SETS BUILT LIKE CARS

Taranaki Daily News, 29 August 1930, Page 12

SETS BUILT LIKE CARS

BUILDING MODERN RECEIVERS. Winter is always the busiest time of the year in the radio trade. It is the season when families are glad to collect around the fire and the loud speaker. It is the period of perfect reception. This year the trade in Australia has been greatly helped wit's the test cricket descriptions broadcast, which have given a wonderful impetus to business. °The result is that manufacturers of radio receivers are working at top pressure; some are having difficulty in filling all their orders. At one wellknown Australian factory, for instance, double and treble shifts are working in the “bottle-neck” sections. These sections are so-called because they are the “congested areas” at times of heavy pressure and operations are practically continuous. Chassis parts, condenser parts, coils—the machines that produce these components work night and day in order that the men engaged in assembly work may never be kept waiting. The.modern radio receiver is mounted upon a steel chassis which is squeezed into shape under power pressure. Various dies are used in cutting holes in the chassis before the latter starts on a journey around the benches to have the components attached. From bench to bench the chassis is passed, accumulating pgrts as it goes. At the first bench valve contacts and valve screen holders are added; at the next, the condenser panels are assembled, tested and fixed to the chassis. The radio frequency transformers and audio frequency transformers come next, then the wiring of t)ie radio frequency components, and then the audio frequency. So the set in embryo traveL along until it is complete. At many stages on the journey it is stopped for inspection and test. Finally, the set arrives in a test room where'a miniature broadcasting station is operating. This room is closed in a copper screen, fine enough to be fly proof, and the screen effectively shuts out all electrical interference. The broadcasting station is set in operation, the set receives the station on different wave lengths, and tests are made for sensitivity (distance getting), selectivity (separating of stations on similar wave lengths), volume and tone.