Hard to tell.......................as I stated in my reply to Dx Ace, he was
nice enough to reply to me this morning. I'll give him the benefit of the
doubt.
I have been doing ok with eBay purchases lately. The key has been going for
not so expensive units. I was looking at a Swift M4000D microscope the other
day. I entered a maximum bid of 235 dollars. Somebody else won the item for
265 dollars. He wanted it more than me, so he did deserve to win the item.
Radios are another story. Every radio that I have purchased from eBay have
needed some sort of repair. I purchased a Drake TR7 a few months back.
When I went through the alignment of the BFO injection frequency, I noticed
that the amplitude of the BFO was low. I also noticed that RF output on
anything above 40 meters was low. I traced the problem to a cold solder
joint on the reference oscillator board. After I repaired the unit, the TR7
was putting out 260 watts of power. Evidently, somebody tried to compensate
for the lower power output by disabling the ALC circuit.
When I e-mailed the seller and explained the repairs that I had done, he
proclaimed "oh, I was wondering why I had to turn the mic gain up much
higher than my other rigs".
Conveniently, no microphone or power cord was included in the sale, but he
did include the Cinch-Jones power connector.
I already had a PS-7 power supply, so this wasn't an issue.
Then, there was the Drake SW-8 that I purchased from a hamfest. The seller
was "selling it for a friend", so he didn't know too much about the item. He
was nice enough to include batteries with the unit, but he didn't bother to
tell me that the electrolytic capacitor in the wall wart had exploded and
that there was 3V of ripple in the output.
This caused the internal bulk electrolytic capacitor at the power supply
input of the SW8 to fail. Too much ripple voltage caused excessive internal
heating of electrolytic caps, unless they are specified as the high ripple
types that are used in switching power supplies. Other than this issue, and
the fact that the LCD had some missing segments, the radio was perfect.
Actually, the LCD issue is common. You need to remove the LCD panel itself
and clean the rubber strips that interface the panel itself to the main
display board of the SW8.
I know that many folks on this NG have had good eBay experiences with
receivers, and I am happy for those folks!

Pete

"N9NEO" wrote in message
ps.com...

Pete KE9OA wrote:
I was looking through eBay for Drake equipment. Radio Mart had a 1994
model
SW-8..........he represented this unit as a very late model. Tonight, he
has
a Drake SPR-4 with a S/N of 562, which he states that he knows this to be
a
very late model.
SPR-4s were run into the high 5000s or low 6000s. He is selling one of
the
earlier units. No big deal, except that the later models used glass epoxy
boards, and they used silver mica caps in the front end on the LW range.
I
have had a couple of those earlier units, including one that was
purchased
brand new. The earlier units were pretty deaf on the LW range, unless you
used the loop antenna.
True, he does give a good presentation, but he gives out misinformation
with
the authority of an expert. I wonder how many folks fall for this
gibberish.
No problem in stating that a unit is in mint condition if it really is,
but
to state that a low S/N unit is a very late iteration is outright lying.
I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and I did ask him if maybe somebody
had
misinformed him about how late in the product life cycle these units were
actually made. I am not sure if I will hear from him or not. Always good
to
do some research and be prepared before bidding on eBay.

Pete

Perhaps Mike M. will be along with some input for you. I think
Radiomart is one of his favorite subjects.

NEO