The very first Zenith "Transoceanic" radio
 

I did a trade with a friend for this rather rare 1942 Zenith "Clipper" Transoceanic 7G605 portable radio. This version with the sailboat stitched grill cloth was the first short run of this first Transoceanic radio. This represents CEO McDonalds original intent to have this for use on his sailboat. It was soon changed to the bomber-plane design due to the onset of WWII, which is the more common model. It took a lot of trail and error for the Zenith engineers to work the bugs out of this set, have it fit in such a small case, and have it work properly under very humid conditions. Besides getting a recap to fine working condition, this set appears to have never been cleaned and detailed. It has such a nice patina I really don't even want to touch it! I definitely wont polish-up the gold metal parts. I'm glad to have this piece of radio history in my collection.
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Beautiful set!

Thank you. It evokes the WWII era for me and how so many people snatched-up this set to stay informed of the latest events wherever they went. The Transoceanic would become one of the most longest-lived type of radio of all time. It went from 1942 to 1981!

She's a beauty!

Thanks. Amazing how a portable set like this survived 75 years without any serious damage! I'll get around to giving it a gentle cleaning and sprucing-up some time. I am really liking it as-is right now!

There's just "Something" about a spiffy Tooob T/O...

And this is not just the first Zenith T/O. you had to rub it in and score the early version with the Sailboat grill design, (later in the run changed to a bomber). It's also in beautiful condition to boot.

Honestly, I'm only really learning about this set now that I have it! I didn't know just how scarce the sailboat grill-cloth version is, and how good the condition is in relation to what turns up before I bought it. I'm also glad that the grill cloth is not a possible swap-out. It has a nice aged patina. I did a trade/cash deal on it, and I realize now that my friend was quite fair with me. Although in general it has a utilitarian appearance, it has nice details that make it very appealing. A much more primitive look than the post-war versions.

They don't make them like this anymore. If they malfunction or break you throw away and buy new. Not my tube sets: not EVER!

Wow that is an impressive score!

That and a fairly short run post war variant are the only two tube TOs I need to have the complete tube line.

IIRC last year a dealer at Radiofest had one that they wanted ~$800 for.

I was lucky my friend got another and allowed this one go. This was the first chance I ever had to acquire one.
Wow. With the trade and cash, this one probably cost me a little over $400.

Its great to see the first one after working on a few others. Thanks for sharing.

You're welcome. I have a H500 myself and enjoy seeing how much more primitive the pre-war model looked, which I find more appealing. It seems after the war that Zenith wanted the T/O to look more upscale and modern.

I've found that a lot of the better Tooob stuff is a lot more robust & serviceable than its given credit for.

Not to be contrary, but I see more sailboats on Praybay than bombers. Either way, it's a great score and I'm glad to see some general tube Transoceanic interest here at VK. I don't have either of the WW2 versions, but I have examples of most of the rest of the tube line. My earliest is an 8G005YT which was the last with Loctal tubes. I notice here and there the same model # with Z1 on the end. Not sure what that means, but Zenith did a lot of minor changes throughout the run, so no telling.

I don't have the next model, the G500, which is where 7 pin miniature tubes come into play including the rare 1L6 which by the way some smart individual is making a solid state sub for. As much as I hate solid state junk, this is a great idea and much needed as the original tubes are all but depleted which is (of course) driving prices way up. I'm not looking for a G500 to babysit as it is nearly identical to it's predecessor. Then I have a decent H500 which in my opinion is the ugliest one of the lot, but I do like the new clamps they added for spare tubes. I have a few B600s and all I can say on those is I haven't found one yet that doesn't work at least on the Broadcast band.

The king of the lot is an A600L. L stands for leather as they have the brown leather case. One mystery I've found is that I have seen 2 distinct shades of brown. One is almost reddish orange. Either way it goes, they are hot with collectors as most people didn't bother paying an extra 20 bucks or so to get brown. The smart way to sell one is to part it out as all of the trim and knobs are brown and even harder to find than a complete unit. So if you need a knob or a handle and don't want to pay a couple or three hundred for a complete unit to rob of its knob, then you have to luck out and find someone parting. I see them doing it all the time with the normal black sets on Praybay.

I'm thinking of letting mine go as I just enjoy radios and have 2 other examples of the 600 line. Might pay for some caps, dial string, and a solid state converter tube replacement.