I realized something today: I apparently have a "thing" about tuners

mhardy6647

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So -- our church services, for some reason ;) have been via Zoom for... oh... about a year now.
Well, this morning, while sitting upstairs (where I have a little Zoom workstation set up, Altec Santiago sound reinforcement and all) with Mrs. H, chit-chatting with folks before the service, my mind wandered and I started looking around the room... counting tuners.
AM.
FM.
AM-FM.

I counted twenty-five.

There are some more in the basement.

I may have a little problem.

Thanks for listening.

:o
 
Sounds perfectly normal to me.

Now, the question is: Do you find any stations worthwhile listening to? Given where you are, I remember the wonderfulness of northeastern US radio in the mid-to-late 20th Century. Roscoe! Cousin Brucie! WPLJ! Even (a bit further south) WMMR! All gone, I s'pose...

Here in the Centennial State I listen to KUVO, "The Oasis in the City" most days....on my single FM source...:rolleyes:
 
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I remember listening to monster US stations up at the cottage in my dads 1971 Buick Electra. Electra Limited actually. Fully analog, with a dial that would flip over as you selected AM or FM. Two hours north of Toronto, we would get these incredible US stations, the signal doing just the right bounce to get to us. While we had great stations like CHUM and CFTR each cranking out 50,000 watts of AM glory, the US stations were just better. Bigger. More alive!

Sadly, those days are long gone.
 
Not to veer the thread off topic, because that never happens here, but that Buick was a damn fine car. I was too young to drive it, but it just ran forever. Aside from a not unusual TH-400 rebuild, that likely could have been eliminated with yearly transmission fluid changes, it ran over 140,000 basically trouble free miles. Finally the great rust reaper, as was common with 60s and 70s cars, caught up to it. The day the tow truck came to haul it away, it still started, idled and ran beautifully and didn't burn a drop of oil. If not for the rust, I could imagine that car doing twice the mileage.

1971 was still a good year for the auto industry and their product. Yes, the compression ratios dropped, but that big 455 was reasonably unencumbered by emissions controls and the great weight reduction craze brought on by the 1973 gas crunch, hadn't taken hold yet. My dad liked it so much, a used 1975 took its place. Sadly, that car was notably cheaper in build quality with a much more plastic interior. It never ran quite as well, and wasn't as trouble free. To me, however, that car will always be special, as it's the one I learned to drive in.
 
And to go full circle, my one remaining good tuner is the lovely Sony 730ES. Complete with simulated wood cheeks. Shortly before the bug shut everything down last year, I had taken it to the best tuner tech in Canada for an alignment and a serious servicing. She sits with him still, awaiting the reopening of the world. 8ED70307-6DDC-4D1A-BF4A-1D734E9C62CD.jpeg
 
Twenty-five tuners!! My friend, you are now a fully certified, card carrying hoarder.

I have two and I am thinking that is one too many.
 
That's not your garage, is it? :)
Nah. My garage isn't that small.

I gotta say I'd probably get a kick out of having one of those in there. Likely the more sporty two door, with some fancier period wheels.

I have to admit still having a yearning for an early to mid 70s Cadillac though. When they were just old cars, I remember going looking at a few of them, and while they ran and drove just beautifully (the Caddy 500 with their TH-400 combo still being the most luxurious drivetrain I've ever experienced - take that, Jag, Mercedes, and Rolls Royce!), but the bodies were trashed by Ontario road salt. They all had the familiar streaks of brown running out from under the vinyl roof. Sigh.
 
I remember listening to monster US stations up at the cottage in my dads 1971 Buick Electra. Electra Limited actually. Fully analog, with a dial that would flip over as you selected AM or FM. Two hours north of Toronto, we would get these incredible US stations, the signal doing just the right bounce to get to us. While we had great stations like CHUM and CFTR each cranking out 50,000 watts of AM glory, the US stations were just better. Bigger. More alive!

Sadly, those days are long gone.
WKBW in Buffalo? Or was that too far east.

On the Buick threadcrap, my dad had a Buick Wildcat. Which I was never allowed to drive. With good reason.
 
WKBW in Buffalo? Or was that too far east.

On the Buick threadcrap, my dad had a Buick Wildcat. Which I was never allowed to drive. With good reason.
WKBW was easy to get in Toronto. But I don't think the weird AM bounces aligned with our location near Minden.

Anyhow, we'd prefer to listen to more exotic locales. Like Cleveland.

Btw, as we continue tmeandering around the topic of tuners and Mr Hardy's mental health, wasn't there a couple of 100,000 watt stations in Ohio. Cleveland and Cincinnati? WKRP?
 
And come to think of it, i remember us getting Detroi-it, Boston and even Nashville on occasion. Pretty heady stuff for a 7 or 8 year old in the mid 70's.

But yes, I believe it was Cincinnati that we got the most often. We even honoured it with a mechanical preset on that old Buick radio.

Wow. These memories are really lighting corners of my mind. Although a bit misty and water colured, they do remind me of the way we were, in Minden.
 
Since moving to the Houston area I sold mine.
No stations worthy, except one that plays dj selected music on weekends
 
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Twenty-five tuners!! My friend, you are now a fully certified, card carrying hoarder.

I have two and I am thinking that is one too many.

Yeah, and I am not quite sure how or why.
Mind you -- and I know youse guyses understand this -- we're only talking about tuners.
Not receivers.
Not radios.
Just.
Tuners.

Very few of any real repute, although none is really what I'd consider a clunker.
Many have some back story that makes them significant to me, like the EICO HFT-90 that my father built and that I literally grew up with.
And then there are just some cute ones.

DSC_4074 (2) by Mark Hardy, on Flickr

Oh, crap, I just remembered another one that's upstairs, when I thought of the cute Sansui.
This one, which I got from one of the northern New England gurus/enablers -- who, come to think of it, was the source of the Sansui above, too.

Oh, and I happen to have a photo of this one, too. :rolleyes: The little Bell on top of the Sansui. Got the Sansui from the same fellow, come to think of it.

DSC_5411 (2) by Mark Hardy, on Flickr


Crap.
I just remembered another one: a remarkably good-performing, fairly modern Parasond from the same, aforementioned guru.
I better stop typing now.
 
And come to think of it, i remember us getting Detroi-it, Boston and even Nashville on occasion. Pretty heady stuff for a 7 or 8 year old in the mid 70's.

But yes, I believe it was Cincinnati that we got the most often. We even honoured it with a mechanical preset on that old Buick radio.

Wow. These memories are really lighting corners of my mind. Although a bit misty and water colured, they do remind me of the way we were, in Minden.

You mean CKLW out of South Detroit? :p
 
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