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In a Nutshell
Very early (Oct. 29, 1940) pre-WWII version of the SX-28, completely restored and working fine
Introduction:
If you don't already know everything about this "Super Skyrider" cult communications receiver, please read the extensive documentation 'Hallicrafters SX-28 "A Pre-war Masterpiece"' by Henry Rogers, the director of the Western Historic Radio Museum, Radio Boulevard (ref.1). From 1940 to 1946 the SX-28 (later SX-28A) was the flagship of all Hallicrafters. It was the "ultimate receiver" of these years, carefully drafted after listening to radio amateurs as well as government engineers and military decision makers. It was introduced in late 1940, when the "Battle of Britain" started with massive German air raids against British towns and Italy unsuccessfully attacked Greece, and still one year before Pearl Harbor. By April 1942 almost all US manufacturing changed to "War Production" and most SX-28 were made for the government and the military. The design was improved several times during the war and around February 1944 the SX-28 was replaced by the SX-28A, that was produced until June 1946. An estimated 27'500 Super Skyriders had been manufactered (Aug. 1940 - March 1942: 6'000, April 1942 - Jan. 1944: 11'000, Feb. 1944 - June 1946: 10'500). The price of an SX-28A in 1944 was US$ 223. The SX-28 not only is a technically outstanding receiver but also a historic landmark, directly involved in the interception and decoding of German U-boot Morse messages encoded by the famous Enigma machine.
The radio has 15 tubes with two RF amplifiers for the top four bands and single RF for the lower two bands. The frequency range is .55 to 43MHz in six bands. Two AVC, Lamb noise silencer, calibrated bandspread, and a 6V6 push-pull audio amplifier make the SX-28 an all-time ham favorite, with superior sensitivity, stability and selectivity. Moreover its art-deco styled cabinet and its powerful audio allows the radio as well to serve as a home's preferred AM radio and claim the family room, not only a den, in particular when coming with the matching beautiful and rare R-12T speaker, made by Jensen.
Additional information:
ref.1: http://www.radioblvd.com/SX28Notes.html
ref.2: http://www.cryptomuseum.com/df/sx28/index.htm
ref.3: http://www.antiqueradio.org/halli12.htm
ref.4: http://pcbunn.cithep.caltech.edu/jjb/Hallicrafters/SX28/SX-28.htm
ref.5: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hallicrafters_SX-28
ref.6: http://www.qsl.net/la5ki/price.htm
ref.7: http://www.w5cz.com/1941_Hallicrafters_Catalog.pdf
ref.8: http://www.radio-antiks.com/Design/Assets/RADIO-ANTIKS/Images/Radios/Hallicrafters_SX-28/Schem_Halli-SX288_annot.jpg
About my Sky Rider:
My radio has serial number H-119077. This number is only 26 numbers higher than serial number H-119051, that according to ref.1 has been made on Tuesday, Oct. 29, 1940, based on its rare inspection tag. Still according to ref.1 Hallicrafters by the end of 1940 made about 2000-2500 units per month (all models included), i.e. about 63 units per day. Thus with very high probability my radio was made the same day. The receiver is in outstanding condition. The blue-gray wrinkle finish and the writings are original and in excellent condition (pict.s 21-25,29). The corrosion-free chassis has been fully restored and recapped (pict.s 35,36). My fellow restorer predecessor had done the 12 "easy" caps, I took care of the 11 hidden ones in the RF deck cages, as well as all electrolytics. All tubes have been optimized by using my stock (pict.39). During the restoration and repair of some wafers of the main band selector SW-8 I had to identify components from the schematics, that are hard to locate. With the help of Henry Rogers I annotated the numbering scheme of the wafers of SW-8 for this particular schematics (pict.s 37,38, high res. copy at ref.8). The carrier level meter works flawlessly. The Jensen 12" PM speaker and 5 kOhm audio transformer of the RT-12T are in mint condition too. Please
e-mail me (Kris) for any questions, ich spreche Deutsch, je parle Français.
For the economists only:
Ref.6 is a price guide 2000 for Hallicrafter radios. It contains 287 models, the top SX-28 at $1925 price-wise being in 4th position, and 2.5 times higher than the top SX-28A at $750. The lowest and the average prices for the SX-28, however are lower than for the SX-28A, the reason being that, due to older age, their cosmetic condition is normally worse and there are more unrestored SX-28 than there are unrestored SX-28A, which is due to the much more time-consuming restoration of the early version. A good example is the radio restored by Phil Nelson (ref.3). I am (and you as potential buyer are) blessed that mine was in much much better cosmetic condition when I bought it. I managed to recap all 11 "difficult" capacitors in the RF cages with a tiny soldering iron, without demounting the whole RF section.
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