Estate Sale Finds In 2007!
 

This is the first estate sale TV find for 2007. While a newer set, it needed to be saved. Its a 17" 1979 Zenith Chromacolor II with space command. 1979 is the last year for the chromacolor II. Chroma II's are probably the best most reliable chassis zenith made. The space command was a plus. It was $14.00 at half price at 155 Addison Rd, Riverside, IL. Model SK1745W, 17KC55 chassis. For once I find a zenith set that still has a legible model tag. Most of the time they are either torn off, or badly faded away. I noticed the "space command" and looked around for the remote. Couldnt find it. The people running the sale didn't know either after looking around for a good 10 minutes. So we figured it was lost. As I brought the TV to the cashier, there was a box of miscellanious on the floor next to the cashier. Sure enough, I spotted the remote in there just as I was paying for the set!

Typical zenith, it still works perfect with a strong tube. The remote didnt work. Had some cracked solder joints at the transducer to board connection.
The set was made in Reynosa, Mexico. Many parts were made in Mexico and Taiwan. It appears that the CRT is the only thing made in USA. Its sad to see this. The 1968 zenith sets were the first to start using foreign made parts. Yokes made in Holland, then portugal, then in 1969 you started to see mitsubishi transistors and japanese lytics. Then you started to see Taiwanese made UHF tuners. All the American jobs were starting to dissapear. It just got worse with zenith as the 70's progressed.
They were still the best TV's though.

That's a system 3 tube in there isn't it? I have a set that looks just like this and has a system 3 tube but I haven't opened it up to see if it is a Chromacolor or System 3 chassis.

Cool Doug! And yes.. That is the LAST Chroma 2 chassis. I sold Zeniths then and thet new tri-focus tube came out for the System 3's but Zenith rolled out some "portable" sets with that tube using the Chroma 2 chassis. I always figured they were using up the remaining parts.......

Estate sale find: 4-21-07
 

Went to a sale at 3928 Johnson Ave, Western Springs, IL on april 21. Picked up this mint zenith 4 tube hybrid with the factory correct gusdorf cart. The original owner was an engineer for western electric. He had some old WE photographs I bought as well as a few old phones. The TV was in the finished basement since new. The man had a few chairs arrayed around the TV set near the wall. I think this TV has hardly any hours on it. Looks like it was bought for show only. The house had baseboard heat, so there was practically no dust inside. The photos are exactly what the inside of the TV looks like when I first took the back off. Looks like im the first to pull the back off of it. The horizontal output still has the silicone holding it in place, didn't want to pull the tube to test it as its still original and untouched inside. Very rare to see a chassis with no dust accumulation.
When I went into the house, first place I look are the bedrooms. I found a 1985 zenith table set with space command. I was considering buying it. The lady running the sale said it was half off then said there an older one downstairs. She said they though it was a black and white at first but then found out it was color once turned on. "its pretty old though, you might not be interested" she says. "The picture is not that good". When I go down into the basement I was shocked to see it was a 4 tube hybrid. I havn't found a 4 tube hybrid at an estate sale in years. The picture wasnt that good, because someone turned the focus control all the way to one end and had a dull picture. Adjusted to about mid range and had that pefect crisp chromacolor picture. The peak picture control was down too, adjust that and the picture gets even better. The set was marked $15 and got it for half off as it was after 12pm on saterday.

This one is a 1973 model D4026W with a 19DC21 chassis. Its the chassis that uses the solid state stick HV rectifier (no trippler). I took a good number of photos of this set, mainly because 4 tube hybrids are among my favorite sets. You're very luck if you find one these days.

Compare this to other models available in 1973 and it just makes them all look sick. It gets said again and again...what a way to build a TV set!

Estate sale find: 5-5-07
 

Went to a sale yesterday at 180 Southcote, Riverside, IL. Found this nice 15" RCA XL-100 portable from '74. Uses the CTC-72 chassis. The set was not this clean when I found it, it was sitting on mantle above the fire place in the basement. It needed a good cleaning, so it got taken apart as you can see. Everything came out of the cabinet, including the CRT for proper cleaning. Cleaned up like new and works great. These XL-100's have a great sharp picture like a chormacolor II. Nice bright low hour set with good original antennas.
This one is model ET355Y, no missing model tag for a change! Especially on a portable, they are gone 98% of the time. Then again, the TV's themself are gone 98% of the time...

