Remember when you could fix a radio with just a multimeter and a schematic?

I was working on an old Cessna 172's KX 155 nav/com last week, trying to save the owner some cash. I found a cracked solder joint on a filter cap, reflowed it, and the radio came back to life, but the frequency display was off by about 0.05 MHz. Turns out the old crystal had drifted with age, something a simple visual fix couldn't solve. What's the oldest piece of gear you've brought back from the dead lately?

3 comments

3 Comments

terry_bailey352mo ago

Honestly, that's just wasted time when a new unit works perfectly, unlike @taylor.jordan's fun project.

william_taylor26d ago

Getting an old radio working only to find the crystal drifted reminds me of trying to patch a leaky pipe in an old house where the rest of the plumbing is rusted out. You fix one thing, and something else goes. It's like that with anything built before the 80s, you can bring the power back but the parts are just tired. Same with my neighbor's old Ford pickup, fixed the starter but then the carburetor started flooding. Seems like once you mess with one old thing, the whole system gets offended and starts complaining.

taylor.jordan2mo ago

I got a 1978 Atari 2600 working last month. The picture was just rolling lines until I replaced a single, tiny capacitor on the main board. My big win was figuring out the soldering iron settings before I melted the whole thing.