Another TV shop is closing down

[drh4683]

Unfortunatly, Kens TV in lombard IL is closing at the end of this month. The owner is retiring after 45 years of service. Another TV guy I know (who has almost 300 vintage TVs) is friends with the owner, so he got to pick through a basement packed with old tube type color TV sets last month. I got the "leftovers", or whatever he didnt want. most being junk that was salvaged for parts. Basically he was being greedy and selfish, he wouldnt let me into the basement to take a look untill he was all done finding what he wanted. Since he knew the owner, he felt he had first chance on whatever he could find. He found some pretty nice stuff, like rca table remote sets, motorola remote sets you name it, it was down there. The guy just likes having old tvs, but doenst fix them, and does not go beyond the tube tester. Thus, I got to take all the NOS zenith and RCA parts. Picked up all kinds of parts that I dont know what to do with. Some of the parts included NOS motorola UHF and VHF tuners, as well as zenith and rca tuners and flybacks among other hard to find parts like knobs etc.

Anyway, I found 4 sets that looked to have some hope, all being sets he didnt like or "already have a few of those". Sorry guys, this guy refuses to show his sets on ak. Ive tried to get him to take some pics to show but he refuses.
First set is a 1972 zenith console, 20CC50Z. Looks complete, some missing knobs that I know I have somewhere. Otherwise, looks complete.

[drh4683]

Luckily I got the only 2 zenith 4 tube hybrids in the basement. This one is a 1972 19CC19

[drh4683]

The next generation, 4 tube hybrid is a 19DC11 with the chromatic button. this one has a burnt fly. Moyer cant help me on this one, they dont recognize any of the model or chassis numbers??????????? I'll just need to wait a few years untill I find one hopefully.

[drh4683]

a rare name thats almost completely gone is coronado. this is a japanese set made in april of 1970. Works great with the exception of missing knobs in various places.

Congrats Doug! I could just kick myself for not having checked a old time TV shop in the small town where I have some stuff in storage.....never got around to visiting them only to find that they moved to a new location since the last time I was up there.....of course any of the old stock they had probably got tossed out during the move.

Moral of the story, DON'T WAIT!!

Anthony

[Chad Hauris]

I wish I had kept those Zenith 4-tube sets I used to have...I could've given you the flyback, unfortunately I got frustrated dealing with sync and color problems and sent them to the trash about 10 yrs. ago. I do however have a video camera recording! I made back then so I can still see what they used to look like when turned on. Luckily I found another one recently but it doesn't have the illuminated channel numbers.
What store was Coronado from...W.T. Grant's?

I remember WT Grants....their HQ was in NYC near Times Square. One morning while riding the elevator I overheard a couple of lawyers talking about filiing for bankruptcy that very day. Knew it before most anyone else!

Anthony

[jstout66]

Coronado was from your friendly Gambles store. We had a Gambles in our small town along with a Western Auto which sold "Truetone". I remember tv techs in the area (along with my Uncle) hated working on that stuff. Japanese electronics were pretty terrible back then and the parts were hard to get. I do have a 13" Coronado from 1977 and it is a rebadged Toshiba. That one has a GREAT picture so the Japanese must have been getting more "with it" by the late 70's.

Originally posted by drh4683
Luckily I got the only 2 zenith 4 tube hybrids in the basement. This one is a 1972 19CC19

Doug,
Would you be willing to part with this particular Zenith? The Chicago area is a reasonable drive from where I live (I think I could do it on a weekend day). I think my email is posted somewhere here on the forum if you want to email me.
Jeff

[drh4683]

Jeff,

I can part with this one. Already got it fixed, so its ready to watch. Needed a damper tube and 2 caps in the chroma circuit as it had partial color. basically the screen would look color in one half and faded or almost black and white in the other and would vary with the color control setting. Weird symptom. two 50uf@100v lytics cause it everytime in the chroma circuit. You can email me at [email protected]
Doug

[Chad Hauris]

Doug do you need a flyback for that 23" Zenith...I removed the CRT from the set pictured to use in a CTC-31...the chassis works fine. Would the flyback from it work (don't know model but it has a transistorized IF module and an IC but rest appears to be tubes). Just PM me w/address if it looks like it will work, just reimburse me for shipping when it arrives...I can check the chassis number tonight if you'd like.

[wa2ise]

One local TV shop folded about 2 years ago, and the other in the next town burned to the ground 6 months ago. Meant to visit it but never got around to it. It had older TV sets on display in the front window, and I think that they serviced Seaburg jukeboxes too.

[maxm]

I live in Chicago, so there are still some shops left in the big city, though I'm still angry about not checking out the shop I saw closing a few years ago.
There was actualy a TV man located down the street from us, a really nice guy who tried to fix our TV once, but the CRT was bad (no green). Sadly, a few years ago, he retired and moved away, right before I got intersted in old sets.
When he moved he threw away about 15 sets, mostly newer ones with no chassis..., I did the get the Zenith hybrid black and white set that tv beta guy now owns. I know there was a tube color set in there, but it was buried, and I wasn't really intersted in that stuff back then, boy I wish it was there now...
There is actually a shop, called Deltronics, which actually specalizes in repairing ond tube grar, mostly guitar amps and expensive audio items, along with servicing regular new stuff. They fixed up my Grundig radio with a broken coil that I didn't want to deal with. I asked once it they fixed old TVs, and they said no problem, but I havn't brought in a set yet, sicne there is a minuimum charge of about $70.00 on just about everything, now we know why people throw away stuff when it breaks instead of getting it fixed.

[bgadow]

I have caught several guys when they were closing and got some good stuff because of it, mostly parts. I know I should do more but partly I'm a procrastinator and partly I'm still just a little too shy. My usual excuse is that, if I found a bunch of stuff, what would I do with it? I'm bursting at the seams as it is!

There are a couple shops left in town; one has moved more into appliances. I don't think he would have anything old, from what I know about him. The other guy is drifting towards retirement-I stop by and see him now and again. He has some neat things-store displays, a "drugstore" tube tester and some tubes, some earlier Sams. I asked him last month about crt's but he said he didn't have any. There is a third guy who has a CB shop and said he would be retiring at the end of next year. In a different world I would talk to him about taking over the business...I know him well enough, I think he'll let me know before he tosses anything.

I know one guy who has worked on TV's on the side for decades and has buildings full of sets. I've been in the front of his main building and it was so piled up with stuff that you couldn't see more than 15'. Mounds of solid state stuff. I wonder whats in the back-gotta be some tube stuff, right? He tells me of a Predicta stashed away somewhere. I need to write him a letter-can never reach him on the phone as he does shift work. I think at this point we all need to make an effort to follow the leads because these guys won't be around much longer. I know of several other shops within 30 minutes of here that just might have something. About 14 years ago I sent out postcards to a number of shops saying that I would haul junk TV's for free and this led to many finds, eventually. Last month I sent out 2 or 3 letters to some local shops but got no response. I also should check out the one remaining electronic parts distributor in the area-they are in an old building, who knows what might be in the back room or upstairs? I emailed them once regarding old crt's but never received a response.

One thing with these places, they have been working in the business all their lives and often do not have any apprecitation for tube stuff, so they just toss it. Many have no idea that anyone, anywhere, cares about it.

[Chad Hauris]

I think that a starting rate of $70 is really a fair rate to fix old TV's once you count all the labor and research necessary to fix one of these old sets which frequently have several age related problems such as cleaning controls, replacing caps, replacing powercord, replacing any bad tubes, etc. TV's have a LOT of caps and those add up in price. As a professional you really can't fix a tube type TV for less and make any profit on it.