Estate sale find: 6-2-07
 

I havn't seen one of these around here locally in 10+ years. Its the 14" color portable, the smallest set zenith made at this time. This set is a 1971 model B3510 the "Halley". Uses the 12B8C15 chassis, which is one I've never had before. This is a series string hot chassis set.
Riverside has been a good TV spot this year. I found it on the same street this years first TV find came from! This came from 385 Addison Rd, Riverside, IL. The man who owned it was Joseph Kuizinas and would have been 56 years old when he bought the set. It was actually plugged in downstairs on a bookshelf. It was displayed just like zenith did in the brochures for the small sets, sitting on a nice bookshelf mounted to a wood panel wall with plants and books around it! I wish I had my camera, but it seems like when I bring the camera I dont find anything. The set was using its built in antenna. The antennas were both folded down and intact. The good news is, riverside is just a few miles west of chicago so you can watch TV just fine without extending the antennas, thus they stay preserved.
The TV is a little dirty but all intact and still has the tags on the back so I could identify it. The TV got used probably into the late 80's early 90's. It has several repairs underneath which look like total crap and need to be neatened up a bit. Luckily, the service techs were responsible enough to not lose any of the original back cover screws.
The good news and typical news is, it still works and has a nice picture. A few marginal tubes need to be replaced to keep it reliable. CRT is still good yet! A good cleaning should make it display nicely.
The photo of the set in the book is a 1971 zenith dealer products catalog and shows everything zenith made in nice color photos for this year. 1971 is the only one I have that includes color TV sets. I hope to fine more of these someday..

Hey Doug, in your attached photos, what is the component soldered to the vertical metal chassis, immediately to the left of the AC line in terminals? The AC line wires go into this component, a small thumb-sized metal can, and black and white wires also come out. The two solder blobs where the component is mounted to the rear panel are visible in your photos.

BTW, I enjoyed looking at your site. Nice collection! I think I recognize at least one mid-60s RCA that my aunt had years back...

...

Doug,, visited your website, very nice!!
Dan

Years ago I had an RCA set that had a chassis that looked a lot like yours
http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/att...8&d=1178503746
I still have some of the plug in modules from it, let me know if you might be interested in them.

I have one of those 14" portables, in rougher shape but, of course, still working. They are underrated...who else would build a portable like that?! Talk about making a Portacolor look sick...

True, but I betcha it *weighs* twice as much as a Portacolor..!

I suspect one big selling point of the Portacolor was that unlike most other "portable" color TVs made before the mid-70's, the Portacolor was actually *portable* in the sense that it was rather lightweight and easy to carry.

estate sale find: 6-9-07
 

Picked this set up yesterday at 420 N. Quincy Dr, Hinsdale, IL. This was a tri-level home and this set was in the lower level. As soon as I looked at the carpet on my way into the room, I figured there MUST have been some kind of older TV in there. Sure enough, there was a 1970 RCA early American console. The first picture you see is what the set looked like in its original home. Newer TV on top, which lead me to believe the set didn't work and that the top of the RCA was ruined and scratched.
I was wrong on both counts, the newer TV had wide rubber feet and didnt leave a mark ontop of the set. Since its a well built cabinet, the weight of the newer TV didn't "push" the top down or leave indention marks. The TV powered up and had a color picture, not too bad either! CRT is bright as new and is the original colorama dated 69-39. No signs of cateracts anywhere.
Here's where I got concerned. When you look at the first picture, you see the control door is missing. I was really dissapointed to see that. I figured it must be somewhere in the house. I figured if it was me that broke it off, Id put the broken pieces somewhere safe where they couldnt get lost. As you can see in the first picture there is a green desk. Thats the first place I went to look, and the first drawer I pulled, it was in there under all the junk! Ok, so I found the door, but the broken off hinge piece was still missing, and it was a small piece. Looking more into the same drawer, I found that too! I couldn't believe it!
Now if this were one of those estate sales in which everything was cleaned up and prepaired for hundreds of people to walk through, those desk drawers would have been cleaned out and that door would have been gone. The door was a very nice clean break, and will glue back together almost perfectly. You can see where it broke on the close up of the control door, I didn't glue it yet, just wanted to get some pics while it was still light outside.

