I can't speak to the current Eton / Grundig line, but...

I've an Eton E5 (identical to the Grundig G5, except for body color) and like it quite a bit.  It's got good reception from the whip, and pretty good sound, especially considering the small speaker radios in this class have.  The FM tuner section especially is quite good.  It's the one I take with me while traveling;

The E5 / G5 is no longer made, being replaced by the G3; some updates to it, but from all reports I've heard / read it's a good radio

Another good one is its "predecessor" the Kaito / Degen 1103 (the E5 / G5 is actually made by them and branded Eton / Grundig). The 1103 has some non-standard ergonomics, but for the price is a great radio - I use mine for backup & as a "loaner" to friends who express interest in shortwave.

They are both the same size - about that of a paperback book.  Easy to pack, they take 4 AA batteries and get pretty good life from them; they also have rudimentary charger circuitry in them to charge NiMH batteries (which come with them) - it's a slow charge, and the user must manually set the charging time.

One nice thing about both of these models is a "line-out" jack, which is quite useful; hook it up to an outboard stereo amp & speakers, external audio filters, or run it through a computer sound card to play with weather fax, digital modes, etc.

With both models, though you have to be careful regarding static electricity getting to the antenna & wiping out the first FET; this isn't unique to these radios, however, as this is true for a lot of portable SW receivers (even the great Sony ICF-2010 had this problem in its early version).

It may be a bit of a pain, but you might try looking at the circuit board traces... If the board has cracked and broken the traces, the jack may still be good, and a replacement still wouldn't work.  If one of the circuit traces is broken due to a cracked board, you could solder a fine (~26 ga.) wire jumper in to bridge the break..

HK$28 comes out to about US$3.60...

Unfortunately, the antenna (and other) jacks are virtually impossible to find, except from a parts radio...  Lots of people have looked, but I've yet to hear of anyone having success.

Inductive coupling to the whip may be your only way to go, then; you might find that you'll want to put a pot or some other sort of attenuation in line to avoid overloading the front end on strong signals, though.

Tom

I'd check the external antenna jack; it's soldered directly to the circuit board, and has been known to crack the board & associated traces after a lot of use.  What happens when you wrap a wire connected to external antenna around the whip (inductive coupling)?

The suffix to the 2SK152 indicates the quiescent current draw, I think; a higher numbered suffix would draw more current, diminishing battery life a little over the lower number suffix.  Don't know what would be indicated by no suffix, but the only effect would possibly be that the batteries have a little bit shorter run time.

I've tried MPF102 replacement, but the particular one I used was noticeably worse than the 2SK152 - I expect that substitutes would have to be individually tried to determine what would be a suitable replacement, given manufacturing tolerances and variances between individual FETs.  It would be interesting to see the results you get from the BF410D replacements.

From earlier posts, I see you have checked the voltages on Q303 - those will tell whether or not it is good.  A quick & dirty check is to tune across the range 1619.9 KHz to 1620.1 KHZ with the whip collapsed - if you hear a drop in the background noise as you go up, it's likely Q303 is working as it should. (As I understand it, the CPU switches Q303 out above 1620 KHz to avoid overloading the receiver; at what point it switches back in, I don't recall off-hand...)

A Hallicrafters Sky Buddy - spent many hours with it & a pair of headphones...  Acquired it second-hand in 1966, lost it in '71 due to some rather regrettable circumstances (but that's another story), and have missed it ever since.

The Trans-Oceanic radios are wonderful!  I've an H500 and Y600L (leather-covered) and (along with my Sony ICF-2010) would probably be the last radios I'd ever part with.

There is a rather active T-O community on the Web, with a good-sized Yahoo group devoted to it.  You'll find just about everything you need to know about the T-O there.

A couple of things to keep in mind - it was built in the days when AC power was nominally 105-110 volts, so you may wish to run it from a Variac or something to drop today's 115-120 volts down a bit.  This puts less strain on the internals - the 1L6 tubes are quite scarce and rather pricy.

There are some people who have worked up solid-state replacements for the 1L6; I've heard that it works well, but requires realigning the radio for best results - not quite "plug and play".

