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Black Radios Drake radios have been my passion for years. I buy, sell, repair, refurbish and restore them! I'll treat your rig as if it was my own.

Refurbishment, sales and repairs of classic Drake and other Amateur Radio gear.

Folks, although I do appreciate the occasional business that I get from this page, it is an unusable mess, as far as I a...
09/16/2026

Folks, although I do appreciate the occasional business that I get from this page, it is an unusable mess, as far as I am concerned. The interface was designed by a two year old and it’s all geared towards engaging the folks with two second attention spans.

If you need to find me, my email address is in the header information for this page. I almost never check the messenger app because it’s full of stuff that I am not interested in.

Yeah, I sound like an old fart. I own it. Email really is the best way. One has to compose the message and await a reply. I reply and try and answer your question.

Anyway, now I have to take a few minutes to figure out how to get back to my main account. Whilst I take the time to figure out where they hid the post button, enjoy this photo of my cats playing in a box.

Cheers…

05/19/2026

For What It's Worth Dep't.

Replacement can capacitors are getting increasingly more expensive. Prices now go anywhere from $50 and up for parts for the cans. R-4C's are double that because of two cans. Add my time and you're going over $140. I will still do these but recent issues with lead time have made me search for alternatives (mainly because of the time issues, because the Hayseed product is first-rate but their turn around time has gone out to over a month).

Many of you have seen the kits you can get on eBay and other places. These use a circuit board in the footprint of the can but use radial-lead capacitors on top, which look like, well, separate axial-leaded caps on the top. For many of our sets that are not collector-grade, these kits will work as well as any can cap but will not look original. I can pretty much say that installation will be the same as far as time is concerned but the parts cost is much lower. I have located a vendor that uses name-brand, 105C-rated caps and it will come out to roughly $25 per can for the parts.

Feel free to email me at w1es at arrl dot net for more info...

05/19/2026

This page continues to get clogged up with spam and content that I did not authorise to be here. You will be best-off to email me at w1es at arrl dot net and I can get back to you.

I just opened up this page for the first time in awhile. The reason I don't come here is that the user interface is horrible. It's mainly Meta trying to sell me "features".

I am still around and very much working on Drakes from the 1-A to the TR5 (including the TR7, which is actually earlier).

Again, contact me at w1es at arrl dot net.

12/11/2025

The pipeline is filling up. Just received a TR7 for an evaluation and alignment. Still have a slight backlog and I recommend planning on sending radios in January to reduce risk of losing your equipment.

Address

555 Woodland Drive
Graham, NC
27253

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 6pm
Tuesday 9am - 6pm
Wednesday 9am - 6pm
Thursday 9am - 6pm
Friday 9am - 6pm
Saturday 9am - 6pm
Sunday 12pm - 6pm

Telephone

+19196381428

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