I am afraid that my knowledge of American TV production in the last years is lacking. Can anybody provide information about plant closings, farm-outs to other countries etc.

What WAS the last set "Made in America"? What was the last CRT facility for consumer CRTs?

Or perhaps there is still some TV mfg in America that I am not aware of?

Thanks for any info,
jr

I've seen plenty of newer CRT sets (usually larger ones) that were assembled in USA; but, the parts came from other parts of the world. I don't imagine there's been a 100% or near 100% USA made TV in 30 years.

Last 100% US parts set was a long, long, long time ago. Last final assembly in the US probably was in Tennessee at the former Magnavox (then Philips, and finally independent) factory (called Three Rivers, or something similar, if I recall correctly), or perhaps Sony?

First sets to be outsourced completely were small black and white, generally to Taiwan.

RCA factories went to Mexico fairly early; Zenith followed later; LG acquired the Zenith Mexican factories and still has some.

Also, in the 1970's 12-inch B&W portable TVs were outsourced to Korea, Japan, Taiwan and a couple of other Asian countries as well.

The last ALL American built Zenith was in 1968. After that, small parts like purity ring assemblies ect. were imported. That was the beginning of the decline in quality and also the decline in my interest as a collector. Don't get me wrong, there were some nice sets rolling out of the Zenith plant in the '70s but I wouldn't get all "ga ga" (no not Lady Ga Ga:D) over any of them.

My '72 Zenith Chromacolor had a " made in Holland " Yoke assembly.

My '72 Zenith Chromacolor had a " made in Holland " Yoke assembly.

Zenith was making a lot of tubes there too, they seem well made. Lots of factory originals (yellow print) found in Zenith sets.

Sanyo still assembles sets here, but the parts are all from Mexico and overseas now.

Probably GE - they had a plant here in Portsmouth VA producing TV's into the 1980s. EC, PC, and PM chassis sets were entirely engineered at the plant. I've posted about this plenty before, but I have engineering-only parts from a stash my Dad got when the plant shut it's doors.

I've got bare (as in no silkscreen markings) PC chassis and EC chassis modules, and a whole bunch of boards that are complete, without silkscreens, with little labels indicating stuff like "Hitachi Chip, IF NB, no SAW" and "ECS crystal, no comp". Perhaps the coolest items were CRTs with big blue labels on the safety glass stating - "Do not use in production - no UL submission".

Oh yeah, and disc capacitors too - GE probably could have saved some money by not buying so many disc caps. Dad got several HUNDRED thousand of them - Maida Developement (maker of HV and other Disc Caps) is right here too.

Cool stuff!

Cheers,

Fot the CRT's - probably the Rauland plant - they supplied Zenith and a few others.

Cheers,

RCA was "assembling" TVs in the 1980s in Bloomington Indiana to at least the late 80's. Then GE bought, raped and pillaged RCA and not sure what happened after that...

...then GE's television business got relegated to the toilet, and RCA became French .....then Korean....then Chinese.... and as far as GE... well same sorta thing. Ugh:nono::thumbsdn::tears:

I think GE bought RCA in '86. I believe that was when GE shut down their own TV plant and simply stuck the GE logo on RCA sets. About a year or two later, GE sold the RCA/GE consumer line to Thomson. Still, the only difference between an RCA and GE was the name on the front of the set. I think Thomson finally stopped using the GE name in the late '90's. In the 2000's, RCA got passed around some more and it's now nothing more than Chinese made junk.

I recently picked up one of the last "real" GE sets from the mid '80's - a 19" knob tuned PC chassis set. Of course, it needs a few new caps; but, I plan on fixing it and keeping it since it's one of the last "real" GE's and, IMHO, was one of GE's best solid state color sets.

This is one of those questions that's really hard to answer, since there are so many variables. Probably the closest I can think of would be the Sony consoles, which were "assembled" in San Diego, CA through the early 90s. I'm sure the board came from abroad, but the CRT was made at one of two plants here and in Mexico, and the wood cabinets were mainly built in San Diego.

I wonder when Curtis Mathes quit making their own chassis? Curtis himself died in a plan crash in 1985 or 86, and the company went down hill. I think until then, the company bragged that their sets were 100% American-made.

Charles

Every solid state CM TV that I've seen had a Japanese NEC chassis in it. I had an early SS CM combo from '74 that used an NEC chassis.

