Murphy SAD94L mystery...

[Ian - g4jqt]

I bought a Murphy SAD94L at the last Wootton Basset auction, but am casting about looking for the differences between this and the SAD94. I have an SAD94S which is MW and SW. The SAD94 is MW and LW, but so is the SAD94L - which is printed on the back cover.

I have Murphy Service sheet for the SAD94 and just the circuit for SAD94S, but can't locate anything specifically for the SAD94L. To confuse matters further there is the AD94 which appears the same as the SAD94!

Can anyone clarify any of this? 

Thanks.

Ian

[Mike Watterson]

See https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/murphy_sad..._94_l.html

Perhaps the SAD94 and SAD94L are the same and Murphy added the L during production to avoid confusion. See also 1950s Pye models where the, set back, service info and adverts can have 3 or even 4 names for the same model, excluding Invicta variants of same chassis that might have no model ID.

I was also puzzled by 1935 to 1945 Ever Ready models (and some equivalent Lissens) that seemed to never have a model ID on back, chassis or cabinet. They actually had a two part guarantee card, sometimes stapled inside the cabinet and the small part would usually also get detached.

There were also Irish made Pilot, Murphy, Bush and Pye sets that only diverged after 1954/1955 (due to UK VHF-FM which didn't start in Ireland till 1961-62). Sometimes these had the same model, slightly different or completely different IDs. Some were UK export versions with SW replaced by LW that were never sold in UK.

I'd be surprised if a SAD94 with LW is any different to a SAD94L, other than any changes that might happen during production. Some models had no changes and others had changes big enough to be outlined in later service info. I think Murphy didn't allow ERT or Trader 3rd party service info for many years.

In general service info for export or Irish versions of UK models is sparse to non-existent and certainly very rare indeed in ERT, Trader or R&TVS publications.

[Ian - g4jqt]

Thanks Mike. Mike Barker (very well informed on all Murphy matters) has confirmed that the SAD94 and SAD94L are the same, and that the L was probably added later in production to clarify the difference between the two.