Also, there are plans out there showing how to make up a battery pack for it; requires 2 voltages, 9 VDC and 90 VDC.  The 9 volt section is usually made up of D cells, the 90 volt section uses 60 AA batteries in series (you could also use 10 9 volt batteries in series, with a reduced run time compared to the AA batteries).  There's even artwork available to print out to make the DIY pack look like a period-correct battery pack!

I don't recall off-hand if the H500 uses a selenium rectifier; as I recall, the 600 models do, and it's regarded as a good preventative measure to replace it, as they have been known to go "poof", spreading selenium dust around - not healthy.

You're going to really enjoy your T-O!

Please don't think that the noisy intolerant folk are representative of all Americans; unfortunately, the shrill, closed-minded ones get the most attention...

While there is a substantial number of people who are so fixated on their own particular worldview that they are incapable of even considering that there may be other viewpoints with equal (or more) validity, there is an even greater number who simply wish the loudmouths would shut up.

Unfortunately, a disproportionate number of the loudmouths are in the public eye on both sides of any issue, demanding, in effect, that "I'm right - the facts don't matter, and anyone who disagrees with me is an ignorant lout!!!"  Witness to this is the substantial number of politicians whose ego demands that their "gut feelings" have ascendancy over scientific truths, and that the only criteria they recognize to accept that science is valid is that it supports their position.  (I live in Texas, and Governor Rick Perry is a classic example of this.)

The truly tolerant, open-minded Americans tend to recognize that it is useless to try to enlighten these windbags, as it would be a futile waste of time; they simply get on with their lives, happily and quietly leaving others to get on with theirs.

If I have offended any loudmouth windbags by this, they have my condolences.  However, this may be a good thing, as it would mean they recognize themselves; awareness of one's intransigence is the first step towards correcting it.

Get one of the dummy cassettes with a cable that plugs into an MP3 player, ipod, etc. to output via the tape deck and use that; worst case, you'll need to make an adapter for mate the 1/8" stereo plug to whatever your radio uses for a "external speaker" jack.  Simple interface, easy to implement; I use one routinely.

Should be less that $15 at a truckstop; Radio Shack may have them also.

Not me...  Been watching in bemusement (also some slight amusement, as well...); I expressed my opinion and left it at that.

Bravo!  That goes right to the  core of the issue - it's not just the leader, but those people he surrounds himself with and how he wants them to do their jobs...  Many enterprises have gone down the tubes because the man in charge had a staff of "yes-men", whose primary focus was in telling the boss what he WANTED to hear instead of what he NEEDED to hear.

This principle has been recorded as far back as Machaivelli - "The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him."

Moderation is generally a thankless task; no matter what is done (or not done), someone is going to be offended over something.  Usually those offended are those who have an idee fixe that they have an unfettered "right" to post whatever they want, whenever they want; concomitant with that idea is the certainty that their particular worldview is the ONLY valid belief structure, and anyone who disagrees (or even worse, challenges) is automatically wrong.

I don't presume to speak for others, but I appreciate the presence of eham, and find it easy to disregard those whose agenda appears to consist of a compulsion to argue and indulge in ad hominem attacks - they rarely have anything of value to contribute anyway, and seem content to indulge in pilpul...

(pilpul - hairsplitting arguments over inconsequential issues)
 
So, to the moderators of eham:
Thanks for your efforts -  I may not agree with your decisions 100%, but your work is always appreciated!

One essential CD in my computer toolkit at work (I'm a network / telecom admin for a small school district) is the AVG rescue disk...  Free download & use for private users, Linux-based.  Boot from the CD, it then loads a variant of Linux, and runs AVG anti-malware against the Windows disk.  Since Windows never loads, the malware can be more easily identified & found.  AVG updates their virus definition files twice daily, so it works quite well; I use it as my first line of defense to find / clean out malware.

Two nice things to know about CAT5 network cabling; the pairs are intended to be self-shielding due to the twist, and nominal impedance of each pair is 100 ohms.

The GOP hasn't had a real, honest-to-goodness statesman since Goldwater.