Kenwood Eleven III resto and poor AM performance

JAL413

New Member
Hello All,

I did a full recap on my Eleven III. Also replaced the dial cord, changed to LEDs and replaced transistors on the power supply board and power amp board due to an intermittent pop in the left channel that I later found to be a bad solder joint on the power supply board. Cleaned all the switches with Deoxit. On FM in would occasionally not kick in to stereo but just giving the VCO pot a little budge fixed that. The variable capacitor pulley and shaft walked out of the bracket letting the anti-backlash gear fall off, so I had to get that back together. Thanks to many threads on here, the receiver now works and sounds great except for AM radio. I plan to send it out for an alignment, but I was wondering about the poor AM performance. Even a junky radio picks up a lot on the AM band here but this unit only picks up one station which is the next town over and even then I have to turn the volume way up to hear it. The signal meter doesn't move at all when tuning along the AM band. Any thoughts? I only have the factory antenna, but like I said, even a cheap radio picks up a lot more than this.

Thanks in advance
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Nice unit. I have a Kenwood Eleven I have to look at yet.
Cosmetics look great too.

John
 
Thanks. I see you're in Wolcott. I was planning to bring it to Approved Audio in Litchfield for alignment. Any experience?
 
(Embarrassing statement ahead :confused:)
I lent my stereo FM generator out several years ago along with my
distortion analyzer and never got them back. Forgot who I lent it to.
You just can't align these blind, like any tuner section etc.
I'm still kicking myself.
 
Hello All,

I did a full recap on my Eleven III. Also replaced the dial cord, changed to LEDs and replaced transistors on the power supply board and power amp board due to an intermittent pop in the left channel that I later found to be a bad solder joint on the power supply board. Cleaned all the switches with Deoxit. On FM in would occasionally not kick in to stereo but just giving the VCO pot a little budge fixed that. The variable capacitor pulley and shaft walked out of the bracket letting the anti-backlash gear fall off, so I had to get that back together. Thanks to many threads on here, the receiver now works and sounds great except for AM radio. I plan to send it out for an alignment, but I was wondering about the poor AM performance. Even a junky radio picks up a lot on the AM band here but this unit only picks up one station which is the next town over and even then I have to turn the volume way up to hear it. The signal meter doesn't move at all when tuning along the AM band. Any thoughts? I only have the factory antenna, but like I said, even a cheap radio picks up a lot more than this.

Thanks in advance
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I also got an Eleven III. My best looking receiver, truly an eye candy, as far as receiver goes. For your AM reception issue, I would check all connections (internal and external to the AM ferrite stick), including continuity check for the loops going to the ferrite rod - may have to take it out of circuit to do this properly. If everything looks good, adjust the ferrite stick to different positions to see if it helps. Next, I would move the entire receiver to a different location to see if any improvement. Radios are Kenwood's strong trait, so when the radio under-perform, it usually means something is defective. broken, or you're in a bad location with interference, shielding, etc., messing with your AM reception. Many devices can interfere with AM reception such switching power supplies, monitors, florescence lights, etc. Lastly, an external antenna usually is best for AM/FM radio reception.

Just wondering, do you have the replacement parts (caps, troublesome transistors, etc.) list for the Eleven III you can share?
 
I'll have to get a list together. Didn't order everything all at once or from the same place. Will check the ferrite bar loop continuity tonight. Never thought to check that, but I guess it does get moved around and wires could break.
 
Checked continuity of the blue, orange, and white wires to ground. All 0 Ohms. One thing I noticed is the orange (wire is actually yellow), and white wire are soldered on to pins 4 and 5, so I'm wondering if the previous owner was trying to troubleshoot this problem as well. They would have been wire wrapped from the factory, correct?

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I measured voltages on the tuning circuit and the power supply board. Not sure how significant some of the differences are. Can someone with more experience offer their thoughts?

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