I picked up this set today at the Habitat for Humanity Resale store. It is a thrift store 2 miles from my house. This thing should sound pretty good. It has FIVE speakers per side!!!!!!! That is 10 speakers total. I am thinking two are for the TV and the other eight are for the record player and AM/FM radio. I will have to get into it to see what the deal is. I bought it for the whopping sum of $24.00. Too bad it was not a color set.


polaraman

Speakers!

polaraman

You just dont see that everyday!! Nice score!
Dan

Hehehe, with THAT amount of THAT type os speakers, this thing can end the tranquility of ANY neighborood...

Spectacular!

I need some schematic help on this one. The set is 1P56 Tuscany. Stamped on the Tv chassis is 21N95 and another set of numbers above it 0025. Tube location guide for the receiver says Series 2500R. It appears as though SAMS did not make a photofact for this set. Am I looking in the wrong place? Is this a Dumont/Capehart set? Help please!!

polaraman

I picked up this set today at the Habitat for Humanity Resale store. It is a thrift store 2 miles from my house. This thing should sound pretty good. It has FIVE speakers per side!!!!!!! That is 10 speakers total. I am thinking two are for the TV and the other eight are for the record player and AM/FM radio. I will have to get into it to see what the deal is. I bought it for the whopping sum of $24.00. Too bad it was not a color set.


polaraman

That's a very nice looking entertainment center (I'd say '50s or sixties, but given the fact the TV only has a VHF tuner , I'd say it's probably no later than 1963), all right, but I wonder about the size of the screen (I think that's what you were referring to in the title of this thread). [i]Sixty-one feet? The CRT looks to me as if it is no more than 23" at best. Where did that 61' figure come from? :dunno:

BTW, I hope you get it working. These older TVs are great, built much better than today's black-plastic cube sets. The cabinet looks like a fine piece of furniture as well.

The sound quality should be excellent too, with five speakers on either side of the cabinet. A lot of those old three-way sets were built with premium sound systems; in the late sixties I had a Zenith 23" b&w console with a 6x9 oval speaker in the base of the cabinet, a tone control, and a 6BN6/6BQ5 audio stage. The sound was great! So good, in fact, that I eventually patched an old FM tuner into the sound channel (across the TV's volume control). The sound, again, was excellent. I'd have kept that set for several years after this modification, but I moved about three years after getting the thing working (it needed all new tubes--it was a trash-day find, and someone had filched every tube from it except the 1J3 HV rectifier and the CRT) and wound up trashing the whole thing, :no: including its nice wood cabinet. And after all that work I put into it...

Great set Rich!
I have a similar Curtis Mathes but I don't think the speakers are anywhere near that nice.

The 61' refers to the tag on the back that says it was sold new June 13, 1961. It is a 23CP4 crt.

4 of the speakers are for the TV. The other 6 on the front are for the Radio/phono.

If I had a SAMS I would get right on it. It has a lot of black beauties in the chassis. I will have to attempt to calculate all the colored stripes.

polaraman

Nice set!! Hope you get it working. Looks like it should play great. If picture tube is bad, and I suspect it is, it may be hard to find. The IF transformers in radio MAY have migration problems. Great score.

Nice find Rich! Any chance of showing pics of the radio and record changer? The way the picture tube fits into the bezel gives sort of a Motorola of that era look to it. I always loved the combo's with doors that covered the screen. Cant wait to hear more about it!
-Tony

That's a unique chassis mounting...and Philco had the nerve to call their setup "cool chassis"! Plenty of airflow there. It would be interesting to know who built the guts. Maybe an EIA code somewhere?

Here is the receiver and phono. Receiver selector switch has AM, FM, FM-AFC, RIAA, LP, 78, Stereo Phono, and FM-AMX.

polaraman

Selector switch!

I had one of those changers in an Emerson two piece one time. Was a cool changer in the fact that the platter stopped during the cycle, dropped the record and when the tonearm set on the record the platter would start spinning again. Looks like a top notch set. Cant wait to see how it works.
-Tony

I am going to attempt a restoration of this set. It seems as though it is a pretty good combo. There is a turntable expert here in town. He is expensive but he knows his stuff. It sounds like a pretty interesting turntable.

polaraman

Your turntable is a Glaser-Steers. Probably a model GS -77 or close relative. I think i have a manual for it in pdf format somewhere ,PM if you want a copy.

I pulled the Tv chassis! Need some help with some Black beauty capacitor values.

yellow purple orange gray yellow ....... .047 @ 400v ???
yellow purple yellow gray red ....... .0047 @ 200v ???
brown green orange gray blue ....... .015 @ 600v ???
brown gray orange gray yellow ....... .018 @ 400v ???

I wanted to be cetain before I blew something.



polaraman

I pulled the Tv chassis! Need some help with some Black beauty capacitor values.

yellow purple orange gray yellow ....... .047 @ 400v ???
yellow purple yellow gray red ....... .0047 @ 200v ???
brown green orange gray blue ....... .015 @ 600v ???
brown gray orange gray yellow ....... .018 @ 400v ???

I wanted to be cetain before I blew something.



polaraman



Yellow purple yellow is .47, yellow purple red would be .0047, yellow purple orange .047, the red fifth band would mean 200v.
the others are correct. Not sure what the gray means.

Easiest way to remember is red add 2 zeros orange add 3 zeros yellow add 4 zeros, so 47+4 zeros is 470000pf = .47mf

There's a chart here: http://www.pickguardian.com/pickguardian/Images/Sprague%20Bumblebee%20Chart.pdf

Here's another chart, the gray is the tolerance, it's an 8 so 8%
Seems kind of an odd tolerance but that's what it says!

http://www.pmel.org/Handbook/HBpage26.htm

Thanks Eric,

I thought my .0047 was wrong. They are rather large caps for 200v. A .47 @ 200v looks to fit the bill. I'm flying blind here with no schematic. I will do the Tv before I attempt the receiver.

