A few months ago, my eldest sister passed away. Her youngest daughter, who was still living with her at age 40 cleaned out the house and sold it for a thousand dollars. (which she never was able to collect.) Anyhow, she was digging through an old trunk and found 3 old transistor radios, I managed to get two of them working by replacing electrolytic caps the other was so trashed it ended up in the trash. The biggest one boasted 14 transistors! Sounds like a 4 transistor to me but oh well, I did get it working fairly well.

The Major has a Toyota volume knob? What's going on there? 31:00 Do that in the summer while some birds are out, film results. Great job of repairing, entertaining, and educating (i'm sure someone will find this useful someday in repairing on of their own).

I must have received 7 or 8 of those transistor radios as gifts when I was growing up in the 60s. I got two of them on my 10th birthday in 1968. Then a few months later I won a drawing contest at school and the prize was ...a transistor radio! I wish I knew what happened to all those radios. They were probably victims of my mother's insane spring cleaning jag of 1972. She threw out everything including 5 milk crates full of record albums that belong to my brother Roger who was serving in Vietnam at the time.

I don't even watch TV anymore. I constantly look for new content from this guy. He knows his stuff, and I love the dry humer!

Your patience, and humor is impressive. Enjoyed the video, and learned a lot. Thanks.

Great you picked the Major 10 transistor radio. Those non-vented Caps are good for pops. Great repair. Interesting to see a Toyota made volume knob.

I'm gonna start looking for transistor radios to repair. That looks fun!

Wow! I'm not the only idiot who got covered in black ink. In my case I foolishly turned the printer upside down to get rid of a paper jam. The result was thick black ink all over my hand and right up my arm to the elbow! Thanks for the great video by the way, I got one of those tiny radios in the late fifties. They always came in a little leather case stamped with 'Genuine Hong Kong Cow Hide' !

The transistor count in the Major is likely converter, local oscillator, 1st, 2nd IF, detector, pre-amp, bias transistor (possibly for outputs), driver, 2 output. WRT performance, the lower the uV/m number the better. Some transistor radios can be annoying to fix. But good job!

Back in 66, my uncle hired me to drive tractor on his farm, putting up hay for 5 dollars a day. When at long last all the hay was cut, bucked, and stacked he even paid me and a couple of my friends who he hired to help. So it was off to the local drug store, where they sold transistor radio's. I purchased a JADE 10 Transistor, it was blue-green in color, and worked OK I guess. Now I couldn't afford the damn 9V batteries, but I had some old 6 volt lantern batteries laying around, so I wired that to my radio, and used black tape to hold the radio to the battery which was bigger then the radio. I was pissed that it didn't work as good with the 6 volt, so I screwdrivered the hell out of the little radio till at long last I had MUSIC! Problem was, it was SHORT WAVE! Never did figure out why, and as life went on, I married, went in the Army, then the Police Force, then retirement. I moved back home to help my mom and sisters.Well mom had kept that stupid little radio all that time, and gave it back to me when I moved back. A few months ago I tried to get it working again, even replaced the caps, but it was completely screwed up. I still have the case and speaker I guess, shit canned the board.

Nice job in repairing those. They were cheapies in their day but they worked. Gary

Got to love all those extra holes in the circuit board on the Major, it was probably pre-drilled for the super deluxe 14 transistor model.

I've probably watched this video 3 or 4 times over the years but only now do i notice that the Major appears to be a Toyota built radio! Around 12:40 you can see the name molded into the volume control wheel...

Well this helped me got a Philco and Channel Master that are crackly. Love the style of those old radios from the 60s-80s.

“Focus you stupid thing”! Ahhhh, a memory from childhood!

Hi shango066, I really enjoy watching these videos, I am very interested in AM and FM radio, I am an electronics student and your videos are very educational, keep up the great work, you do such a fine job...):

A very good job. My best compliments.

Good technical information as usual...thank you! Just before you mentioned it...I was thinking of piping the Jade through a Marshal Amp, and see the "cadets" gathering to listen!

The variable capacitor center vane contact fingers are tarnished, the only way is some ISO Pro alcohol as close as possible to the center shaft and operate over and over and leave to dry. Great Video Thanks.

That was kinda neat Major had a Toyota volume pot and in the last video i think it was the delux that had a Nissan pot. Jade build quality was junk must have been a 5 and 10 purchase back in the day.

