Building a transistor radio how to#
Building a transistor radio portable#

“The TR-1 was much more physically robust, with a lot less to break, and it was much, much better on battery life.” “The vacuum tube radios were serious battery hogs, and any vacuum tube generates a certain amount of heat when it operates, and you have to be careful not to drop them,” Wallace says.

Building a transistor radio portable#

Although a limited number of portable radios using vacuum tubes had been available, the TR-1 immediately transformed the state of consumer radio technology. It received AM stations and sold for $50, the equivalent of more than $400 today. The Regency TR-1 hit stores on October 18, 1954. “The engineers got a crash program together and developed the necessary transistors and circuits, and they actually managed to get it on the shelves for the Christmas season of 1954.” “In the spring of 1954, they said, ‘Let’s get a program together and try to make a product-not for a couple of years out, but let’s see if we can get it on the shelves for this Christmas season,’” Wallace says. They pushed engineers to develop an alternate material that could function reliably in a small, portable radio.

Executives at Texas Instruments, one of the companies licensed the patent from Bell Labs, were highly motivated to get a practical transistor radio to market before the competition. The original transistors had used a substance called germanium as the conducting material, and though it worked well in lab settings, it proved too fragile for everyday use. Although it was initially just used for military applications, engineers and businessmen quickly recognized the potential of the transistor to revolutionize radio receiver technology. It was smaller, consumed less energy and was much more durable. The transistor came to replace the vacuum tube in a wide range of devices. “Not long after the war ended, the transistor was developed at Bell Labs, in 1947.” “There was a tremendous push during the war to reduce the size and power consumption of vacuum tubes,” he says, particularly because the receivers used in radio-controlled bombs depended on vacuum tube technology. The research that led to the transistor replacing the vacuum tube was based on work done during World War II, says Harold Wallace, a curator at the museum. Before the Walkman, the iPod or the iPhone, it all started with the introduction of the first commercial transistor radio, currently on display at the American History Museum.

Then, on this day in 1954, the nature of consumer electronics changed forever: listeners could carry around a small device and enjoy their music on the go. Families sat huddled around a wooden appliance, which used a large amount of energy and was too fragile to be carried around because of the breakable vacuum tubes inside. TAB, an imprint of McGraw-Hill Professional, is a leading publisher of DIY technology books for makers, hackers, and electronics hobbyists.For the first 50 years after its invention, the radio was essentially a piece of furniture. “I would definitely recommend this book to novices and all hobbyists and engineers who have not have much practical exposure to radio design and development.” - EDN “This is the perfect guide for electronics hobbyists and students who want to delve deeper into the topic of radio. Overall, this extremely well written and comprehensively illustrated guide and reference deserves a place on the inquisitive radio amateur's bookshelf.” - QST

Image rejection and noise analysis methods.

In-phase, quadrature, and AM broadcast signals.

Transistor and differential-pair oscillators.

Basic and advanced superheterodyne radios.

Building a transistor radio how to#

Digging deeper, this practical resource shows you how to engineer innovative devices by experimenting with and radically improving existing designs.

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Decision Sciences & Operations Management.