"m II" wrote in message news:5IU5g.5294$a7.5015@edtnps90...
It must be a coincidence. There was a Realistic dx-160 thread a while
ago. Today I visited a local second hand store and picked up the same
radio.

It's in good shape, with factory external speaker and manual. Price?
Seventy dollars Canadian. I was happy and the seller was MORE than
happy. It was a good deal all around and now my first 160 has a twin
buddy to keep it company.

Life is good.


mike

I always enjoyed tuning a DX-160. They were really nice receivers.
Congrats!

"SWL-2010" wrote in message
. ..

"m II" wrote in message
news:5IU5g.5294$a7.5015@edtnps90...
It must be a coincidence. There was a Realistic dx-160 thread a while
ago. Today I visited a local second hand store and picked up the same
radio.

It's in good shape, with factory external speaker and manual. Price?
Seventy dollars Canadian. I was happy and the seller was MORE than
happy. It was a good deal all around and now my first 160 has a twin
buddy to keep it company.

Life is good.


mike

I always enjoyed tuning a DX-160. They were really nice receivers.
Congrats!

I see these on Ebay all the time for pretty cheap. How does this radio
compare to my DX394B? I could use another tabletop.

MnMikew wrote:
"SWL-2010" wrote in message
. ..

"m II" wrote in message

news:5IU5g.5294$a7.5015@edtnps90...

It must be a coincidence. There was a Realistic dx-160 thread a while
ago. Today I visited a local second hand store and picked up the same

radio.

It's in good shape, with factory external speaker and manual. Price?
Seventy dollars Canadian. I was happy and the seller was MORE than
happy. It was a good deal all around and now my first 160 has a twin
buddy to keep it company.

Life is good.


mike

I always enjoyed tuning a DX-160. They were really nice receivers.
Congrats!


I see these on Ebay all the time for pretty cheap. How does this radio
compare to my DX394B? I could use another tabletop.

Although the DX-394 has it's shortcomings it's still far ahead of the
DX-160 in overall performance. The '160' is not a serious table-top by
today's standards or even in it's day. It's more of a trip down memory
lane now. Consider one of the discontinued table-tops by Kenwood or
Drake. In your price range the Kenwood R600 or Drake SW2 would probably
be good choices. I'd go for the SW2 which has a great sync' detector for
program listening.

"Lisa Simpson" wrote in message
.. .
If you wanted to try an old bandspread tuning radio for a good price, I
would just buy one. Try to find a good clean one with the dial in good
clear
condition and make sure the bandspread is not broken or defective if
possible, because you depend on them. I remember when it dawned on me
how
to determine where I was on the dial, once you do that, you can't be as
accurate as a digital radio, but with practice and patience, you can get
real close, as the used to say, maybe just a "scosh" off.

Anyone care to try to write up a tutorial, or point at an existing one,
that
explains how to do this magic? My 160 should arrive any day now! : }



Lisa, first, you will want to find the WWV signals at 5, 10, 15 Mhz, if they
are accurate, then your main tuner is aligned, and will give your point of
reference. Use the band selector to chose which band you are going to tune.

On the long scale along with the regular frequency numbers there will be
some colored "marks" resembling diamond shapes, if I remember right. Set
the main tuner on one of the marks to tune a Meter band. Then, with the
bandspread dial all the way to zero, you will begin to tune slowly across
the band, when you find the station or signal, note where on the bandspread
you are. It's not really to hard to do.

Also, on the main tuner, (long scale), it's marked in MHz, so, for example,
between 9 & 10. You know halfway, you will be at 9.50 MHz. Halfway between
9 & 9.5, you will be at 9.25 on the dial, just keep that in mind when just
using the main tuner alone.

Hopefully, you can obtain a good copy of a uers manual. There are usually
some manuals for sale on E-bay. The use of the receiver controls is a snap,
because they are right in your face, but it will give you the information
about the color of the marks for the meter bands, because I cant remember
the color's now. It will also give you the detail of setting up the meter
band better than I can, it's been along time since I had one sitting in
front of me.

The dial on the Dx-160 is beautuful when lit, because it's all color coded.
I think you will enjoy many hours of SW listening on it. Once you get the
hang of bandspread truning, I think you will enjoy the challenge. I still
do on my old Kenwood R-300. I hope this will help you somewhat.

Mark Zenier wrote:
In article ,
Silfax wrote:

On 2006-05-04, SWL-2010 wrote:

On the long scale along with the regular frequency numbers there will be
some colored "marks" resembling diamond shapes, if I remember right. Set
the main tuner on one of the marks to tune a Meter band. Then, with the
bandspread dial all the way to zero, you will begin to tune slowly across
the band, when you find the station or signal, note where on the bandspread
you are. It's not really to hard to do.


If I recall correctly the markings on the bandspread dial were only
"accurate" for the amateur bands. There was a chart at the back of the
manual for conversion to the sw bcst bands.


I'm pretty sure it was the broadcast bands.

But you folks act like you've never heard of Crystal Calibrators?

Most folks had a box, or built into their receiver, a 100 kHz crystal
oscillator, designed to produce harmonics all across the band, trimmed
to WWV so it could tell you where you where.

Back in the '70s, when digital divider ICs became common, projects to
build them were in just about every electronics magazine that produced
even more useful frequencies, like 1 MHz, 100 kHz, and 25 kHz modulated
with an audio tone so they were easy to find, all done with a chip or
three.

Mark Zenier

It was also in the 70's when digital frequency displays became
practical/economical. I built the display featured in a 1977 issue of
'Popular Electronics'. It cost about $100 for the parts, including the
PC boards. It seemed like a lot of money back then but it was a real
luxury to have 1-Khz tuning accuracy in those days. I used that display
with my Halli' S20R. The magazine article showed the display being used
with the Realistic DX-160. I built a second one for a friend who had a
DX-160. I still have my display and the S20R.