Delco Sonomatic from 1969, 94APB1 Radio installation and test?

[Guest mvnielsen]

Hi people,

I recently bought this radio for my 1968 Buick Skylark and would like to bench test it before i install it in my car.

it has a kind of hole to a special plug on the back of it, along with the antenna hole and a additional wire to the xtra rear speaker.

i've posted a few pics on here of it.

on the back just over the plug it says:

GD - for ground

SPK - for speaker (front)

12V - for the + on the battery

now the question is - i need the "female" plug for the radio - but where do i get it ans what's it called in english (am from Denmark myself)?

and also, i tested it out on my little car, just to see if anything happened, and nothing happened...

if it's a radio with tubes - how can i tell? and how long should i wait till the tubes start working?

or is the radio from 1969 past the tubes age and entered the transistor age?

and also, how do i install the pre-pushed radiostations? i know i can pre-set them, but does anyone know how?

any help would be grately appreciated

thank you

[JohnD1956]

H Mvinielsen, hope I can be of assistance.

As to the plug, you can probably get some female spade connectors at your parts store, and then just push the connectors onto the spade connectors at the back of the radio.

The radio is transistorized and does not require a warm up. The knobs pull off the front and the knob behind the center one on the right should have a built in fader switch. You'll know if it does because the fader switch has three prongs attached to the rear knob. If you don't have this then the speakers won't work.

If you do have this then you may want to try a temporary speaker, just be sure to ground it to the chassis. The factory speaker will only have one lead because the frame of the speaker is the ground.

To set the push buttons first you tune to a station then you tug the push button of your choice out one stop. It goes easy and you should not be able to pull it out of the radio but you'll feel the one step stop. Then you push the button back in all the way and the station will be set for that pushbutton.

[Guest mvnielsen]

Hi there John, and thank you for your answer!!!

I figured out the setting of the radio stations, thanx a bunch, aparently u have to pull a little harder than i thought, but now that works perfectly.

I didn't quite get what you wrote about the fader switch - i taken a new pic that i'll post - do you mean the 3 wires coming behind the tuning knob?

"The knobs pull off the front and the knob behind the center one on the right should have a built in fader switch. You'll know if it does because the fader switch has three prongs attached to the rear knob. If you don't have this then the speakers won't work."

or do you mean, that the knob to the right of the center knob, with the "I" on it - that i can pull the "C" know all the way out, there should be 3 prongs attached behind it?

thanx again!!

[JohnD1956]

Mvnielsen Sorry for the confusion. Here's two pictures to explain what I meant. It looks to me like you do not have the fader switch dial and that is needed to complete the circuit from the radio to the speaker. You may be able to put a jumper lead into the holes from the front of the radio for bench testing purposes.

[BUICK RACER]

Hey Kids, the fader is only used if you have 2 speakers, one in the front and one in the back, otherwise there should be a jumper already installed.

Make sure you have a speaker hooked up before you put the power to it,too.

[Guest mvnielsen]

Hi u 2

And thank u both for the answers - i actually managed to bench test the radio yesterday on my little car and it finally worked!

Only - there was only a weak bussing coming out if the speakers, like from when u haven't tuned in the radio, and even having a new smart electronic antenna hooked up to it, i couldn't find any stations?

I then tried turning the little scrue (?) in the little hole just over the tuning knob, as i read somewhere that to adjust the radio i should turn the radio to aprox 1400 and the turn the scwue? But nothing really worked?

Any idea of what's the next step?

Thanx again

[Larry Schramm]

Is the antenna ground -grounded to the radio for a ground plane?

[Guest mvnielsen]

I grounded the antenna to the same place as i grounded the radio, so the antenna was properly to the car...

Unless i should ground it somewhere else?