This was the exact model my father had on the desk my entire childhood. Had it modified to go just a hair out of band back in the day for use with a club he was in. Mod included a little box on the right side, three rotary switches that if memory serves had ten numbered positions each (maybe they were lettered, maybe there weren't ten, but there were three rotary switches you needed a tiny flathead screwdriver to adjust). I never realized this was considered a premium model. Radio Shack earned their reputation for selling junk, but I knew some of their transceivers were actually decent. Never knew they had premium models though. I just assumed we got lucky with ours and it never failed on us. Man, though, what styling! Looks like something straight out of some 1982-made movie about Viet Nam or something. Never pumped more than 4 watts out, but had it attached to a Shooting Star beam antenna atop a 55-foot Rohn tower in the back yard. That antenna was a pair of 4-element beams in crossed polarities, and a quad reflector instead of yagi reflector. My father has told me a couple of times about the time he unkeyed and heard someone unkey right after him, several times. He thought someone was deliberately walking on him at first, but how would they know to unkey at the right time? He then did a quick test: seven quick on-off keyups of the microphone. They were followed by seven quick repeats. There were no repeaters on the station. He was hearing his own signal skip all the way around the world. Conditions happened to be absolutely PERFECT that day before I was born. I forgot the thing had a clock on it! I forgot about the clarifier! I forgot about a lot of little things about this radio! Do you by chance have the two-button black desktop stand mic with the gain slider on the neck? We also had two matching mobile TRC-449 radios. One was in the process of being modified by Dad to have a detachable faceplate, before those were even a thing, but that project got put on the wayside by the changing time/money/motivation availabilities that occur with life. I found it as a teenager/early adult, and started to continue the modification, but didn't document anything and wound up forgetting things... again, time availabilities, money, motivation... Unfortunately, I didn't finish and that radio is in pieces now... somehwere at Dad's house. He still has the 457 and both 449s, as well as a couple of other radios. I have a TRC-224 there somewhere. Brings back memories... thank you for the video!
some of my fondest memories in the radio hobby was on one of these radios, i was having a bad day on the job. went down to the radio shack store a plooped down one hundred seventy nine dollars down and took it home. don't know what happened to that one but i have one on my shelf just like it. I was in the loop when i bought it
I HAVE ONE. And as a teenager in the mid 70's I lived in Cocoa Beach Florida. I had a 5/8 vertical at 60ft. I still have many QSL cards from Europe from those days. I just got my hands on another one a few days ago on E-Bay and plan to rework my original. GREAT RIG.
Thank you for the great review, just getting back into cb radio after 40 years away, had a 23 channel Navaho back then, will look for this one in the yard sales to add to my collection, not many on the air around here, but doing what I can to revive it!!
Thank You for this video i just bought one of these yesterday. i had a CB Phone back in the late 70's with a Rack Shack base antenna on roof in Boston. i just set up a new base at my house its in my bar=/man cave i have a Siro 27 GP 5/8 wave and was using a little TRC-419 now i wlil have a nice base with SSB just need to source a better A/C cord then the one that is on there now. Thanks for the Great Video.
Love mine as well. 99% of the time, mine's on either ch 38 or 39 LSB. I did wind up switching out a few of the electrolytics..Now looking for a matching power base mic. I currently have the un-amplified 6A8 mic
I own a SSB CB exactly like this one. It was a Ham fest find, I paid $40.00 for the CB. The Realistic TRC-457 was the first 40 channel SSB CB Base Radio Shack sold in their stores. New this model sold for around $400.00 new. I've seen a few on ebay for outlandish prices. I agree that this is the best SSB CB Base Radio Shack sold. I just love my TRC-457.
Robert Bales Radio Shack's first SSB Base was the TRC-46, the secont was the TRC-48, the third was the TRC-57. Check this site www.radioshackcatalogs.com for more information.
Hi are able to tell me what transformer you replaced it with when you did conversion and to make clock work with loose time what mods did you have to do
Extremely informative. Even though most radio in my neck of the woods has gone "bye-bye", (Ohio) I subbed, because I was a 42+ yr. operator before calling it quits in The late 90's. I hope that all your videos have this much depth! I'll soon find out! 73's, and may God bless. Shawn S. KKG-4728, MA-680, N8JAM.
