Turner Expander 500 Microphone Review
Turner Expander 500 Microphone Overview
The Turner Expander 500 is another legendary Microphone from the 70’s and 80’s and was extremely popular during the Golden Years of CB radio. Many people don’t like them and say that they are big and ugly, others love them. The Expander 500 had a very loud, powerful audio and it socked a real punch with audio that stood out from the crowd. The microphone had a tone and a volume control along with a meter to test the battery voltage. Some of the later model mics had a lock switch which was a great addition.
Reviews
Turner Expander 500
I own one of these I bought in 1981 and it’s still in use today. I’ve repaired it a few times but thats to be expected, the microphone is 39 years old! I’ve used the turner on all sorts of radios over the years and still love it. It is a compression mike so I never used it on sidebands a lot but for FM and AM this old mic is clear loud and very sensitive.
I agree with the previous poster here, the Turner is a part of CB history. It was made in the days when every channel on your CB was taken and you had search for a free one to talk. There were parties every night, eyballs with complete strangers, TVI and neighbours banging the door 🙂 Busby cruising the streets trying to catch unlicensed CBers.
The best days of CB radio are sadly behind us since the advent of the internet, but a lot of the old equipment remains and provokes evocotive memories of good times and friends that are no longer with us. The old Turner expander is just that, a mic from a time past, it’s one of those Mics that looks and feels completely retro, and I love it 🙂
Mantis
A piece of CB history
The Turner Expander 500 is a piece of history from a great era. They had a very distinct audio and when turned up they really packed a punch. They certainly are a big microphone and one thing that annoyed me about them was that the slider tone and volume controls always scratched the paintwork on the panel. Apart from that they are a real iconic mic. A must for every CB fanatic who grew up in the 80’s.