That civil Defense Emergency was called CONOLRAD or something like that, not sure on the spelling, but I sure do remember when it was introduced and all the testing that we went through.

Got something like this as a 4 or so year old kid around 1980 from our next door neighbor for Christmas (about a week before). I played with it all day the first day I had it. I don't remember having it very long though.

That Jade is not a Radio its a Theremin ;-) Great Job.

Enjoy these, very educational, thanks !

5200 subs!!!! Wow good work man. You deserve it with all the hard work. Good for you Shango.

One of your best videos.

Forgot to say, lots of potential cold solder joints seen on that board. Crappy blobs of solder can crack the traces due to sudden heating of the very thin traces.

Wow a Toyota branded volume control never seen that before.

It's amazing what lengths we go to transmit our voices. I always had a transistor radio in my 1950's childhood. Big Multi Band, valve receivers hidden behind walnut veneer and glass dials of museum quality were always inches from my nose. Black and White BBC TV was absolutely riveting. Is color TV racist? Should we revert to B&W? They watch us ALL destroy ourselves in the "logic loop" of obfuscation.

and what a miracle - these old radios still play these old broadcasts today! Canned time! Or is it just the sound quality?

Fun video! These didn't make you pull your hair out at least lol. I liked the concept of this two part deal. You should do it again!

I’m surprised we haven’t seen any of these with sand in them .. since so many were used at the beach .. back in the day …

Great radio review and repair ! Did you use some contact cleaner ? My radio of choice is the Lacrosse 810-805 AM/FM/WB digital radio that uses three AA batteries and has external power, flashlight and earphone jack to extend battery life. This radio is a good back up for a cell phone or B.O.B/Get Home Bag ! Keep up the good work. Eyes UP and lights down, tjl Sent by Win7Pro64 w/ADSL

You know that Jade sounds a bit like a Theremin.

Nice work as always

Jade giving her best impression of the middle section of 'Whole Lotta Love' there. I've had something with those Daiwa capacitors in it, might have been Sanyo set. Second most interesting thing I've said today.

I love how in those days I thought that the number of transistors who didn't increase the power of the radio at least that was the gimmick they tried to say would work

QUERO UM RADINHO DESSES!!! AMO RÁDIOS!!!

Most all these transistor radios are a PITA to work on. Fortunately most of the time a recap fixes them. Once in awhile you'll come across one with a non-cap failure that makes it extra tough.

Hi shango. Do you know why they always put the windings on one side of the ferrite rod, and not on the middle?

I'd have said the gloves were for insulating your hands from the circuits, period.

PIcked the Jade since it seemed to be more of a challenge to repair. Kinda interesting to see my name written on your tablet too.

The Jade... those are silicon transistors. Yeah, early silicon transistors did suck. The Major had all germanium.

Excellent job on the Major. Is it for sale? I like transistor radios with metal fronts.

Could you try contact cleaner? I don't know if it would help, but maybe worth a shot? I assume there is a place for cleaner to leak in

I used to buy "two transistor" pocket radios at the neighborhood corner store for $1.99 each.

Isn't there a broken resistor in the Major radio? Thanks for the video.

the capacitor check function in most multimeters measures the time it requires for the capacitor to charge, then it gets the value from that. so if the capacitor ESR is large, it will show the value being low, if it's leaky, it will show the value high. where it was beeping it was indicating that the value is over what it can measure, which was because it was leaky and made it charge slower

Also check the voltage of the 9 vlt battery.If its down,it will also effect everything else.

Not sure about the higher number of the sensitivity being better. On most radios the lower the number of the sensitivity is better. The lower the number means it takes less signal input to make it work.

I love the rubber gloves!

Ok, recapped it and it's fine now.

I have a 1958 Inscol TR 661 and a Monatone book form radio of around the 1970's. Both made in HK & both have the Civil Emergency marks on the dial. I think the Inscol needs the electrolytics swapping & i'm real keen about that.

Great videos! I lack knowledge and experience in tv repair. I've learned a lot from you. I have a Roxy UR-300 with no FM. If you could share a schematic, that would be great.

Don’t know much about radio workings, only what I remember from a kid. I have however found a source for a small collection. One says “15 transistors “(‼️). So, I’m building a small collection of my own-looks like.

