"William Stearns" wrote in message
...
I acquired a GT550 along with its matching power supply about 10 years
ago from someone's garage. I've had the thing packed up for about the
same amount of time. I have the manual and tons of schematics along
with several hand drawn schematics from the previous owner(s) with
various notes and dates. I pulled it out over field day and turned it
on to listen to it next to the Alinco HF rig that hasn't been out in
at least 9 years to see if it still could hear. Surprisingly both
rigs worked and my oldest son, now 10 seems somewhat interested in the
hobby. Maybe he just likes all the dials and lights. :-) So, I'm
thinking I want to dig into this vintage radio and try to get it back
up to snuff as an electronics project for my oldest and I. Does
anyone have any hints and possibly and specific vendors that they've
had good luck with in the aid of restoring a vintage radio? Thanks in
advance and 73 de KE4RGH.

You will want to replace all the electrolytics in the rear apron mounted
audio board.
If you can find the xtal calibrator, it is a nice addition.
One of the flaws in this rig (and the SBE SB-34, and likely many other BA
xcvrs) is they have one adjustment that is to equalize the VFO for RX and
TX. This can only be done on one freq- above and below, there will be an
increasing delta between the two- w/o an RIT, this is problematical.
The 2 planetary drives in series always seem to develop backlash over time-
keep them lubricated and reduce friction along the drive train as much as
possible.
Wonderful looking rigs though.

Dale W4OP