RETRO RED 60’S PHILIPS GROOVY GF819 RECORD PLAYER
Manufactured by Philips in the late 60s this record player is finished in a superb red cabinet with grey lid. It’s mains powered and has an integral transistor amplifier with oval Fane speaker. Overall condition is very clean with only minor marks to the cabinet and few dings to the metal speaker grille as can be expected considering it’s nearly 50. Cabinet size is 40cm wide, 45cm deep and 20cm high.
Fitted with a new Sonotone cartridge and twin stylus (LP/S) it will play records at 16, 33, 45 and 78 rpm. I’ve only tried it on 45 and 33 which sound correct. The BSR auto-changer allows automatic positioning of the arm to the selected record size and will return to rest when it reaches the end of the side. You can also stack several records to play uninterrupted although I found this temperamental to get the singles to drop one at a time and with several singles the speed seemed to vary – I think it depends on the single ridges. You can see it working automatically in the video playing a single.
Sound quality instantly brings back that classic 60s sound. Controls are simple to operate with a fully auto mode that moves the pick-up arm to play the correct size of record (7”, 10” or 12”) and when finished will select the next record from the stack or return and stop. Crank up the volume and fiddle with the tone control for your favourite sound. There’s even a DIN socket to connect up to an external amp or recorder (although it’s much more fun to play the real vinyl!)
weighs over 6.5 Kg.
28/08/2021 at 4:28 pm
I’ve got one of these, but the cartridge has disintegrated with age (literally crumbled) and the solder joints to the cartridge have broken. Wanted to play my wife’s 78’s and 45’s, but not possible in current state. I love the BSR auto-changer (one of the reasons we kept it). I’m a mechanical engineer, sadly not an electrical, and my eyesight is not great. Could you service ours, or recommend someone who could?