Help Needed From DuMont Chatham Owners
 

I'm going to refinish a DuMont Chatham that I recently acquired and need a little help from a fellow owner of this set. One of my decals is completely worn off. I need pictures of this decal so that I can recreate it during the refinishing process. All of the other decals on the set are readable and are in the pictures below. The one that is missing I'm assuming is the volume/power decal. If you have this set with a readable decal could you post and or send me the pictures? I've found a replacement for the DuMont decal here http://earlytelevision.org/for_sale.html. The only resource I've found for the other words is here http://www.radiosupply.com/category/205.aspx. They do not have exact replacements for the decals but I'm hoping to get something close. Does any one have a better source for decals? I suppose it's too much to ask to get an exact replacement set, but who knows.
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6173/...9ee9a82d_m.jpg
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6161/...5d242fb1_m.jpg
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6155/...2148fdb5_m.jpg
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6180/...e1a45eb5_m.jpg

Here are photos of the decals on my RA-103 in the Revere cabinet.

http://antiqueradio.org/art/temp/DuM...ightDecals.jpg
http://antiqueradio.org/art/temp/DuM...LeftDecals.jpg

This guy made very nice reproduction decals for my RCA CT-100:

Scott Wright, Solidesign
8005 Ore Knob Drive
Fenton, MI 48430
[email protected]

Regards,

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

Thank Phil. I sent an email to Scott with the images you posted. They are much better looking than mine. Hopefully he will be able to recreate them and I can have a nice fresh looking set soon.

Hope it works out. His price was for making a sheet of decals -- as many sets as will fit on a page. Then you would have extras to share. Sell a few sets to other RA-103 owners, and you can recoup your cost.

Phil Nelson

Soundesign is THE source for custom made decals.

He did a sheet for my DuMont RA-105B7 "Sussex"...

http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/j...ept2011032.jpg

Before I emailed him the file, a GF of mine sharpened it up in the digital domain. Then he printed a whole page of decals. I believe the color chosen was "Aztec Gold."

Hint: Before you apply the decals, make a cardboard jig/template to guide your application to the TV cabinet. I used one for mine, and it came off perfect. Then, I buried the decals in the finish.

Recoup costs indeed :sigh:, is the product worth the price? If it is I'm going to go for it so if any one else needs these decals let me know.

As to quality, if you look at the photos of my DuMont decals, those are original. The edges are reasonably sharp, but not super-crisp (they underwent some minor wear before the cabinet was refinished).

I don't have close-up photos of my new CT-100 decals, but they are somewhat better than the DuMont lettering in sharpness. Although I had provided the decal guy some reference photos, I believe he just used those as a guide and created the lettering anew using an art program like Visio.

The price depends mostly on how long the art takes him. Materials cost is not much, although he told me that his gold ink comes from Germany.

Phil Nelson

Just noticed that your decals are printed straight. Was that how that your set was decalled originally, or was he not able to curve the lettering?

Here's a dial detail of my Rumson, original finish.

http://tvontheporch.com/images/img_0718.jpg

I guess that doesn't answer whether lettering could be curved, just that it wasn't on later sets.

Nope. They were straight origionally.

These are exact duplicates. Applied with a template...:smoke: