1964 Zenith 5111 comes to life!

[charokeeroad]

I remember that Blue Cheer album.. I was stationed in Huntsville Alabama working on Hawk Radar at the time.. nice to see it from time to time.

[ctc17]

If its that toug to find one pm me your address and ill send you one. - keep several stock because they are always bad. Sometime I forget I live in LA the land of everything instantly

[Tubejunke]

Just an update to let everyone know that this thread and the set is not finished. CTC17 was nice enough to send me a crystal that we hope will rectify my sudden loss of color. I simply have not had the time to proceed with repairs! Since I last posted, I have been faced with the punishment of final exams in my electronics degree program that I have been working on for two years. I managed to graduate on May 15, 2011 with a 4.0 GPA, and hope to someday actually work in the field that I have always loved. The prospects are sort of thin as the bulk of employment for electronics technicians has shifted largely to industrial repair. Unfortunately, the country has sort of turned it's back on it's own industrial base, so many (most) of those opportunities have disappeared. Frankly, my interests would be more that of a bench technician than that of a guy with a multimeter swapping out start/stop stations, motor starters, and tweaking photosensors. I was just born way too late I think! Just 10 or 15 years ago a guy like me could graduate and go to work for places like Tandy who actually still had repair facilities to support their products. My best friend's brother worked for them for 15 years after graduating from the same program as I have, but they shut the doors, and needless to say he is not all too happy working in a motor/drive repair business, which would be the closest thing to bench repair left I guess. I would love to work for such a place, and even went as far as to ask one to take me on at a greatly reduced wage, sort of like back in the days of apprenticeship, but the plan did not work! This is not a rant as I am proud of my achievements and if nothing else the knowledge I gained will make me a better hobbyist.

[Tubejunke]

I am bringing this thread back as page 2 has the pictures that many people want to see of the set that is for sale. I never had time to fix the color issue and the super sharp black and white picture is a little jittery, so I think some recapping of at least the horizontal deflection circuitry would be in order before the set is put to good use. I REALLY want to sell this set least of everything, but the right deal will take it. I meant to make room by getting rid of other sets and radios to justify keeping this beauty and getting it set up for fairly regular use. Although I am a TV hobbyist, I will never understand alot about desirability with old sets. To me a 1964 color set would not be all the rage as I have much more interesting things to let go of. I never found a home for my 24" 1958 Space Command and may never find one. To me a 50s set with a large screen and remote control would be more interesting and out of the ordinary than the 1964 color set. Same with my 1947 RCA 8T-243 as far as being interesting, but I feel that it will find a home because there are the collectors who are just into early small screen stuff. The 50s to me all to often gets overlooked and some of the most interesting and best looking, and best performing sets came around the mid 50s. I am hoping that one of the many interested parties will simply come with a van and do a 'bundle' package deal so I can concentrate on only a few favorites that I will keep.

[DavGoodlin]

As an electronics degree engineer, I feel your pain. Even in 1988 when I graduated from College in Maryland, there was little employment in electronics beyond government defense contractors. The electrical power industry (power plants, solar, wind and distribution in facilities) seems to be the only future for us. Boring yes, but its a living. Your degree will help at work but this hobby will keep you sharp on the theory.

[Kevin Kuehn]

Hi Tubejunke,

I was pleasantly surprised to see this thread up at the top. A friend in the TV/appliance biz dropped one of these 25LC30 chassis Zeniths off for me to enjoy last night. This one is a model 5119. I'm sorry to hear you've lost interest your set, but I understand how that can happen.

I also graduated with a technical electronics servicing degree back in 1984. Same deal- always dreamed of fixing quality consumer electronics. Ended up working in the electronic weighing industry for 10 years before finally talking over the family business (non electronics related). I still long to be back on the bench full time, but the jobs just aren't out there. I think if a guy was located near a large enough population, that one could carve out a humble living repairing pro audio equipment. But lately I've been noticing even that market moving to cheep overseas manufacturing.
The electronics business in this county has sure turned into a sad state of affairs.

