Just an idea I had. Im an adequate woodworker, nothing special. I was thinking of building a dove tailed table top tv cabinet, tailored for one of bpc sets ive hanging around. Stain it a mahogany color and do a few coats of clear on top of it. Relocate the tuners to the side with some vintage knobs. Finding a round screen bezel and glass off a junked set, thats close to it and using a custom gasket.

It really doesnt seem all that hard to me. Heck, id even use an old color set for this. Id just use a cheap and well working bpc, so nothing good was used. I assume i could easily find the hardware here or on epay. Now I dont know if ill ever get around to this, but if the idea haunts me enough..

What do you guys think?

I think it's a great idea.
I've been wanting to build a 1/4 scale 1950's 21" B&W floor model using the guts from one of those cheap 5" Chinese Jellybean sets.
Alas I have neither the tools for such fine work or the skill, one would have to be able to machine 1/4 scale knobs and fabricate a mask to fit the rectangular CRT but have a less rectangular look to it.

I'd donate a 5" set to someone who would do it though.

Yes, i think ill try this, i have to find a small round screen bezel first, one that would work on a 12" screen.

Ive even some purple heart wood, that dark purple, weird and insanely hard stuff, id make squished round legs itd sit on out of that, maybe even a yellowish look to the cabinet..i dunno.

but i badly want a daily viewer i dont have to worry about.

The last Zenith color hybrids, and their early SS sets were fairly stable and had excelent preformance.

Darn you all, ive decided to actually build this thing!

Now im just looking for knobs and a bezel and glass.

This is pretty simple carpentry though. I might want to take it up a notch using zebra wood or something of that ilk. I just want it to be pretty. But the custom mask/gasket for the bezel... that does pose a problem as i dont know how to make it.

If you go to all that trouble of building a cabinet, you might as well use a quality BPC set. Or use an old CRT VGA monitor and an HDTV tuner capable of driving the monitor. I did that with a Samsung HDTV tuner and VGA monitor.
http://www.videokarma.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=171412&d=1314328797
This was an old cabinet for an RCA CTC18, chassis long gone. You could build a 16 by 9 bezel of wood or such for the picture tube, when you build the cabinet. I wouldn't remove the tube from the old plastic cabinet, but use it to continue holding the tube and boards, and attach it to the inside of the new wood cabinet you build.

i have one in my stromberg carlson cabinet.the round screen bezel was exactly 22 inches,so a 25 inch crt fit it perfectly.just cut the corners off very slightly.looks good.i just need to find original knobs to complete it.

the custom mask/gasket for the bezel... that does pose a problem as i dont know how to make it.

If the surface contour of the CRT is pretty flat, it could be quite straightforward ... look at this cabinet on eBay.... It appears that the "double D" shape was just cut out of a flat board, and the edges around the hole were slightly rounded and perhaps painted to match the CRT phosphor color. Easy! Likely the tube in this particular set was a 19" metal cone design which had a fairly flat faceplate.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-TV-RCA-CABINET-1950-19-DROP-DOWN-KNOB-HOUSING-/250890143776?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3a6a37c820

Not affiliated,
jr

I used to have a bezel and glass from a 12" Hoffman, I probably still do but I'll have to look around for it.