I am going to make a caps order this week.

polaraman

I started working on the TV chassis today. I have to order some more caps. Will keep everybody posted on the progress. New caps are on the right side of the chassis.

polaraman

A stupid question, perhaps, but WHY did they put crap parts like wax 'n' paper caps in expensive things like color TVs ? Did they not have better stuff by then? Was it cost-saving? When did "modern" caps come into use? I can see-MAYBE-using wax/paper ones in a cheapy AA5 kitchen radio, but a "flagship model" like a color set, it just don't figger-To me, anyway.

I started working on the TV chassis today. I have to order some more caps. Will keep everybody posted on the progress. New caps are on the right side of the chassis.

polaraman

Where do you buy your caps? I've been meaning to make another cap order soon as well.

I changed out 10 of the old caps and all but two of the lytics. I'm out of caps for this project. Have to order some more.

I am pretty lucky that the chassis is elevated. There wil be plenty room to stand up the lytics under the chassis.

Sandy: I bet there was something better. They most likely did not think the set was going to be in use past a couple years. I bet if you asked the TV makers in the 50's if they thought people would be collecting their product 50 years from now, they would think you were crazy.:screwy:


fsjonsey: Were do we order caps:

http://www.tubesandmore.com/

http://www.justradios.com/


polaraman

That's a very nice looking entertainment center (I'd say '50s or sixties, but given the fact the TV only has a VHF tuner , I'd say it's probably no later than 1963), all right, but I wonder about the size of the screen (I think that's what you were referring to in the title of this thread). [i]Sixty-one feet? The CRT looks to me as if it is no more than 23" at best. Where did that 61' figure come from? :dunno:

I was thinking before Polarman said that the '61 referred to the year of manufacture, that it might refer to the length of the beast rather than the CRT.

David

I finally made room and have the set on all fours. The radio works fine and sounds pretty good. Have to do some cleaning of the controls. I will also will have to pull each tube to check them.

The record player motor is pretty gummed up. It will not allow the motor to spin like it should. I pulled it apart and the bearing are not burnt up. What should I use to clean and lubricate the bearings?


polaraman

Here is the receiver and phono. Receiver selector switch has AM, FM, FM-AFC, RIAA, LP, 78, Stereo Phono, and FM-AMX.

polaraman

I supersized the pic of your set's function selector and found that the position you refer to as FM-AMX is actually FM-MPX. FM-AMX probably would have referred to a now-obsolete method of stereo FM broadcasting popular in the early '60s (known as "AM/FM stereo"), in which one channel of the stereo broadcast was carried over an AM station and the other was broadcast over an FM station. This method of "stereo" broadcasting, which was of mediocre quality at best (the sound quality of one channel, the one broadcast over the AM station, was always at the mercy of atmospheric conditions, interference, etc.), was superseded in the early sixties by the multiplex system now used by U.S. and Canadian FM stations. There is a classical FM station in Cleveland (WCLV, first at 95.5, now at 104.9 and unlistenable in most areas east of Cleveland, because of a strong country station just 0.2 MHz down the dial) that went on the air in 1962; it was probably one of the first stereo multiplex FM stations in northeast Ohio.

I seriously doubt, however, that your Capehart console has AM/FM stereo, as there is only one tuning knob and one dial pointer for both AM and FM. If it were AM/FM stereo, you would have individual and independent tuners for both bands. Heathkit had an AM/FM stereo receiver in the sixties that was set up this way; I don't remember the model number offhand.

BTW, your console's record changer does look like a rebadged Glaser-Steers GS-77. I looked at the picture of the changer just before starting to write this and recognized the beast right away; I recognized it because my dad had a GS-77 changer in his hi-fi system back in the late fifties-early sixties. His GS-77 was all black, however, with a function called Speed-Minder. This was a system that would automatically change the turntable speed according to the size of the record. The record size sensor was near the pivot point of the tone arm and looked for all the world like the number 4. I never saw anything like it; GS must have had a patent on it, as I do not recall ever seeing any other changer with that sort of automatic speed adjustment mechanism since--and I certainly don't see them, or any other kind of record changer, in these days of CDs and MP3s.

The changer in your Capehart console must not have been used much by its former owner if the turntable motor is as badly bound up as you say. You do mention that the bearings seem OK, not burnt or scored, so it seems to me as if the only thing this motor needs is a good cleaning. The GS-77s, as I said, were very good changers in their day and yours can be as well, with a good cleaning. Clean up the motor well, replace the idler wheel under the platter if necessary (after 46 years I wouldn't be surprised if the rubber tire on that wheel is rock-hard), lubricate the rest of the mechanism while you're at it, and you will have a first-rate changer.

Good luck. That Capehart console will be a showpiece once you retube the radio/amplifier chassis and relube the record changer. They don't make them like that anymore.

You are super lucky. That Capehart was the swan song of the brand that had fallen low in the years after the ITT buyout in 1950. The "Camelot" boom that happened from 58 to 67, combined with the Kennedy's emphasis on culture and high art led many folks to invest in big, hi end entertainment systems. That unit there is very worthy of the Capehart name, all it needs is a turnover changer like the classic Capeharts of the 30's and 40's

Congratulations on your find!

Hi,

Your record changer is a Glaser-Steers. Glaser-Steers was purchased in 1965 by GE. GE was Glaser-Steers largest customer then. Very decent for the time and innovative in design. Speed-Minder was really advanced then. After the GE buyout, Speed-Minder was dropped. Interesting console and one of the last great Capehart sets.

Is that the orginal CRT? It looks wrong, ie, too small for that bezel. http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/attachment.php?attachmentid=50555&d=1180737038