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Does anyone do restoration of pre-war 6volt car radios or conversion to a modern am/fm? I have a 1940 Packard 180 the radio has not worked in it probably for many years.

There are many threads on this. Here's one that has references to other threads:

Thread on Radio Repair

If there is someone who repairs vintage stereos in your neighborhood, you can probably get them to work on it, if you provide them a 6V power supply, which can be bought for cheap off of Amazon or what-have-you, and the schematic, which is also available (lists of where in the thread). Info on the thread about that. Better and cheaper than shipping your radio. The tubes are all available in most cases, the capacitors can (and generally should be) replaced by modern equivalents.

Here is another list:

Southern California Vintage Radio Society

There area a few places that advertise conversion to modern stereos. But really, you probably would end up just playing spotify or satellite or something through your radio anyways, might as well just use a redi-rad for that and run your radio through your phone, that's what I do occasionally:

Redi-Rad from the Vintage Car Audio websiteRedi-Rad from their own website

Don't know exactly what one would do if yuo wanted to run it via Bluetooth or other wireless methods, probably someone has figured that out.

If the radio was working the RediRad would be a great option since it is plug and play and does not change anything. You could then use your phone or iPod and play thru the RediRad. If the radio is not working then as mentioned above, any number of places can do the work of both restoring yours to the original spec if that is your wish or convert to modern. Here is one located on the west coast and am sure there will be several others on the east coast. If no one in your area comes up with a specific company suggestion do a search in Hemming's Services Offered section and look for similar ads for radio repair and conversions.

I believe most of the conversion places use essentially the same components and these conversions can be basic AM/FM or with the purchase of additional modules customized for various other functions available in modern auto radios. Downside to a conversion is in a lot of cases the old radio is almost completely gutted leaving just a dial and knobs going into an almost empty case. A few conversions just piggy back a module on to the original electronics keeping them intact but for the most part any future owner would need to find a new radio if he wanted to revert completely back to stock. Depending on the modules involved and how the work was done there could also be future service issues if the place that did the conversion was no longer in operation and did not provide you with good documenation.

In addition to the out of sight audio linked above which looks to be an add on module approach another option would be Secret Audio. That is a complete radio with all components hidden. I think it is 12v but not being a motor but rather a radio with solid state electronics could run on one of the small 6 to 12v power converters without issue. It can be operated by a small box you could hinge to flip up and hide under the dash or by a remote control laying on the seat that could be placed in the glovebox when not in use.

I had my radio converted by "Ralph the Radio Guy". He did a modern conversion in the body of the original radio and all the controls work as normal.

If you check my project blog from last year I cover a bit about it, and here is a video on it:

youtu.be/mWTSQ4wVa9g

I know he has also done other pre-war Packard radios as well.

He is located in Chicagoland area, but you can ship it to him.

Here is his website:

car-radio-conversions.com/

Ralph The Radio Guy did a modern conversion on my '37 One Twenty radio. He did excellent work and the unit sounds fantastic. He even put in a delay so, when you turn it on, it appears to be warming up like the old tubes. Quick turn around also.

Just wondering what was the cost?

For a full conversion and a new speaker, figure $400-500

Oh that's not too bad.