Found at the weekend on eBay, they wanted £30, I offered £20, and to my surprise they too it. I have seen them for sale at £165 restored or in good looking condition, this one didn't tick any of those boxes though. The back was in 2 pieces (Bakelite as well) the front had broken away between the two knobs and it was covered in 65 years worth of nicotine (I have the yellow cloth to prove it).
I've always liked the Philips idea of illuminated front, it a sort of French influenced idea and uses the same principle as fiber optics to transfer light. The idea is the bottom of the clear panel lays over a bulb and the light transfers through the clear plastic over the whole front and now cleaned it does again
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| Philips 141U-15 circuit |
The Repair
My biggest shock (not electrical) was it worked! So didn't need the circuit, but I've shown it here in case others need it. It was a same day fix, rare these day, once I glued all the Bakelite pieces back, and oiled the cabinet, she came up like a new penny The clear front is held in place by 4 gold plated multi-slotted screws and easily cleaned, although no sign it had ever been done before. The two control knobs were heavily grimed with what I thought was scratches, but after metal polish applied they came up lovely.
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| Trader sheet from 1954 shows layout and component values |
All the capacitors are Hunts black wax types and seam to be performing nicely still. An internal loop aerial is fixed around an aluminium frame that runs around the rear of the cabinet. When the front was removed from the cabinet I spent quite a bit of time with a tooth brush removing dirt from the speaker grille, literally hundreds of box holes full of muck. The white paint had fallen away from the tuning pointers so I used Tippex to white that up again, drys virtually instantly so make a clean line. Careful with the grub screws on the control knobs, they're a Philips invention, the screw fits into a hole in the spindle (Nightmare if you have replace control) and near impossible to get the srcew back through the hole (don't remove unless you have too)
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| Tippex tuning pointer |
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| Nicotine removed - clear again |
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| 6 valves, 1 being HT rectifier, no mains transformer, mains dropped through green wire wound (back right) |
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