General:

Nice tuner with excellent performance, made by Sansui in 1968.

 

 

 

Specifications:

Sansui TU-555

Type: Mono/Stereo Tuner

Tuning Bands: FM, MW

Tuning Scale: Analogue

FM Tuning Range: 88 to 108 MHz

MW Tuning Range: 535 to 1605 kHz

Sensitivity: 2.5uV (FM), 20uV (MW)

Signal to Noise Ratio: 60dB (FM)

Distortion: 0.8% (FM)

Selectivity: 45dB (FM), 20dB (MW)

Output: 1500mV

Dimensions: 292 x 111 x 267mm

Weight: 3.9kg

Year: 1968

 

Special futures:

FM/AM round scale with tuning meter and stereo lamp.

 

 

 

User Manual:

Click here to download the TU-555 usermanual in PDF format.

You should set the FM - MPX separation setting at the back panel correctly.

 

 

 

Schematic:

Click here to download the TU-555 schematic in PDF format.

There are only transistors and one FET involved and a lot of diodes: no IC's.

The AM section is not much more than a average 6 transistor radio made in Japan, without the usual 3 transistors audio/power section.

 

 

internal Sansui TU-555 ^

 

Modifications:

The build quality is excellent, although some parts are not easy accessable, the S-meter is of average quality
and all electrolytic caps are out of specs. Also some wiring is awkward, that many Sansui gear have from that time frame.

You may exchange all electrolytic capacitors.
My TU-555 stereo-decoder had not the 0.22µF capacitors but the 3-lead filter-hybrids FP-38A as seen on the picture below,
the left channel FP-38A was defect and consequently the left channel was dead.
So I exchanged both for a set of capacitors as originally shown on the schematic diagram.

 

 

Stereo decoder defect parts ^

 

Stereo decoder with defect filter parts ^

 

FM IF section ^

 

AM section ^

 

Audio Section ^

 

FM front-end and AM front-end made by Alps ^

 

3 gang FM capacitor ^

 

Power supply ^

 

Back ^

 

Sound:

The FM reception and sound of this tuner is excellent, really unprecedented after restoration, regarding the more than 50 years of age:
many much more complicated modern FM tuners cannot reach this kind of quality. A real high-end product of its time.

 

Wood case ^

 

 

Complete Sansui 1968 series ^

 

 

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