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Radio Servicing During WW II In 1942 the manufacture of radio sets for civilian use was stopped and the facilities were directed to war production. By 1943 sets were in short supply. Old radios, long considered obsolete, were resurrected from basements and attics and put into use. The owners needed to bring many sets to the local repair shop for restoration It was quite common to find the remains of a dead rat or mouse that had crawled into the chassis to get warm only to be electrocuted when the set was turned on.Repairing these sets was at times a dangerous occupation. Capacitors contained PCB's; cabinets had asbestos insulation; the solder contained lead; wire insulation was often poor -- and on top of this, the internal operating voltages often exceeded 350 volts! While most radio component production went to the military, the government did allow some components to enter the civilian market. These were marked "MR" for "Maintenance and Repair." During these times it seemed that there was a radio repair shop on every block of a large city. Many of them had poor reputations, for some repairmen were out-and-out crooks, often rewiring sets for substitute components at exorbitant prices when originals were readily available.
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