Show us your vintage B&W sets!

[Steve McVoy]

Actually, it is a model 41:

http://www.earlytelevision.org/western_41.html

[Captain Video]

The brand of my TV is "Colorado."

[Stafjohn]

Originally Posted by bandersen

Wow! Where the heck did you find that?

Steve is right Model 41. Well the simple answer is from my father in law's closet. But his story is much better. He was a truck mechanic, one day a garbage truck was towed into the shop and he saw this TV in the back ready to be crushed, but as fate would have it the truck broke down just in time. He recognized the mechanical TV as one similar to one he saw as a kid in the local hardware store. He has parkinsons so its hard for him to communicate, but thats the best I could understand. I think it came from the Minneapolis area.
He also gave me his mom and dads Atwater Kent 976 radio which I have restored the cabinet and had the radio repaired.

[Eric H]

Originally Posted by Stafjohn

Well this Western Model 31 mechanical may not be exactly B&W, but its not color. (Corrected Model 41, Thanks Steve)

Wow, that is just about the coolest thing ever!
How does it work, is it a projection set, the screen is big for a mechanical set.

Oh, yes, welcome to Videokarma!

[David Roper]

It's a lens-disc set. The image is projected by modulating a crater lamp to shine through 45 triple-interlaced lenses onto a ground glass screen.

[jshorva65]

Here's the current staus on my client's RCA 621TS that needed the new 7DP4 thanks to FedEx. It's almost completed, but there are still some issues to be resolved.

There's a known issue with RCA's KRK-2B 13-Channel tuners involving some solder joints deep inside the unit which I've got strong suspicions of being the root cause of a tricky Intermittent on this 621TS. When first powered up, it takes almost five minutes after the raster appears for the set to produce picture and sound. Since the change in performance manifests as a sudden "popping in" effect and the cycle only starts over if the set is powered down and subsequently powered again from a "cold start" as opposed to being briefly shut down for a "warm" restart, and the bias and B+ voltages remain within specifications both during and after the symptom period, these indications point to a solder joint inside the tuner itself. The prime suspects are the jumpers which join the wiper contacts for each of the pairs of wafer switches (RF/Mixer/Oscillator) and seems more likely to be the jumper in either Mixer or RF since very weak video is evident (out of sync due to simultaneously insufficient sync amplitude) while the symptom is occuring, thus suggesting that the Oscillator must indeed be running and somewhat near its correct frequency.

It's a shame that Louis Stangle of Quality Tuner Service no longer services 24 MHz IF tuners. He did a fantastic job with the 44 MHz Oak TT-166 wafer switch tuner from my Philco 16M91 and at a very reasonable price. We're sufficiently comfortable with servicing drum-type tuners of the 24 MHz IF variety, but have yet to acquire enough practice with "expendable" examples of wafer switch tuners of either IF band to achieve the necessary level of mastery for us to attempt the kind of delicate surgery that Hugo Holden performed on the tuner in his 621TS. Instead, we still prefer to send such work to expert Tuner Surgeons such as Louis.

At any rate, here's a pic of what we've got so far with Jeff's 621TS. We're definitely on the right track, but we still have a ways to go. Many thanks to Todd for the great Restoration work with the finish. Thanks also to Big Dave for the double-checking of everything where my being considerably nearsighted might have caused me to miss some tiny detail had I relied on my eyes alone.

[Captain Video]

A local TV station went here into my house, and they showed part of my collection yesterday, September 18 ( birthday of Brazilian Television ):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T2facGY5Svg

[newhallone]

That was cool. Thank you for sharing this with us. Great tv's. What was cool was you got to do a lot of talking. I didn't understand a word you said but I could tell you were giving some good information that here in the states they wouldn't listen too. Someone posted a clip of a collector that was on tv this last week or so here in the states. In typical fashion they just covered what they thought was interesting. Lots of shots of the 7inch sets, and hardly any of the trk12. In the past you have shared some great info with us about your local history of Tv which has been very interesting and kind of gave me an idea on what you were saying.

Vanessa and Tayana were great too.

[bgadow]

Very nice! I liked that it let us see much of your collection-and almost meet you in person!

[jshorva65]

Well, the touchy intermittent in that 621TS is fixed. There were several cold solder joints deep inside the tuner and some tiny "tin whiskers" on some of the switch wafers. The set produces picture and sound of reasonably good quality, but tends to need tweaking of the Contrast and Horizontal Hold controls a little more often than other 1940s sets we've serviced. Further complicating things, I sprained my shoulder last weekend and haven't felt much like working since then. I haven't felt this crappy since I slipped and fell on some ice last winter while clearing snow. I expect to be laid up for a few weeks. For now, at least we've made considerable progress with this one since it arrived with the original 7DP4 necked. The controls never seem to need turned more than 1/16-turn either way to keep good contrast and sync, but even that much seems like too much if readjustment is needed again after the initial 10-minute warm-up.

[bandersen]

Here are some more of my sets

Admiral 19A11: It's missing a 7JP4 - that's just a piece of paper


Admiral 30B1 chassis: I garbage picked this chassis out of a neighbors trash way back when i was 15.
He chopped up the cabinet with an axe so the garbage men would take it


Crosley 9-407M: Cool continuous tuner and eye tube indicator.


Philco 49-1040: The dirtiest set I've ever worked on!


Philco 50T-1402: Blonde cabinet with back-painted glass


RCA 8T241: Finally, my latest set. Weighs a ton!

[Charlie]

Wow... the tops of the Admiral and Crosley sure are shiny! Is the Admiral a Bakelite set?

[bandersen]

Yes, the Admiral is bakelite. Here's what it looked like when I got it. Novus polish #2 to the rescue The top front of that Crosley is a photo finish i.e. it's fake woodgrain. The rest is real mahogany veneer I think.

[grimer]

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[jr_tech]

Well, since I have been just getting back into the hobby after a long "break", I am slowly clearing out space in my "TV room" and trying the variac on some sets that have not been turned on in 15 years or so. This is the best B/W set so far (outside of a Philco Safari... they always work). It is an 12" Admiral from about 1949-50 stamped "20Z6" on the chassis.

jr