The Menuet type 6204 vacuum tube radio was produced in 1961-1965 by Zakłady Radiowe Diora in Dzierżoniów. It is a middle-class, AC-powered, seven-circuit superheterodyne, equipped with five vacuum tubes and two germanium diodes, designed to receive radio stations and play back recordings from gramophone records. Thanks to the built-in ferrite antenna and sockets for plugging in an external aerial, regular and UHF, the tuner is designed to receive long, medium, short and ultra-high frequency wave bands. The name “menuet” relates to a French folk dance (Eng.: minuet) and the musical form based on its beat.
The oval housing made of wood, plywood and veneer chipboard contains two compartments of different volumes – the lower one houses the radio equipment, and the upper one, which is flat and closed with a cover on a spring-loaded support, contains the GE-56 electrical gramophone manufactured by Łódzkie Zakłady Radiowe T-4 (later renamed to Fonica). Thanks to the use of a two-needle cartridge, the gramophone accommodates 33⅓, 45 or 78 rpm, normal and micro-groove mono records. The housing is narrower than 30 cm, i.e., the diameter of long-play records, so in order to enable them to be played, the designers chose an untypical design solution. The gramophone drive was moved towards the back wall of the housing in which an especially profiled slit was cut to fit the record, as, after it was laid on the turntable, it would stick out beyond the outline of the housing. Additionally, the gramophone is mounted on a flexible suspension of plywood thanks to which the vibrations caused by the motor are largely damped, so as not to affect the quality of playback. At the front of the housing there is a gently profiled opening in the form of an inverse isosceles trapezium. A magic eye tube is located in its upper left corner, on a fabric membrane. Below it there is a panel with a centrally located scale, while on its side there are two symmetrically located rotary switches – the tone and volume adjustment on the right, and the tuning knob on the left. Under the scale is a rocker switch for turning on the gramophone and the selected radio bands. On the sidewalls there are two magnetic electrical speakers connected in series, covered by a grille. Finishing details, such as knobs, bezels, and buttons are made of butter-coloured plastic.

Author: Filip Wróblewski