Video hasn't killed this radio star | Coffs Coast News | Local News in Coffs Coast

BARRY Smith jokes that his hobby collecting and restoring old radios is really his second childhood.

“I made my first crystal set when I was 11 years old and started an apprenticeship in radio and TV repairs but I veered off into a career in electronics - now I've gone back to doing what I really love,” Mr Smith said.

How much he loves it is not hard to see.

At least three rooms of the family's Nambucca Heads home are filled with either the works in progress, the finished products or Barry's pride and joy, his self-made stereo system on which he plays his collection of old vinyl records.

Finding and then fixing the old radios is what Barry really loves.

“I'm a hands-on guy - I love the solder and the fuses and the challenge of making the old sets work.

“When the sets come to me, they are often an absolute disaster.

“It's heartbreaking the damage people can do to the old things.

“They can also make them lethal without realising it - I'm very keen on safety.”

Barry says making the old radios work can take weeks or months, depending on the problems and what materials are required.

“I like to use what I have lying around - it's called 'bodging' and what people always used to do.

“I try to recycle old pieces of anything to make the parts I need.”

That's not to be confused with doing a 'bodgey' job, which Barry certainly does not.

His collection numbers more than 200 old radios, of all shapes and sizes and all in perfect working order.

His favourite is a 1920s single valve mini-phone radio.

“I love the way it is 'olde worlde' and cosy.

“It's amazing when you see this and realise within the next 10 years all the technical developments for the modern radio had been done.

“From then on it was just improvements in components and the size of radios.”

Another favourite is a 1940s HMV radio, completely restored to its former glory and able to pick up short wave radio signals worldwide.

The famous His Master's Voice logo, with Nipper the dog looking into the old bell-shaped loudspeaker, is on many radios in the collection.

For Barry the most important thing is to 'snaffle' the old radios before they end up at the tip.

“A lot of people throw them out because they think they can't get replacement valves any more.

“Actually the valves are rarely the problem.

“There are a vast majority around - spare ones in existing collections or buried in back sheds or attics.”

Barry also has a quite a collection of stories about strange repairs he's done.

“One of the funniest was when a security system in a sex shop kept going off,” he recalled.

“It turned out the squeaky hinges on the aluminium door were the problem - we fixed them using 'sexy body rubbing lotion'!”

And finally, one meeting with an ageing Sir Robert Menzies, who told Barry he couldn't comprehend how people understood 'these technical things'.

To which Barry replied: “And I've never understood politics.”