Lafayette conversion

[PaulJ]

I confess that I had never heard of the "Lafayette Radio Electronics Corp." until this little beauty popped up on ebay a while back. It sat in my shed untouched for over a year and then I got a sudden urge to convert it........ It is beautifully made/presented, bigger than the OS Pixies or Futaba FT-3a but still quite small and made a lovely conversion. Now I just have to choose a model to fly with it......

Does anybody know anything more about the Lafayette Radio Electronics Corp...... Did they make any other R/C sets?

Paul

[DQA]

PaulJ,
Lafayette Radio Electronics Corp. was a New York based supply house from 1931 to 1981. In the 1963 to 1965 catalogs they offered the typical 3A5 pentode tube transmitter of the day on 27.225 MC in built and kit form. The first transistorized unit was a 1966 red and white transmitter similar to the two versions of the CO-PILOT offered in 1967.
The three transistor version "CO-PILOT" was my first RC transmitter in 1967. By 1968 they carried Citizen-Ship and Testor's proportional radios and the CO-PILOT disappeared from the catalog.

[DQA]

PaulJ etal,
My error, the 3A5 is a dual triode (oscillator/amp), and the 3A4 is a pentode (RF amp often with a 1L4 oscillator). Sorry about that.
Both were used in some of the early RC tone transmitters in the US during the late 1940's to the early 1960's when the transistor era took over.

[Phil_G]

3 archive pics:

...and my own Lafayette, with receiver and actuator:

[PaulJ]

Many thanks both for the extra info and pictures. A little googling found that Lafayette produced lots of other electronic and radio products. Though quite simple, my set had a real "quality" feel about it so I'm a bit surprised that they didn't develop further in the r/c market.

Paul