The AM Forum

I picked up one locally that was a mess, then a ham friend took it on and after three tubes and 2 electrolytics, he presented it back to me aligned. What a pal! Its actually a decent receiver, having crystal first LO and a variable second LO. Triple conversion except on 80, and semi-variable selectivity. For AM, its not broad, something like 3.6 KHz @ -6 dB in wide with the LC filter on the 50 KHz IF. I looked through the archives here and nothing about the AM quality of this set. Anyone using these in their station anymore. I'm impressed by its less than boat anchor sizing (for 1963) and sensitivity, selectivity and stability. The three S's.

The 2-B is a nice radio.  I wish I still had mine.

The-2-A had a 4.8 KHz max bandwidth.  Then, for some reason, Drake dropped it to 3.6 KHz in the 2-B.   They went back to 4.8 KHz with the 4-series radios.

3.6 KHz is a bit narrow for center-tuned AM, but you can always tune off to one side or the other for a little more FI.

I had one along with a 2BQ. Unfortunately they were both under water for about 72 hours as the Passaic River flowed through someone's basement. Got it for nothing. Everything was crusted in dirt, slide switches wouldn't move, and controls made audible sounds when you turned them. Cabinet was scratched as it drifted around the basement. Got a tub, filled it warm water and some light detergent. Took the receiver out of cabinet and soaked it in the tub. Worked the controls and switches until everything moved freely. Flushed everything with clean water. Blow dry with the shop vac blower and let sit for a week. Receiver played great with some minor tweaking of the alignment. Not a bad receiver for SSB or CW but AM quality was only fair. Since I wasn't a great fan of Drake gear it eventually found a new home.

Drake published a factory update to add 160 meter coverage without using the 2LF plug-in.  I have a copy of the document but haven't tried it in mine since it came with a 2LF.

The 2A and 2B are often under-appreciated receivers.

I had a R-4B. The 4.8 kc filter was barely passable on AM (OK when the band was crowded). I can't imagine how horrible a 3.6 kc bandwidth would sound.

I had an R4c, nice but when someone was 1 or 2 Kc off frequency I did not know they were there.
Happened a number of times, tuned off to one side to get the highs, and never heard the other person off frequency on the other side.
Something could likely be done about that, stagger tune the IF or lower the Q with resistors like they did with the G76 rx.

Nice small well built stuff, attractive also.

That's surprising with an R-4C, unless perhaps there was a very narrow non-standard filter in the AM filter slot.

Since the R-4C is crystal filter based, there isn't much in the IF chain to stagger tune.  A stock radio had an 8 KHz first IF crystal filter and a resistor jumper across the AM filter slot.  Pretty broad.  And the usual AM crystal filter was 6 KHz.

I do not remember what if any filter it had in it, it was 20? years ago!
I remember it being very sharp, but good sounding if tuned off the the side.

I also remember the crazy design with ic chips in the cathode of tubes and so on.
Wacky mix of solid state and tube/high voltage....

I don't think there were any ICs in the R-4C.

Your right, no ic's in my R4C, only transistors & fets...  16 of them in the noise blanker alone.

In the R-4C, there were 6 tubes, 15 transistors, 22 diodes, and 1 IC. Earlier R-4C used less diodes.

I bought a 2B new back in the day....mebby 62'?
I hated it and got rid of it PDQ.