Interesting Frankenset
 

What a heck of a lot of work!

Charles

That's just wrong! Interesting, but just wrong. Guess it beats a fish tank though.

Bill R

I wouldn't mind havin' it...Even if it is somewhat of a "Blivvet" (grin)

Ha! That's pretty hot stuff! You could get killed for doing that today, but a good idea back 60 years ago. Hmmm....I gave away a very rough Columbia cabinet not too long ago, but they turn up quite often. Maybe the next one I can outfit with that spare porthole chassis up in the attic. (What I really want to do is outfit a console radio cabinet as a mirror lid or something similiar.)

I wanted to convert this...to a TV...but
 

Several years ago, I bought this empty radio cabinet. An unbelievable Philco Art Deco set, with a top that opened to expose the radio controls and dials.

Unfortunately, I ran out of time for projects, and had to sell it on ebay for around $100...but, oh what a 'faux pre-war' TV it would have made!!!

Pretty classy Victor to "butcher" that way. There was a lot of that kind of thing going on back in the '50s; you could read about such projects in such as Popular Science and the like.

While as a kid I took the guts from a battered Philco console (complete with "slicer" changer with optic pickup head!) and placed the radio chassis and speaker in an older Atwater Kent cabinet from which the guts were long gone, any more I generally like to have things presented as they were supposed to be.

This is what should be inside one of those old Victor machines; a gem I got operating back about 20 years ago. I had to go into the motor and weld a break in the mighty spring. :eek:

http://i29.photobucket.com/albums/c3.../victor3-1.jpg

Naw, I'm not about trying to stuff a TV where one never was. :rolleyes::screwy: :D But for others..whatever stokes their stove...

Is it just me or are the old Victrola cabinets kinda scary looking? I mean, they are beautiful furniture works, but they always struck me as strange.... lol.

Talk about a lot of work! At least he did it neatly.

I bet it was done in the 40s, before the Victrola was collectible. Probably they got hold of a freight-damaged TV. And am I correct in remembering some Westinghouse-branded sets with 48-1000 Philco chasses? I think so!

Charles

I believe that's a 1948-ish Philco TV chassis. Note the channel selector on the left. Whether Westinghouse rebranded it, I wouldn't know.

Yeah, they cut up two nice sets to make one. But this one takes up less real estate and is more aesthetically appealing than factory combos of the time, which tended to look plain and massive.

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios

Here is another Frankenset that was offered to the museum last year. The owner claimed in was made in the 20s.

http://earlytelevision.org/images/!c...022005-2A9.jpg

My humble opinion:
 

That Ebay set is a nightmare!!!

Could be Count Dracula's home entertainment system... or, The Munsters home entertainment system...

That one looks like it was built to be a TV... I ran across a handful of 100% custom TV cabinets while I was a TV man in the wealthy areas of Los Angeles. I guess at the time the TVs were new, if a homeowner was spending zillions on a designer livingroom, the TV was just as important as, say a hand-built fireplace mantel. The nicest one I saw was in a home in Brentwood, and it was about 7 feet long and ceiling height. It was blood-red mahogany with a piano finish, and had very VERY intricate inlaid wood and a whole lot of hand carving work. It had a Shaw or Conrac 27" B&W chassis in it, and a complete Fisher high-end tube hi-fi outfit with Borg-Warner turntable.

Charles

I don't think it was made as a TV. Here is the label on the back:

Hey, gang, the "Vocalion" was a brand name for phonographs of the Aeolian Piano Company in the early 1920's! They merged with another piano company, "Ampico", in about 1931...so I really doubt this was built as a TV!
(Aeolian was famous for player pianos, and the deluxe, very expensive "Reproducing" pianos, which played special piano rolls that reproduced the exact playing of famous pianists!...I own three of them!)