A Cool Looking Radio

Recently I spotted a cool looking Philco radio at a local junk store and snagged it for $40. I awkwardly loaded the spiderweb filled wooden box into my car and drove it home to my apartment. The label inside has the part number 42-390; a nice radio for its time in 1942. The wooden cabinet shows a lot of water damage and aging so it’s a perfect donor for a Fallout themed project.

The original circuitry was trashed, so I decided to start from the ground up and only recycle the cabinet. I removed the circuitry, faceplate, and speaker from the cabinet leaving only the wood and some mounting bolts behind.

I think the radio may have served as a part donor at some point as all the tubes and many of the components have been removed.

I recruited my friend Kai to help and we managed to procure an air compressor from a kind stranger in town (small communities rock). After blowing 74 years of dust, spiderwebs, and dead bugs out with the compressor I wiped the remaining dirt out with a dry cloth. After all of this cleaning I glued the loose bits of wood and veneer down and threw a coat of furniture polish on.

My scrap computer pile yielded a display that fits perfectly into the hole left by the removed radio unit. The donor unit is a Carry-I computer. I can find little information about this particular model, so I may have to perform some exploratory surgery to determine how to drive the display.