Absolutely beautiful radio. This was earlier in the year when skip was really going crazy and sadly we had to listen to that asshole "41" out of Canada every day. That said, of all the Navaho citizen band radio sets the TRC-457 would be the one I would want. This is a true classic :)
Yep, it is sad we have to listen to *41*. Lately he's been calling himself *Needle Bender* but he's still just the same warmed over piece of shit he always was. Changing his handle didn't fool anybody. Today I notice he went back to calling himself *41* again. That said, the TRC-457 is a great CB. Would love to have one myself.
I need to get mine off the shelf and see if it works the only thank that was changed out. a four or five pin cobra mike put on it the mike thing on the radio was worn out.
Awesome, I had that one when I younger and Its a great radio for adding extras, the cool thing was the two way clarifier mod and the extra frequencies.
I believe I have this exact radio but maybe the poster could confirm it. I bought it off eBay a couple years ago and if I'm not mistaken this is the same video that the seller posted with the ad. It's an awesome radio.
That is easy to check. My unit (being the one in the video) had a rectangular paper sticker om the back with the following text: "production number 70004466" (it is located right above the black aluminum Radio Shack ID plate) To the left, there was a smaller sticker with the following text: "3A7" (without the quotes). Let me know if this also on your unit. If yes, you have the one in the video!
It is a vertical antenna, 24 ft long, with the base at 20 ft height. From the base, 3 radial wires slope to ground level. The bottom of the vertical (which is isolated from the grounded mast) is fed with low-loss coax of about 4 ft long. The coax goes through the wall to a Collins 180S-1 antenna tuner which resides indoor. With the tuner, I can manually tune this vertical antenna within 1:1 resonance on any frequency from 2 MHz to 54 MHz. It works well on 27 MHz, but the best performance is on the 40m band (7 MHz) and 20 m band.
oh don't worry. I bought this radio down town Chicago . I kept watching it they brought it down to a hundred seventy five dollars. I bought it I worked as a barber on the seventeenth floor. so I would go out to pass out flyers.
Can you recommend a good antenna for this radio? Even some place to look for one. Friend of mine was givin one with no book and needs antenna to get it up. TY
No, the caps are not missing, they were replaced with ceramic SMD types, soldered underneath the board. The original electrolytes went bad, that's why.
My favorite base radio was this one. Had one in my Grandmas garage. My antenna was just outside the door. It was a single element dipole antenna a friend made, and gave to lucky me. I turned it by hand to direct. Also, my friend modified the guts of a handheld D-104 mic, and put the board in a Grey base desktop mic. I talked so much skip in the summer of 1988. 16 years old, with a modified super base station "radio shack" in a garage!!! As of today I just modified my Uniden HR 2510. Did the frequency mod, and my nerves were racing!!! Next is the Talk Back mod in a few weeks. Last step is to get my Ham license again, never renewed it, like a dumb ass.
i have one of these in near mint condition, it was my dad's. I also think i still have the owners manual. if anyone wishes to buy it from me, let me know, im located in new york send me a message
Great SSB except for drifting. Terrible AM single conversion. On AM voices have a lisp and muddy sound. This is the case for the 142GTL also. The crystal filter is too narrow for AM. And that horrible clipper filter circuit on AM.
Nice video and cb radio u still own it in 2023
This was the exact model my father had on the desk my entire childhood. Had it modified to go just a hair out of band back in the day for use with a club he was in. Mod included a little box on the right side, three rotary switches that if memory serves had ten numbered positions each (maybe they were lettered, maybe there weren't ten, but there were three rotary switches you needed a tiny flathead screwdriver to adjust).
I never realized this was considered a premium model. Radio Shack earned their reputation for selling junk, but I knew some of their transceivers were actually decent. Never knew they had premium models though. I just assumed we got lucky with ours and it never failed on us.
Man, though, what styling! Looks like something straight out of some 1982-made movie about Viet Nam or something.
Never pumped more than 4 watts out, but had it attached to a Shooting Star beam antenna atop a 55-foot Rohn tower in the back yard. That antenna was a pair of 4-element beams in crossed polarities, and a quad reflector instead of yagi reflector. My father has told me a couple of times about the time he unkeyed and heard someone unkey right after him, several times. He thought someone was deliberately walking on him at first, but how would they know to unkey at the right time? He then did a quick test: seven quick on-off keyups of the microphone. They were followed by seven quick repeats.
There were no repeaters on the station. He was hearing his own signal skip all the way around the world. Conditions happened to be absolutely PERFECT that day before I was born.
