Just completed a restoration of this 1949 Zenith 28T960E Basket Weave porthole TV with a 28F20 chassis.

It was a pretty straight forward restoration, with no real surprises. The 12" crt was rebuilt at some point long ago, and is in decent condition. I did have some trouble with the sound and discovered that the problem was the typical Zenith Mica in the IF can issue that you see so often in their radios of this vintage. After working through that everything else fell into place.

The cabinet was in pretty good shape and just needed a good cleaning and polishing to bring it back to a presentable condition.

Overall I'm happy with the set and the performance. The picture is a little on the soft side, but I guess that's to be expected since the crt is not in the best condition.

Bob


http://i642.photobucket.com/albums/uu143/ampico-kid/DSC_0279_zpsc4268b04.jpg

http://i642.photobucket.com/albums/uu143/ampico-kid/DSC_0272_zps68191ff2.jpg

http://i642.photobucket.com/albums/uu143/ampico-kid/DSC_0294_zpsb38c0029.jpg

http://i642.photobucket.com/albums/uu143/ampico-kid/DSC_0295_zpsb04e1a1a.jpg

I'm in love...EXCELLENT job !

The picture is a little on the soft side, but I guess that's to be expected since the crt is not in the best condition.

The picture looks pretty good to me. Nice restoration job!

Nice! I'll bet your visitors flip when they see that set on!

Nice set! Picture looks great, but I am wondering about the last photo... is there something missing on the top-right side of the actress' head?

Nice set! Picture looks great, but I am wondering about the last photo... is there something missing on the top-right side of the actress' head?

In that particular scene she (Betty Grable) was wearing a very dark color bow in her hair. It doesn't show up very good in the picture. I think that's what you're seeing (or not seeing).

Nice! I'm not a huge porthole console fan (so sue me), but that one is very pretty in operation.

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

That is one of the nicest examples of that classic early Zenith I've seen! Great job.

Beautiful, I love it!

you did vary good job,looks great !

Trust me on this, you show that off to Non-TV types, you WILL be heralded as some sort of God..

i have the 10" table model and it looks nice but gets blown away by other sets , motorola , rca to name a couple , i did find that if it is tuned too far it will soften and had to make the sound and picture on mine match so that you got sound when almost tuned out , it wasn't getting sound until it was tuned to the point where the picture was really soft, so a little tweaking and you may find you have a better image , if you tune the picture to where it starts to go out and theres no sound that could be it.

mike

i have the 10" table model and it looks nice but gets blown away by other sets , motorola , rca to name a couple , i did find that if it is tuned too far it will soften and had to make the sound and picture on mine match so that you got sound when almost tuned out , it wasn't getting sound until it was tuned to the point where the picture was really soft, so a little tweaking and you may find you have a better image , if you tune the picture to where it starts to go out and theres no sound that could be it.

mike

I find a similiar problem on my Pilot Radio TV37. You tune it to a nice picture and then the sound isn't optimum, or vise-versa. You have to make a compromise between the two all the time.

i have the 10" table model and it looks nice but gets blown away by other sets , motorola , rca to name a couple , i did find that if it is tuned too far it will soften and had to make the sound and picture on mine match so that you got sound when almost tuned out , it wasn't getting sound until it was tuned to the point where the picture was really soft, so a little tweaking and you may find you have a better image , if you tune the picture to where it starts to go out and theres no sound that could be it.

mike

I understand your problem regarding sound and picture. You can either have good sound and soft picture or sharp picture and weak or no sound. That's not the case with this little Zenith. I can tune it and achieve best sound and picture at the same time. I believe the crt is a little tired or possibly the video alignment is off just a little bit. In either case....I'm happy with it as is, but thanks for the input. Bob

As always, beautiful job on bringing it back! It looks outstanding, I'd be happy with it too.

I'll just add my voice to the chorus, it's a beautiful restoration!