As for the model, its a 1970 model, made late in 1969. GM 627L the "Providence" with a CTC-38XJ chassis. Once again, I got lucky and the model tag was still on back! I thought I had a CTC39 at first. This has one of those indented 3 channel readout UHF tuners. The set is in excellent shape inside and out. Don't see this type of cabinet too often. It will need just a little work to bring it back 100%, but the good news it everything is complete.

...

Not an exact fit for the thread but I thought it bared mentioning. Was at the flea market Saturday and saw the oldest TV they have had in awhile. A Zenith color console which I thought initially was a $ervice $aver but then I walked around front and it said "Solid State". No mention of Chromacolor on the set-I should have pulled the back cover to see what the chassis was. I'm guessing it was one of the pre-modular ones? Not too bad a shape, and only $10 (as was the late model Zenith console parked next to it). It was old enough that the crt had a green halo. Too white a phosphor to be Chromacolor, I think. This was a 25V set. Anyway, I went back and looked a second time but decided to pass. No room here, and I have no luck getting anyone to come down here and get the sets I've already rescued. It wouldn't surprise me to see this set sitting there for awhile. These booths are under a roof but no walls. There are several vendors in a row with lots of used electronics and the consoles usually sit until the particle board falls apart.

Zenith never had a 25V set that was not Chromacolor that may have been a very early solid state set 1972 or 73 by 75 they used the chromacolor II crts.

I was actually thinking the screen looked too small for 25", but maybe it's just that I didn't have much to compare it with. I know Zenith stuck with those 23V tubes for a long, long time but this had the more rectangular corners.

As far as I know Zenith did not make a 23V soild state set until 1975 or 76. Before then the soild state sets were the top of the line at 25V. The early Chromacolor 25v tubes would go yellow around the edges. But by 1974 they used the one piece bonded tube without the safety glass glued to the tube.
Zenith had some early soild state sets by late 71 early 72 they are rare not a lot of them were sold.

Well, fellas, I thought about that TV all week. I decided that if I went back to the flea market Saturday morning and it was still there, well, I would go ahead and get it. Indeed, it was still there. The vendor begged me to take it, no charge. Seems they rent the same space each week...once when they weren't there somebody dumped the two consoles in their spot. The market wouldn't haul them away and the vendor only had a car so they were just stuck with these monsters. They talked me into taking the late model set as well but when I got back to the space with my truck the folks were nowhere to be seen. It was enough that my wife and I had to load one by ourselves, so I left the other.

So...it uses the horizontal chassis, 25CC55. It was built the last quarter of '71 (meaning it was "in production" the same time I was!) Overall in decent shape. Some of you will ask, does it work? Come on now. This TV is 36 years old; it spent at least a couple weeks sitting out on the flea market grounds. (at least it was during a drought) The cord was gone. What do you think? It's a Zenith...of course it works! The picture does bloom/shrink quite a bit but that can't be but so hard to fix, right? One neat thing is that the UHF uses presets, lettered A, B, C, etc. If you press in on the UHF fine tuning knob a dial scale lights up and you can adjust them. The screenshot I posted is with rabbit ears out in the shed.

One of you WILL be coming to take this off my hands, RIGHT? It is free, and I'll help you load it. Just be warned that I will try to fill the rest of your truck up with other stuff I'm trying to unload! PM if interested.

Estate sale find: 8-4-07
 

Estate sale find at 8227 N. Washington st. Niles, IL. Picked up this little 12" RCA Victor solid state "new vista" portable b/w set. I figured this set to be about a '67 at first. Like all RCA's my first check is for a model tag (it was still there!) model AG 005 J. I didnt work, sound but no pic. Could smell some ozone from the back of the set with a faint HV ring. Got it for half price at $5.00.
When I got home I took the back off to troubleshoot the HV stage. I do not have service data for this set, uses a KCS153 chassis. The set does use a 2BJ3 HV rectifier. I also noticed all the components had 1965 date codes! Apparently its a '65 model which surprized me. Im going to assume this is the very first solid state portable RCA b/w set. I dont recall ever seeing this model. The only early rca solid state portables Ive seen are the ones from about '67-'68 with the pop up control panel.

