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Old 04-18-2005, 01:12 PM
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Jeffhs Jeffhs is offline
<----Zenith C845
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Fairport Harbor, Ohio (near Lake Erie)
Posts: 4,035
Quote:
Originally Posted by JimiJohnB
Hmm....well turns out mine is the R-7000-2 which is slightly newer than the R-7000. A little searching on eBay shows that units in similar condition have been selling for $300!!!! I'm shocked!!! I thought maybe 50-75 bucks, but 300? I tell you, while the radio is neat as heck, for 300 bucks I'd have it on eBay this evening if it weren't for its sentimental value.

I bid over $200 (!) last night on a Zenith TO Royal 1000-1, in good shape; still waiting for the end of the auction (which should be around nine or so tonight Eastern time). So far, it looks like I'm winning. Didn't mean to bid that much, but someone outbid me by $1 at first and I kept raising my maximum, as until I got to $200 (my sixth try) someone was always outbidding me. I think what may have happened is that I was bidding against myself, but the system saw that as another bidder going against me. In over a year of trading on ebay, I have never been outbid so many times! Well, hopefully I'll win this time around. I just checked my status (got a daily status email from ebay this morning) and I am still the high bidder. Perhaps my $200 bid is scaring folks away? In any case, I hope to win this TO as it was one of the first solid-state versions made by Zenith. I only wish, however, someone had warned me ahead of time that the TO 1000 was AM/SW only, without FM. I didn't realize Zenith made the solid state TOs without the latter until I saw the one I am presently bidding on. By the time the 1000 was introduced in the late '50s, the standard 88-108 MHz FM band was being used by stations (and had been since 1947 or so, replacing the old 40-Mc band), so I naturally expected that the solid-state TOs would have FM in addition to their seven SW bands and, of course, the standard broadcast band. These sets could not have been cheap when new and, of course, they were not built of cheap plastic and circuit boards as much of today's consumer electronics are. With all the fine workmanship and all (hand wired chassis, plug-in transistors, etc.) which was Zenith's hallmark from the company's inception in 1918 until it was sold to a Korean electronics firm (which will remain nameless here) in the '80s, why on earth would Zenith exclude FM coverage in the 1000, yet have it in all other subsequent models? If the 1000 went for anything over $100, even in the '50s, I would expect it to have FM.

I don't mean to speak ill of the dead (Zenith was and still is my favorite brand of home-entertainment gear; I have several radios made by them that work great), but IMO, Zenith made a huge mistake by failing to put FM in the Royal 1000. As I said, for the price this radio likely sold for when it was new, I would expect not only FM but tone compensation circuitry and possibly a larger speaker (or at least an external speaker jack in addition to the earphone jack on the front panel).

Oh well, at least they did put a phonograph input on the R1000, which raises another question in my mind. I have a Zenith K-731 hi-fi tube radio that sounds out of this world with an electrostatic tweeter, 5x7 oval main speaker, and a 35C5 output (and looks just as good in its walnut cabinet), but it does not have a phono input. Zenith's C-845, however, which had virtually the identical audio system to the '731 (with the exception of using two cone-type speakers rather than a large oval and an electrostatic tweeter), had such a jack. Go figure.
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Jeff, WB8NHV

Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002

Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.
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