"Probably the closest I can think of would be the Sony consoles, which were "assembled" in San Diego, CA through the early 90s. I'm sure the board came from abroad, but the CRT was made at one of two plants here and in Mexico, and the wood cabinets were mainly built in San Diego."

Sony may have indeed, been the last to produce consumer CRTs in the US... Does anybody have a shutdown date for the Sony CRT plant in San Diego?

How about the Rauland plant?

thanks,
jr

In the late 90s I had a job that took me to a metal fabrication plant in Bensenville (I think). They were making the metal ring band for 27" and 32" Trinitrons. I have no idea where the CRT plant was. But found it interesting that there was some CRT component manufacturing occurring here.

"They were making the metal ring band for 27" and 32" Trinitrons"

Those were really tough bands to cut off the tube!

I found this 2009 article that states that... the Sony US CRT plants were shut down about 5 years before...So that pretty much pegs it at 2004. I was not aware of the Sony facility in Pittsburgh.

http://www.allbusiness.com/company-activities-management/financial-performance/12874083-1.html

jr

Thats awesome!! I never knew that.. For how many years were Sony CRT's built here?

This is one of those questions that's really hard to answer, since there are so many variables. Probably the closest I can think of would be the Sony consoles, which were "assembled" in San Diego, CA through the early 90s. I'm sure the board came from abroad, but the CRT was made at one of two plants here and in Mexico, and the wood cabinets were mainly built in San Diego.

I wonder when Curtis Mathes quit making their own chassis? Curtis himself died in a plan crash in 1985 or 86, and the company went down hill. I think until then, the company bragged that their sets were 100% American-made.

Charles

BTW, I thought those RCA/GE BPC sets back in the early to mid 90's were built here in the US somewhere. Those sets had awful tuner issues.. I fixed a pile of them in the past.

BTW, I thought those RCA/GE BPC sets back in the early to mid 90's were built here in the US somewhere. Those sets had awful tuner issues.. I fixed a pile of them in the past.

Believe it or not, I still get those in with tuner connection issues from time to time. It's hard to believe that some of these sets are pushing 20 years old. I think it was '92 when these came out and I remember it quite well.

Wow! At least the CRT's and FBT's were made well obviously

Seems like I've seen US made RCA's from well into the 90s-certainly their consoles.

I think that Sony plant in PA was the former VW plant?

The Three Rivers plant was still around early in the 2000's, doing contract assembly for Samsung for one. You should be able to find the story on the web-apparently, their congressman got a bill put in that levied a tariff on all Chinese-made TV sets, and the proceeds were to be divided amongst all the American-owned TV manufacturers. (which consisted of, well, Three Rivers!) That would have kept them alive but the deal fell through so I don't know what happened from there.

In 1990 my father bought a new GE and my grandfather bought a new Sylvania. Both were assembled in the US.

Wow! At least the CRT's and FBT's were made well obviously

Yes, they held up fairly well. Can't say that for the newer RCA's. The flybacks started going downhill with the CTC197 and really got bad with the Chinese built M134, ATC series, and other chassis sets made over the last few years. Also, I've seen some newer RCA's with weak/shorted/arcing CRT's.

Yes, they held up fairly well. Can't say that for the newer RCA's. The flybacks started going downhill with the CTC197 and really got bad with the Chinese built M134, ATC series, and other chassis sets made over the last few years. Also, I've seen some newer RCA's with weak/shorted/arcing CRT's.

For some reason, I had it in my head that those RCA/GE chassis were made in France... The CTC-175/177 was a very easy set to work on, and as others said; virtually trouble-free outside of the tuner shield can being used as an inline ground connector for the whole board :bash: .

Charles

Even in the early 60's... CM used Matsushita oil-filled capacitors in their black & white TV chassis.... .047's, .01's, etc... those were Japanese... and actually held up quite well in my set. I think their stereo chassis also used them (still installed in mine). I've also seen CM tubes that were marked Japan.

Even in light of this, I remember as Charles mentions... they used to say they were all-American made. Woods TV was the BIG Curtis Mathes store for Beaumont... and I recall them talking about that in their TV ads... made here in America. I guess they just neglected to include "with parts from Japan"

"made here in America. I guess they just neglected to include "with parts from Japan""

Depending on how the decision was made to use these parts, I am not sure if I would take issue with off-shore parts used in "American Made" products. Did C-M have a component engineering/evaluation group?

A CE may have chosen the Japanese-made caps as the best possible to use for a particular high stress applications. :thmbsp:

Or a bean counter may have said "buy the cheapest parts you can order". :thumbsdn:

jr