Anyhow... below are a couple pictures of the set I adopted last night. Not sure what I'm going to do with it right now, but I'll for sure enjoy looking at it for a while. I hope you don't mind me posting them here. If it's for whatever reason a problem I will gladly delete.

Best of luck with selling some of your items.

[Tubejunke]

Originally Posted by Kevin Kuehn

I hope you don't mind me posting them here. If it's for whatever reason a problem I will gladly delete.

I don't mind at all. The more the merrier! As far as losing interest in the 5111, I really didn't lose interest, but I need room to even move around the TVs and radios that I have compiled over a number of years. I posted all this stuff for sale in the classifieds section of this site and a ton of people ended up wanting pictures sent to individual email. I had no idea that as many people would be interested! So, I had to direct everyone to pictures already existing in this thread. VK will not allow duplicates. Unfortunately for me more people are interested in this one set than are interested in what I really need to move and that's a few 40s-50s TVs and radios. Ya just can't house them all and the unfortunate reality is sometimes you end up having to give them to Goodwill of something where they will end up as fish tanks or in the dumpster. I would never do that with certain items, but there are a lot of TVs that are nice and desirable to the right person, but you have to have the right person willing to come and get them. I would never donate the Zenith, the RCA 8T-243, or the radios. I can sell the radios probably locally at a flea market if nothing else. TVs are always harder to find a buyer for and sometimes you can't even find a good home for one free of charge. I tried for a long time to find a home for my super clean 24" 1958-9 Zenith Space Command and it's still sitting there. The set would not be what I would call common by any means as it is NOT a 21" and IS an early remote control set. For a long time the big collectors only wanted to talk about 40's "roundies" and the 50's sets were basically nothing, time is moving on and it's time the better looking 50s sets got more recognition I think. Actually, I have always liked them better. They are generally easier to repair and far better looking IMO!

[Electronic M]

Kevin, I believe I have a spare tricolor on-off-vol knob laying around that might fit that set.

Some day I'll own a Zenith roundie, ain't no one gonna stop me when I find one for the right price.

[Kevin Kuehn]

Tom,

I do have that knob, although it's cracked around the stem. I think it can be glued.

[miniman82]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

Some day I'll own a Zenith roundie, ain't no one gonna stop me when I find one for the right price.

You could say the same thing about CTC-4's...in fact it's true in your case!

[Tubejunke]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

Kevin, I believe I have a spare tricolor on-off-vol knob laying around that might fit that set.

Some day I'll own a Zenith roundie, ain't no one gonna stop me when I find one for the right price.

Hey Tom, if you have a real nice adjustment door you might want to keep it in case you ever end up with my set! Mine is there, but it has a few wrinkles in it....

[Kevin Kuehn]

Originally Posted by Tubejunke

Hey Tom, if you have a real nice adjustment door you might want to keep it in case you ever end up with my set! Mine is there, but it has a few wrinkles in it....

The control door on my set has a couple wrinkles too. I think they got left open and turned into little suicide doors for the cat to hit.

[Electronic M]

YUUUP! Though a thing (money) almost did stop me (man I love Christmas and the many good things that come with it).

If something I've been wanting or really like is available for the right price, and is practical for me to transport I tend to go for it. Though space lately has been a major consideration.....Perhaps I need some kind of SciFi-ish spatial expansion device.

If my folks offer on a good sized house goes through that should do me on space for awhile, and I'll have all my stuff in one place for the first time in years so I can get everything in a line up and pick stuff to sell without worrying that there maybe one I like less in storage. Not to mention the side benefits of being able to run my stereo full tilt without bugging folks in neighboring apartments, and erecting out door antennas.

[Electronic M]

I do have a spare door from a Zenith color set of unknown model. I don't recall it being bent, warped, wrinkled, or what have you, but I do believe that it may be dirty or scratched.