Well, like most vette projects - I started off working on getting to the wires under the steering column to look for a short, and ended up taking the whole dash and console out. Took off the dash pad and everything.

Anyway on the right hand side under the dash pad there was a part (original Delco markings). I found it in my assembly manual. It lists it as a Convector Assembly. I know that it is part of the radio assembly, but it's not being used because the previous owner had an after market radio in the car.

My question is do I need it? What did it originally do? Is it useful for anything?

Glenn

It's useless unless you have an original radio. You might want to hang on to it in case you ever go back to an original, otherwise it's not worth very much. Now if you had the original radio with convector it would be worth a little more.

Thanks Steve,

Do you know what it was used for?
Glenn

Welcome to the world of funky electronics...!!! Here's a behind the dash picture Juliet shared with me when I was looking for an original radio for "The Toy".

A regular AM/FM radio just had one of those components while a stereo AM/FM radio had two different ones. I'm not sure just what part they played in making music, but they were required.

Well, by no means am I an expert in old electronic technology, just the new stuff. However, from the name and the looks of the picture from Norsky there I would have to say they are used for cooling. The large black fins are definitely a heat sink, and I would imagine the component in the center of them (Most likely some form of transistor which could be pretty large in those days) would be cooled through convection. Heat would transfer through the metal and the large surface area of the fins would allow for heat dissapation.
Amazing when you look at that and think those are transistors in the center, the computer we're using (If yours is a Pentium 4 has about 70 million transistors in a 2 inch square surface!
Thats why we have all these noisy fans everywhere in our cases today!!!!
Anyway, hope this all helped somewhat.

Jim, I'm curious as to what year car the "behind the dash" shot is. I'll be re-installing my interior soon and some more shots like that would help. The body is still off and I'll be painting in a week or two, then the insides go back in. I noticed what looked like a brace behind the dash pad that mine doesn't have. Mine is a 68 conv.

gmurray said: Thanks Steve, Do you know what it was used for? Glenn

Glenn, I also am not an electronics expert by any means, but I do know the convectors used with the "mono" radios have only one transistor and fewer wires then the ones used for "stereo" radios which had 2 transistors. I guess it has something to do with amplifying the output circuit?

|UPDATED|2/27/2004 4:46:00 AM (AZT)|/UPDATED|

Well at least I know that the car wasn't originally mono. My Convector has two transistors, and more wires.

Funny how much things have changed in 30 years

daveb12 said: Jim, I'm curious as to what year car the "behind the dash" shot is. ... Mine is a 68 conv.

Dave, Juliet's is a '70. She is the driving force behind the '70 Vette Registry. She has posted some project photos on the Links page of the site that you may find helpful.

Chris McDonald also has a great photo documentation of the restoration of a '71 droptop that might be helpful on his site - McSpeed.

There are also a few more restorations that have been posted recently where the photo documentation is super.
____________________________________

Jim O.
Save the Wave...!!!

Thanks! I guess I should take some more shots of mine. Th frame is done! L-71 Engine sitting proudly in it's place, full drive train, tank refinished and a scan of the sticker re-attached! Photo Shop and a scanner did a great job of reproducing the sticker.

I just got my tri-carbs back from being re-conditioned, they look new at one fourth the price of replacing them!