. If the Germans captured one they often used it, not destroyed it.

Building a bigger more resource hungry tank to counter it rather than reverse engineer the T34, & build it properly, was a serious mistake. The Russian opinion was that with the new German tank took two Russian shells to kill it instead of one, which was more of an annoyance.

QUOTE: problems were at the top

Albert Speer was showing a Russian tank to Hitler. Hitler was very critical of the finish. Speer showed him that the tank was machined only where it needed to be eg turret bearing seats, and nowhere else. This enabled a faster production rate of an equally effective tank.

I like that big "ferris wheel" turret tuner! The metal can capacitors on chassis are very 1930s professional-grade like in Western Electric equipment. The British Marconi war equipment was 'rough and ready' but functional, they were too concerned with winning a war rather than creating works of art.