I am not electronically skilled, so could anyone please explain this situation to me? I'd appriciate it very much.
Atwater-Kent model 84 (early) catherdal.
1. With long antenna and ground properly hooked-up the radio does not recieve any stations at all.
2. With my home transmitter hooked directly to the antenna lead-in wire AND (hears the strange part!) a wire branching off to the 24 tube (2nd Det. I believe), I get the transmitted signal loud and crystal clear! The radio controls barely have any effect. Volume depends on the transmitted signal. You can nearly sweep the entire dial and still get the transmitted signal.
I found this out by accident when the antenna wire touched the tube post and I am baffled now. The chassis has been restored, but the seller told me that the set had a volume level problem. I will be getting back to him soon, but I thought I'd give you guys a little mystery to solve with this one!
Thanks so much,
Joe

I haven't been able to contact the seller of the set as of yet. Please feel free to even give your best guess at what the situation might be with this set. The main thing I want to be sure of is that I am not harming any components of the set with this arrangement.
Many thanks to any replies,
Joe

I was thinking, I was told by the owner that the radio had been restored years ago, but it had not been in use for a long time. I am going to clean the tube sockets. The filiment on that 24 tube did look dim.

Refer to this thread,same radio;
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=192200&p=1603815#p1603815
Phil