I forgot the thing had a clock on it! I forgot about the clarifier! I forgot about a lot of little things about this radio! Do you by chance have the two-button black desktop stand mic with the gain slider on the neck?
We also had two matching mobile TRC-449 radios. One was in the process of being modified by Dad to have a detachable faceplate, before those were even a thing, but that project got put on the wayside by the changing time/money/motivation availabilities that occur with life. I found it as a teenager/early adult, and started to continue the modification, but didn't document anything and wound up forgetting things... again, time availabilities, money, motivation... Unfortunately, I didn't finish and that radio is in pieces now... somehwere at Dad's house.
He still has the 457 and both 449s, as well as a couple of other radios. I have a TRC-224 there somewhere.
Brings back memories... thank you for the video!
some of my fondest memories in the radio hobby was on one of these radios, i was having a bad day on the job. went down to the radio shack store a plooped down one hundred seventy nine dollars down and took it home. don't know what happened to that one but i have one on my shelf just like it. I was in the loop when i bought it
I HAVE ONE. And as a teenager in the mid 70's I lived in Cocoa Beach Florida. I had a 5/8 vertical at 60ft. I still have many QSL cards from Europe from those days. I just got my hands on another one a few days ago on E-Bay and plan to rework my original. GREAT RIG.
Buddy of mine used one of these back in the 80s he always sounded LOUD on the air.
Thank you for the great review, just getting back into cb radio after 40 years away, had a 23 channel Navaho back then, will look for this one in the yard sales to add to my collection, not many on the air around here, but doing what I can to revive it!!
Thank You for this video i just bought one of these yesterday. i had a CB Phone back in the late 70's with a Rack Shack base antenna on roof in Boston. i just set up a new base at my house its in my bar=/man cave i have a Siro 27 GP 5/8 wave and was using a little TRC-419 now i wlil have a nice base with SSB just need to source a better A/C cord then the one that is on there now. Thanks for the Great Video.
Dude, u have a serious collection of radios.....one of the best out there
Thanks!
The first base station I ever had. Was a good one.
I realize it's kinda off topic but do anyone know of a good place to stream new movies online ?
@Quincy Augustus i would suggest flixzone. Just google for it :)
Nice Radio 👍🏻👍🏻
Love mine as well. 99% of the time, mine's on either ch 38 or 39 LSB. I did wind up switching out a few of the electrolytics..Now looking for a matching power base mic. I currently have the un-amplified 6A8 mic
I have a NOS I just recapped and tuned it. Excellent radio! Nothing made like it today.
great videos on all your radios. you know what your doing. I really enjoy the videos,great information,and help. thank you 73's dan 2052 seattle
I own a SSB CB exactly like this one. It was a Ham fest find, I paid $40.00 for the CB. The Realistic TRC-457 was the first 40 channel SSB CB Base Radio Shack sold in their stores. New this model sold for around $400.00 new. I've seen a few on ebay for outlandish prices. I agree that this is the best SSB CB Base Radio Shack sold. I just love my TRC-457.
Robert Bales Radio Shack's first SSB Base was the TRC-46, the secont was the TRC-48, the third was the TRC-57. Check this site www.radioshackcatalogs.com for more information.
Hi are able to tell me what transformer you replaced it with when you did conversion and to make clock work with loose time what mods did you have to do
Extremely informative. Even though most radio in my neck of the woods has gone "bye-bye", (Ohio) I subbed, because I was a 42+ yr. operator before calling it quits in The late 90's.
I hope that all your videos have this much depth! I'll soon find out! 73's, and may God bless.
Shawn S.
KKG-4728, MA-680, N8JAM.
Absolutely beautiful radio.
This was earlier in the year when skip was really going crazy and sadly we had to listen to that asshole "41" out of Canada every day. That said, of all the Navaho citizen band radio sets the TRC-457 would be the one I would want. This is a true classic :)
Yep, it is sad we have to listen to *41*. Lately he's been calling himself *Needle Bender* but he's still just the same warmed over piece of shit he always was. Changing his handle didn't fool anybody. Today I notice he went back to calling himself *41* again. That said, the TRC-457 is a great CB. Would love to have one myself.
Hi I have the 57 but I want trc 457 I'm looking. for one email. me Stacey Snell 024@gmail. com
I have been looking for one of those and I have a problem with mine it doesn't receive or transmit
I need to get mine off the shelf and see if it works the only thank that was changed out. a four or five pin cobra mike put on it the mike thing on the radio was worn out.
