WTF; DuMont 30" Royal Sovereign rebadged Crosley!
 

I'm floored. I have been collecting TVs since the mid 70s, and I have had two Royal Sovereigns.... and I NEVER HAD A CLUE that Crosley had a version of it! I guess I'm not too surprised that they did, because there were plenty of Crosleys with the DuMont Chatham chassis.

But why have I never seen the Crosley 30"???????????

http://cgi.ebay.com/Vintage-giant-Cr...QQcmdZViewItem

Speechless, Charles

damn! 30 inch tube. Biggest B&W I've seen. If the tube face is truely cracked and not teh safty glass, that's gota be a bitch to find a replacement for.

...

I emailed the seller and the CRT is cracked. It is not the safety glass but the CRT itself. DAMN! A 30BP4 would be hard to find.


polaraman

Crosley E30
 

Here is a photo of my Crosley E30 TV. It is a crosley design, not just a DuMont in a different cabinet. Alas, my CRT is gassy. Anyone know where I can get a replacement? (Don't I wish!).

There was another 30" Crosley? on eBay a while back.
I would think this tube is harder to find than a 15GP22!

Eric,

The Crosley on Ebay followed me home. And I suspect your are right, there are more 15GP22s than 30BP4s!

Here's the thread:

http://audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=4270

John

That's one heck of a set - shame about the CRT. A friend of mine told me stories he'd heard about the 30" sets - said how they had problems with tube implosions, since it was so hard to make those 30" tubes perfectly round and sealed, and that he'd heard of a tube just imploding while in use. <BOOM!> Now, this was all heard second/third hand - may not be true, but it certainally makes a lot of sense. But tubes going gassy to me seems more likely. Anyone seen one of these operational?

-Ian

Dr. Dan has one that I have repaired, and it's working great with strong tube! It's the 1951 version with the single chassis and click-detent tuner, whereas the early one has the 2-piece chassis and Mallory Inputuner. I originally found that one in Simi Valley, CA... Was in the paper "Big B&W TV, works, Great for kids, $25". The ad was so classic that I saved it. The ad didn't even say DuMont! That was in the mid 80s. The other Royal Sovereign I had (now also Dan's), is the early two-chassis set. CRT OK, but not working. That one also came from a newspaper ad, and it has an interesting history: actress Jeanette McDonald was the original owner, and had given it to a friend. The friend stuck it in the garage where it sat for all those years. At least that ad said "enormous".

And John, I stand corrected! The Crosley in your photo is indeed different from the DuMont 2-piece chassis.


Charles

I had the pleasure of seeing the DuMont at the ETF Museum in operation & for me it was one of the most impressive things there, just overwhelming. That is "brute force" television!

Here's a photo of the Jeanette McDonald set after I got it home... Circa 1996. I just called it "twin chassis" in the previous post, but my photo reminds me it's actualy THREE!

Charles

The Hello-Fuzzy !! A feller could about take up residence in that bad boy...-Sandy G.

Charles,

While I love my DuMont RA119B1, I have to admit the RA119A is much more interesting from a technical point of view. Sounds like the one your worked on for Dr. Dan was the same set I have. Hmmm Dr. Dan.... Is that the mysterious Iacobi? Would love to see his collection!

...

Okay, that is one bigass set!

veg

YES! PM or eMail me and I will see if I can put something together... You and I have dealt many times on eBay (my eBay name kx250rider).

Charles
[email protected]

Somebody asked about seeing one of these in operation. Here's my (blurry) snapshot of the DuMont at the early television museum in Ohio.

http://antiqueradio.org/art/temp/DuM...lSovereign.jpg

And their house photo of the same set.

http://www.earlytelevision.org/dumont_ra118.html

It was playing the Wizard of Oz continuously during last year's convention.

A truly amazing set, and it's hard to grasp how mammoth it is unless somebody's standing right next to it.

Here are a couple of shots from the ETF convention. The size reference is Mr. Peter Fasciano.

I was kinda tickled that Mark Schubin started using this picture for his column in Television Broadcast magazine right after last year's Early Television Convention.
(With apologies to Mark for swiping his picture!)
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I saw the crosley set on ebay and I was floored. I never realized crosley made such sets. I'd love to own one but I have no room. Beautiful set. Very impressive to say the least.