Trouble appears to be a defective damper diode. Its one of those TO-3 cased dampers. Horizontal output transistor checked pretty leaky too. Typical germanium semiconductors, very unreliable! All I need is to get the NTE numbers and should be good to go.
This is quite a well built rugged little set with a power trans as well! One thing I do not understand is the use of the name "New Vista" on a solid state set. I thought "new vista" was referring to the nuvistor triode RF amp that was used in the VHF tuner. This set is all solid state with exception of the HV rectifier.

Hey Doug,
That set is a first see for me as well. Nice find. Will this set operate on 12VDC? I may be able to help you with the semiconductors. I have a bunch that I got from a friend of mine who stopped fixing TV's. Just let me know what numbers you need. I had a CTC40 RCA when I was a kid that had "New Vista Color" stamped on it which I also thought was strange since it was all SS except for the HV rect. I also had a little GE 12" solid state AC/DC set that was probably a little newer than your RCA. It also used a tube HV rectifier. And, no, I no longer have either set. The CTC40 had a bad yoke and CRT and I don't remember what happened to the GE. If I only knew then what I know now...

If that set was closer, I WOULD take it. I like provincial and Danish modern solid state sets... they seem pretty rare.

I believe you are correct; that looks like an RCA "Minikin", which was their first solid-state B&W portable. I dunno why those say "New Vista" on them though, but perhaps they hadn't yet decided on some sort of new moniker ("Trans-Vista") for solid-state TV's.

Estate Sale find: 8-12-07
 

1970 RCA Trans Vista Color, model GM-711L, "Tarleton", CTC-40P. Purchased at 23W234 Cambridge Ct., Glen Ellyn, IL. Original thread on this TV can be found here: http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/sho...t=122071Listed Noted on "estate sale finds in 2007" thread for the record.

Estate sale find: 8-18-07
 

Picked up a 1971 Zenith console color set. Was a great find as early 70's zeniths are my favorites and are hardest to find plus being a dual speaker danish modern cabinet design made it even better. model B4744W, 12B14C50 chassis. This is a hybrid chassis for course but still had plenty of tubes in it. The set was at 2234 Grove Ave, Berwyn, IL. Found it in the basement. Luckily a clean dry basement. The set was pretty dusty and didnt work that great when I found it. After looking around the basement, I found the original operation manual for the set.
I never had a 12B14C50 chassis before and have been wanting to find one. After looking at the service manual, the 12B14C50 was noted as the "top of the line TV chassis for 1971".
It has the ultramatic UHF tuner, which I have never had on a manual tuning set before.
While looking around the rest of the house, I found some other manuals that helped me determine what TV's they had. I found the manual and schematic for a rca CTC-11, which was long gone. I think its safe to assume this '71 zenith replaced the CTC-11 which would have been about 10 years old at the time. That CTC-11 was probably put into the basement. Then I found another manual for a 1990 Zenith console with the purchase date and info written on it. I think that TV replaced this '71 zenith, that was put into the basement in 1990 unused. The CTC-11 was probably thrown away in 1990 when this zenith was brought down.

This is just a guess of course. The '71 zenith was a well used TV, but well cared for. The CRT was dim when I found it, so it probably got 19 good years of service. Most tubes were changed over the years, but the CRT is still original. The set does not appear to have had any serious work done to it, the chassis appears to have never been pulled out.

So basically, this TV survived 17 extra years and should have been thrown away in '90. This would have been typical. In the early 90's I found lots of early 70's zeniths at the resale shop by my old home and at the curb. Im glad they decided to keep it.

I went over the entire chassis. I didnt need to rejuv the tube, just raised the heaters up to about 8 volts for 15 minutes and brought the CRT back pretty good, even at a cold start up its about 7.8 out of 10, green gun being the weakest at about 7.3. Tuner got pulled to check out the ultramatic drive components. Everything looked good and moved fine.
VHF tuner was pretty dirty and intermittent.
One thing was impressed me was the light up UHF scale for presets of the ultramatic tuner. The dial scale lights up when you push in the UHF fine tuner. Never seen anything like it before. Also, the VHF and UHF dial indicators are direct view, but angle up tward the operator. You can see in the one photo, the indicators do not face out perpindicular to the front of the TV. Also to note, the Outter knobs are the channel changer, while the inner knobs are for fine tuning. Complete opposite from how most TV's were designed.