That "Jade" radio features an "Acme" polyvaricon??

That Jade radio sounds creepy & evil! LOL 😂 But the Major was a great little radio too.

I used a solder sucker on mine, it worked very well

volume wheel has gotta be some sort of surplus Toyota car part!!!!!

Toyota knobs?!? The Jade is like a theremin!

I got one of those from Listerine for 50 cents and the top off of the bottle package

You know I've had interest in the admirals on the Admiral TV is in products that you have featured here on the channel so far including the transistor radio because my NA is to work where they made that stuff I had more radios and refrigerators and all that crap she put in 30 years and that plant so it would be worthwhile for me to adopt some of this stuff just to have it around maybe who knows why aunt built it or at least help build it

Greetings: The Civil Defense (Conelrad) radio markings were prominent from 1953-1963 until Conelrad was replaced by EBS (emergency broadcast system). I use nail polish in lieu of Loctite.

There is a very good exercise - build circuit making similar sound as one at beginnning of the video with just 10 transistors;)

With the Jade in the beginning turning the tuning dial it could be marketed as the hippest new DJ tool, a transistor record-less scratch master machine. Lay down those crappy sounds on the new/old Jade featuring 8 of the most worn out tranny's this side of the Golden Gate.

CONELRAD markings on the dial will tell you that the radio is no older than 1963, because that was the last year they were required.

Do an EOL video of the Jade since you're not replacing the v.c.

That on/off switch reminds me of whats in a Crosley, still better quality though.

Could someone explain why advertising the number of transistors on the front of their radio was a big feature? What is the difference between one with 5 or 7 and one with 10 transistors? Thanks all!!

I did pick the Major as i liked it, it is a model i like to own :) before MW dies off...

It's like the same volume control in those changes are radio kits and stuff

I'm new to radio electronics and am fascinated by the circuitry. Can someone help me understand what the capacitors are doing and why it make such a difference when changing them out? Also, how can you know where the different sections are when looking at the circuit board.? How can you tell where the oscillator is ? Thanks

Can you still do a video on the deluxe? It's labeled viscount and I have a Japanese Midget tube radio of the same brand. Thing has a really interesting look to it.

good vid interesting

Good vintage.

I have a 2 transistor pocket radio, so the other 8 really aren't needed, just showing off aren't they?

Do I see a broken off resistor right there on the end/top?

Yes............Do a Jade EOL - set it on fire while playing and see how long it will last.

I have 4 transistor/ ic radio made in China, and the all these radio's are problem is it's not tune-in FM bands, AM bands working well. What is the fault is?

Is this supposed to be a Superheterodyne radio - or just a heterodyne radio?

Looks like a Daiwa capacitor in the Jade radio

I have a Japanese made 10 transistor with probably the exact same circuit. It looks identical inside.

The volume knob is made by Toyota

Hi I have a zenith sprit of 76 and it doesn't go full screen and I played with the h and v hold to you have any tips???

How very Hong Koidial......

that Jade radio almost sounded like a Theremin

Can u convert them to fm ?

Is anything still being made in Hong Kong or Taiwan? I doubt it, though. 😔

That Radio Is A Keeper

I wonder if it's worth fixing?

Did you notice the word "TOYOTA" printed on the bottom of the knobs?

Asked for Christmas.. a radio, (Circa 1964) And it wasn't cheep. @ whopping 64$ shame though now they can be gotten for 5$ USD. Thanks

At 12:18, It says Toyota on the back of the dial, I'm confused now. Car company makes radio? Seems legit.

A TOYOTA volume control!! Is it a Camry or Corolla? The dome top black transistors failed all the time in the RCA CTC-38 TV chassis (video failure). Before repair the Jewel would make a good fart machine!!!

Call yourself an expert! You are using the wrong battery. Quite clear is a list showing recommended batteries. I personally prefer the Wizard 7D7604.

Someone modified the Jade into a portable Theremin.

lol prolly shoulda put the gloves on before refilling the ink cartridge. but I guess you know that now, haha.

Man that loud speaker really hurts when it comes in through my bluetooth hearing aide device!!!!

If you have a radio with bad capacitors, just tune into Rush Limbaugh. All his hot air will heat them up and make it work ! lol

Shenanigans with oscillations