[Arran]

Jayce;
  The RCA obviously still has a problem, and if it's making scratching noises whilst you are trying to tune it I think that means that whomever worked on it last either caused that problem or didn't give it a long enough "dry run" to notice it before handing it back to you. I would have a look at the plates in the tuning cap, and also the ground braid, see if there is anything rubbing.
 I've never had an RCA of any model that was a bad performer once it was properly restored, even some unrestored ones were still hot sets. I haven't had much experience with Crosley's, at least the ones Powell Crosley's company made, Deforest Crosleys yes, but those are basically a Rogers from 1932 onward, they were another set I've never been disappointed with much like the RCAs. The few Crosley's I've had were AC/DC sets, whilst they were built on the cheap side they always seemed to work well, good circuit selection I suppose.
 Philcos have been a bit of a let down to me at times, harder to work on, and not always wonderful perfomers even when they you thought they should be. Philco seemed to complicate things just to avoid using certain circuits in order to dodge paying royalties, in some case I really wonder how much they saved with the extra components they had to add.
Regards
Arran