General Electric Radio Humming
 

Hey Guys,

I have a General Electric Radio Model 34R21 It has a hell of a lot of 60hz hum and i was wondering if anyone has seen a schematic or even if i have the right model number! it is a alarm clock tube radio.

Has anyone been seen this radio before or have any information on it?

r0n22

Usually what causes lots of hum is a shot electroytic filter capacitor. Usually 50uF at 160V, and another 33uF at 160V would work as replacements. The amount of uF's is not critical, but the voltage rating must exceed 150V. Places like Mouser.com or DigiKey.com will have suitable replacements (you need not worry about having both caps in the same package, cardboard tube or metal can).

You should also replace any and all wax paper caps.

Typical schematic of this sort of radio:
http://www.geocities.com/wa2ise/aa5diaa.jpgorhttp://www.geocities.com/wa2ise/aa5oct.jpg

Thank you for such a quick reply!

It seems to have a only one can capacitor with
20 MFD 150 V
60 MFD 150 V
5 MFD 25V

I can find the 5 MFD one easy but the other ones are over 15 dollars each! so if i could find a replacement i can find a 22 MFD cap and a 80 or 100 MFD to replace the 60.

Would these do?

You can get a 22 uf to replace the 20 uf and a 68 uf to replace the 60 uf. A 4.7 uf will work for the 5 uf. You can buy these in individual sections from www.mouser.com, www.tubesandmore.com, and www.justradios.com. The caps should be cheap, under $2 each.

You may be able to find usable caps from old PC power supplies, or even from a compact florescent light bulb. It's an old ham radio tradition to salvage usable parts from otherwise junked electronics. :D

Yeah, if you're getting $15 for a price you're looking in the wrong place or at the wrong caps.

About a dollar apiece from this CANADIAN source: http://www.justradios.com/orderform.html

It'll sound great after those caps are changed, been using GE clock radios by the bed for years. Changed the caps in three now, great reliable radio when recapped. That is a good thing when you depend on it to blast you out of bed at 5 AM, bosses get angry when it don't blast.:D Good luck on yours!

And those old ones blast a lot louder than most of the new ones.

That is exactly what I need too, I sleep like a rock:yes::D