“I have built hundreds of kits, perhaps a thousand. It has been fifty years since I built my first.This is the best AM/FM radio receiver I have built to date, but for some perhaps the worst possible choice. It depends on what you hope to accomplish by building the kit. If you hope to build an awesome radio there are much better kits. If selectivity, sensitivity and audio quality are important, here again you could do better. If you want soldering practice, this is far to simplistic to be any challenge. It is large, ugly, and it's design does not lend to a nice finished product.So why do I LOVE it so much? If you want to learn radio electronics, really learn what is happening inside a radio and why (to the greatest detail). If you want to learn how to optimize (tune, calibrate) a radio receiver. If you want to learn to use your test equipment, your frequency generator, your oscilloscope, then this is an outstanding kit! I have learned a great deal from this kit even after fifty years. In fact, the most I've learned from a kit in many, many years!However, if you don't own a scope or have any test equipment or the desire to learn those techniques then 90% of the printed directions are for somebody else. Find another kit! This kit is wasted on those looking for a soldering kit, many better choices in that respect (although if you want to build a truly nice radio you'd spend a great deal more as well).You will need an oscilloscope and a signal generator that will modulate your test signal at various frequencies (so the old 1000hz test signal isn't enough to perform all tests as suggested). As many reviewers have pointed out, you can build the radio without these items, but you would be paying for documentation that you won't use (the parts aren't worth ten dollars). Remember, 90% of the documentation is aimed at using these two pieces of test equipment.I would also suggest that if you aren't familiar with this test equipment then you will need additional documentation as these instructions clearly assume you know how to use the tools you have purchased. This is an ADVANCED kit with a set of beginners instructions included.”
“I have completed several Elenco kits and all have worked first time. Quality and instructional kits. Fun tweaking the components to get the strongest signals.”
“For someone like myself that never has done soldering, the instructions are very well written, one thing I did different in the order of each section, is I delayed mounting the stick on speaker as much as possible, less weight do deal with if you are uncomfortable, you have to remember that this is kinda crude in sound quality, it will not be sounding like a surround system, but if you get all the solder posts and plating welded right, this will serve its purpose! I DO highly recommend this for starting out in soldering. My first one failed only because I didn't solder the hardware on the boards correctly, This very well Engineered Kit has served my purpose, Try it out!”
“While there is nothing too difficult about this kit, it is very involved and I would not recommend it for a beginner. Start with another Elenco kit and work your way up to this one.This kit will keep me busy for a while and it is quite fun to do.”
“I bought this as a gift for a sick veteran of my acquaintance, and he was very happy to get it, and is enjoying putting it together. It's not too difficult, not too easy, and is keeping him busy. It has an ear plug so he can listen to the radio once he gets it put together, and the sound won't bother anyone else. A perfect gift for a man who is homebound and ill, like this veteran, or for someone interested in building a little radio.”
“The quality of the PCB is very poor. Soldering comes out of pcb. After assembling only the Amp works with a very low voice and can be heard using the headphone. No sound comes from speaker. Total waste of money. No radio AM or FM works. No trouble shooting instructions. Low quality parts”