Awesome, I had that one when I younger and Its a great radio for adding extras, the cool thing was the two way clarifier mod and the extra frequencies.
I believe I have this exact radio but maybe the poster could confirm it. I bought it off eBay a couple years ago and if I'm not mistaken this is the same video that the seller posted with the ad. It's an awesome radio.
That is easy to check. My unit (being the one in the video) had a rectangular paper sticker om the back with the following text: "production number 70004466" (it is located right above the black aluminum Radio Shack ID plate)
To the left, there was a smaller sticker with the following text: "3A7" (without the quotes). Let me know if this also on your unit. If yes, you have the one in the video!
Would sure like one of these,l am running a Citizen m6 sideband base radio ,sold only in Canada.Its an extremely quiet and good talking radio.
Excellent video.
i have TRC-433 i wish i has ssb on my navaho..i have a ssb cb and ssb rocks!!
Wow, u have perfect swr no reflect....can I ask what antenna you used in this video sir?
It is a vertical antenna, 24 ft long, with the base at 20 ft height. From the base, 3 radial wires slope to ground level. The bottom of the vertical (which is isolated from the grounded mast) is fed with low-loss coax of about 4 ft long. The coax goes through the wall to a Collins 180S-1 antenna tuner which resides indoor. With the tuner, I can manually tune this vertical antenna within 1:1 resonance on any frequency from 2 MHz to 54 MHz. It works well on 27 MHz, but the best performance is on the 40m band (7 MHz) and 20 m band.
LifeIsTooShortForQRP wow....last thing I would have expected to hear there.... amazing!
Thanks 73rds from Baltimore MD
i had one of those loved it
oh don't worry. I bought this radio down town Chicago . I kept watching it they brought it down to a hundred seventy five dollars. I bought it I worked as a barber on the seventeenth floor. so I would go out to pass out flyers.
Can you recommend a good antenna for this radio? Even some place to look for one. Friend of mine was givin one with no book and needs antenna to get it up. TY
finaltom5 Try www.zerofive-antennas.com
Edward Motacek TY for the link.
I got one of these they have a little mental claw thing in the radio. the last time a repair man looked at it. he said it might happen again
I got one just like this and want to know, How much it worth? Thanks.
I have many radios including Johnson Viking ii, CPI 2000, Sears slant face, President George and the 457 is right up with them.
rhe only thing that was changed out on the one that i bace in my radio room was the mike
I just bought one off ebay...it has good rx but no tx ? anyone know these radios tell me whats wrong?
The relay might need a cleaning. The Navaho was notorious for that.
C77 & C78 are missing. Those were always factory installed .1uf caps. Never seen one without them
For sure it's been modified. You won't have any audio without those caps installed.
No, the caps are not missing, they were replaced with ceramic SMD types, soldered underneath the board. The original electrolytes went bad, that's why.
LifeIsTooShortForQRP Gotcha
i did own one but i have the TRC-458
that board is the SWR Bridge
I always thought that board was a mic compressor.
I had one in 1986
if u ever want to get rid of the navaho trc 457 let me know
Nice rig
My favorite base radio was this one. Had one in my Grandmas garage. My antenna was just outside the door. It was a single element dipole antenna a friend made, and gave to lucky me. I turned it by hand to direct. Also, my friend modified the guts of a handheld D-104 mic, and put the board in a Grey base desktop mic. I talked so much skip in the summer of 1988. 16 years old, with a modified super base station "radio shack" in a garage!!! As of today I just modified my Uniden HR 2510. Did the frequency mod, and my nerves were racing!!! Next is the Talk Back mod in a few weeks. Last step is to get my Ham license again, never renewed it, like a dumb ass.
I have this radio and clock only comes on when i plug it in
Aun funcionan
i have one of these in near mint condition, it was my dad's. I also think i still have the owners manual. if anyone wishes to buy it from me, let me know, im located in new york send me a message
Is it still for sale?
@@paulrash2886 yes. I was going to put it on ebay but please let me have your email, I can send you some photos for you to look at
Stalker XX
Lol same shit coming out the speaker as there was 40 years ago.
Great SSB except for drifting. Terrible AM single conversion. On AM voices have a lisp and muddy sound.
This is the case for the 142GTL also. The crystal filter is too narrow for AM. And that horrible clipper filter circuit on AM.
Junk