This is the first year zenith used the V series CRT's, 25VAMP22 (more rectangular) The color circuits had some issues, hue was not adjustable and when you pulled you activated the auto tint gaurd, the screen went completely green. After looking at the 9-47 duramodule, the tech. incorrectly plugged one of the tint leads one pin off on the duramod. Corrected that and it worked just fine. Zenith also had that non tamper HV protection cover soldered over the HV control. As the set ages, component values change and the HV goes way up. The HV was at about 28 KV and still had plenty of range with the control centered bringing it back to a correct 25KV at zero beam.
Zenith manual tells you to jumper various connections if the HV is too high or low, yet if the HV control goes bad, just "reset the HV to 25 KV and resolder the plate". So you can safely readjust the HV without causing other circuits to go out of tolerance. Zenith only did this for two years then went back to the exposed HV control, probably because the techs didnt like it. Zenith also had that "hollow shaft" HV pots back in the 60's color sets. All in efforts to help keep the customer from touching the control as he would exposed himself to x-ray if brought up too high.
Ive had the same exact issue with the 12A12C52 chassis. Just unsolder the cover plate, bring the control back a touch and you're back to 25KV.

This set is working really nice now. I took it apart and cleaned it up, checked some tubes as nothing else was really wrong. Typical zenith, they just keep going!

The same person must come through California on their way to grab your set, and pick one up from me first :yes:

Charles

Very interesting in that the solid state Zenith I found (above) has the same tuner setup/control panel as this one. The same push-to-set, etc. The difference is that mine says "solid state" on it. Also, the back does not read "$ervice $aver". That one was built late in '71. By the way, mine did find a new home thanks to a gentleman on AK.

Crap! Why don't people around here throw stuff liike that out! I've been putting ads out ASKING for old tv's like that and have no response! I guess people in central Indiana don't have or appreciate stuff liike that. Geez!

I was just killing a little time on the web, admiring Doug's latest find. A hybrid or SS Danish-modern Zenith is one of my holy grail sets.

So I'm blowing up the thumbnail pics, and now I wonder:

Am I the only person who noticed this?

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/att...2&d=1187543328

I may have discovered the reason you don't see this style of tuner very often... Or are you trying to tell us something Doug?

The reason my finger is on the UHF tuner is because the UHF dial scale lights up when push in to adjust for your presets. I wanted you to see the lit up scale thats all. When I went to adjust the UHF stations, I was surprized to see this little UHF scale light up. Never seen anything like it and wanted to take the photo. Another one of those neat zenith features.

Estate sale find: 9-01-07
 

I went to the zenith plant yesterday on my way to an estate sale on the northwest side of the city. After getting some updated pics of zenith's plant, I had to leave and get to the sale before it ended. The sale was at 5812 N. Mobile Ave, Chicago. This is a typical home you'd see on the NW side of chicago.
I found this really clean 1968 Zenith color console in the colonial cabinet. Model Y4520, with a 20Y1C38 chassis. More of a common zenith set with the concentric tuners.
This set was still in the living room! unplugged an not attached to the antenna anymore. A newer 14" GE set was ontop of the set. Luckily a placemat was under the GE and proteced the top of the zenith. Got the set for $40.00.

When I got it home it had to be taken apart for cleaning. Lots of light dust inside the set. After dusting the chassis off, it looked like new. The set must have been untouched for years. The CRT meter wouldnt move. I left the heaters up to 8 volts for about 10 minutes. All three cathodes came back 8 out of 10 on my RCA CRIII. Even after a cold start up the CRT was strong.
Turned on the set and got blank raster. The set had a couple tubes changed in the past. Appeared to have never had a big service job needing the chassis to be pulled. Lots of original tubes. However, many of those orignal tubes had shorts and grid emission. They got replaced and had to take the tuner assembly out to free up the stuck UHF tuner gear transfer and relubricate it.

