[David Dunlop]

The BAND Selector Switch in the upper right section of the Sender front panel appears to be the only user of this particular KNOBS on the entire 52-Set. Nor does it appear on any of the CMC built earlier No. 9 Wireless Sets. It may be unique to the 52-Set, but it is still possible Canadian Marconi was using it on one of the wireless sets built by their Marine Division.

In any event, it is a 3-Wing Knob with the lower wing that points down towards the curved Band Decal, being the longest of the three wings. It is also the wing, therefore, that has a deep groove cut into the tip of it, which was originally filled with green luminous paint. Only a few bits of it remain today.

The KNOBS mounts on a typical D-shaft, with a central, countersunk, slot-head screw, and a slot-head grub screw, directly behind the long wing, locking it onto the Band Selector Shaft. The second photograph shows the grub screw hole and also the depth of the groove at the tip of the long wing, top dead centre.

I have decided once this KNOBS has been cleaned up, I am going to wipe a single coat of flat white enamel into the groove to provide suitable reflective background, and then infill the groove with one or more layers of natural luminous green paint. That should get me pretty close to an original look. Then I will deal with the remaining knobs.

The only small wrinkle to this work is my supply of flat white enamel. I have a 13 oz spray can of the stuff, but for what I need for the job at hand, the amount of wastage to spray some into a small container for one brief dip of a fine tip paintbrush made no sense to me. But I was out of any ¼-oz jars of Testor’s Flat White Model Paint. THAT became an interesting exercise this past week!

Model supplies are non-essential at the moment here in Winnipeg and the shops locked down. On-line purchasing was another challenge. I was finding most places were out of stock, or showing a discontinued status, or showed on line they carried the brand but no details as to what was actually in stock. Checking on-line also showed some interesting News Reports from about a year ago that the company that bought Testor’s a few years ago was shutting the brand down for some unknown reason.
I eventually remembered a Model Supply shop in Calgary I had dealt with a number of years ago and tracked them down on line. 15 pages of Testor’s products were available and after looking through them all, I found the ½-oz bottle of flat whit enamel in stock, along with a shade of red gloss, and blue gloss enamels I had forgotten I would soon need for this project, so I ordered a ¼-oz bottle of them as well. Once here, I will finish off this KNOBS for reinstallation.

David