Here’s a challenge for some of my older readers, particularly those who were in the hi-fi hobby in the 1960s. While looking for the photo of Carol’s banner mentioned in my entry for July 31st, I ran across a blurry photo of my basement office in 1975, including the portion shown at left. The unit on the top of the pile is definitely a Heathkit FM-4 monaural FM tuner. I had it for quite a few years after 1975, and may still have the manual somewhere. I don’t clearly remember the identity of the other two. The middle item is an interesting one: an AM-only hi-fi tuner. I dumped both the AM tuner and the stereo amp on the bottom shortly after I married Carol and bought a Realistic STA-64 AM/FM stereo amp unit for Christmas 1976. Bogglingly (but why dump it if it works well?) the Realistic is still our main stereo here.
AM hi-fi tuners are something of an oddity, and unless I misrecall, the unit shown above had very good sound for the bass-deprived, static-enhanced AM pop radio signals we all listened to in the 1960s. I think it’s an AJ-21, the AM partner to the Heath AJ-31 FM tuner. The color scheme is about right, including the red Heathkit logo on the lower-left edge of the front panel. The knobs look wrong, but it’s as close as I’ve come in scanning Heathkit photos on Google Images.
As for the stereo amp, I have utterly no clue. I’m almost certain it wasn’t a Heathkit. Any ideas?
The system worked very well as a sort of college-kid junker “stereo” (both tuners were purely mono) from 1971 or so to 1976. I am not an audiophile and don’t have an especially good ear, so equipment like that may have been precisely what I needed at the time, as it was all hamfest-cheap. I don’t need a tube stereo amp anymore (I built my own back in 2005) but it would be interesting to see what the two Heath tuners would do with it.
I think you’re right on that the AM receiver is an AJ-21. Picture here:http://www.heathkit-museum.com/hifi/hvmaj-21.shtml
Something about the amp is ringing Knightkit bells for me, and I’m not sure why, though the gold faceplate is consistent with the one I have (still in pieces in the basement).
-JRS
I’m now leaning toward Fisher for the manufacturer of the amp. They seemed to have the gold faceplates and, unlike KnightKit, loved to put lots of knobs in unusual layouts in them.
-JRS
I looked at Fisher and didn’t see anything. The panel’s edges were rounded, which was a style at the time (mid-60s) along with the gold color. Lots of firms used that color for front panels, including Ameco, which didn’t make hi-fi equipment as best I know. (I used to have a TX-86 transmitter.)
It looks similar to a Bogen amp I had in the late seventies.