ESR of the original filter caps were great. This set didnt require any serious troubleshooting to bring it back, just some simple tube changing and cathode reactivation of the CRT. Reassembled the set and fired it up and had decent almost acceptable focus but needed improvement. Focus wouldnt bring it in all the way and was at the end of its rotation. It was a little low at about 3.5kV. The 212-85 selenium focus rectifier was leaky under load and got replaced with an NTE118. Turned it back on again and this time was able to center the focus pot for the usual razor sharp zenith picture! Didnt even need to adjust the HV, right on 25KV. The original sticker was still over the HV control access hole! Those components stayed pretty stable for the past 40 years! I took lots of photos of the chassis. the 20Y1C38 is very similar to the 20Y1C48 and 20Y1C50. These were the last of the chassis that had mostly all tubes and a tube type IF. the 16Z7C50 chassis replaced the 20Y1C series in '69 with the introduction of solid state chorma demodulation and the solid state IF sub chassis. This chassis shown only has one transistor (video driver) as can be seen next to the 12HL7.

I did grab that zenith radio on the floor too! I also got a royal 500E transistor in maroon.

What we always disliked about that chassis was changing the HVreg and HO tube always was a pain in a dark dusty house.

zenith had a clever idea of the hinged HV cage to gain access to the HO tube and HV reg. The first set I had that used this setup was a 20XC38 and was impressed with the tilt out HV cage. Just make sure the HO tube cap wasnt underneath the cage when you went to snap it back down or else.......crunch.

It did help having the hinged cage but I'm glad they moved the tubes to the rear of the cage and the HO to side. It was much better then fooling around with the cage trying to change hot tubes.

About those Zenith chassises with the cone shaped terminals: I knew someone who used to work for Zenith near Chicage who said that the terminal strips and tube sockets were the first things attached to an empty chassis. Then caps and resistors were stuffed into the terminals, and then the chassises were then wave soldered, topside down. Similar to a circuit board, where the solder side of the board was like the topside of the chassis. Then excess lead length was trimmed off, and then topside components (like IF transformers) were installed. "Hand crafted"...

Doug, your finger wasn't what I was referring too! Even my non-TV friends laughed at this picture!

http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/att...2&d=1187543328

Come on, that had to be on purpose!! I would have done it too! :lmao:

Ah ha! I get it now, the "F U" on the tuner read outs! Had to think about this one for a while! Im guess Im pretty naive. I got a good laugh once I figured it out! honestly that was not on purpose!

Beautiful TV set, and nice find with the royal 500. I thought I saw a Royal 790 or 780 navigator in the pile of radios on the floor.
I wish i lived In Chicago, Logan

Doug, your set looks great. Those TVs that used the 20Y1C series chassis were excellent, like all Zeniths. I had a great-uncle who owned one of those sets in the late 1960s; great picture on an antenna (this was some years before anyone in the Cleveland area had cable). The only difference that I could tell between his 23" 20Y1C-series set and yours is that his had light-through channel selector knobs (not projection through the center of the knob or onto the front panel, but with pilot lights behind the knobs that had channels 2, 3, 4, etc. and 14, 25, 35, etc. for VHF and UHF, respectively).

BTW, you won't be disappointed, either, with that Zenith radio you grabbed after getting the TV. That radio is either a C- or H-845 from the early sixties, and they are great from a sound standpoint as well as sensitivity--again, as are all Zeniths. I have a C845 that sounds fantastic and pulls in all kinds of stations, especially in the summer when the FM band opens up. I will also be getting a Zenith MJ-1035 AM/FM/FM-stereo table model radio (1961 vintage) from another AKer any day now, probably next week some time.

I had a Zenith Royal 500 radio (maroon color cabinet) back in the early seventies and should have kept it, but didn't; I don't remember why I gave it up, though.

That little joke about the (coincidental) settings of the channel selector knobs on your Zenith Ultramatic TV was great. I laughed out loud when I read the thing, and yes, it even took me a while to find out what Carmine was referring to, but when I took a good look at the TV's control panel and saw, as big as life, the UHF selector on position F and the VHF selector on position U, it dawned on me what the joke was. :lmao: