Airline Color Combo

[bgadow]

A couple times I have typed up a letter or flyer and mailed it out to the local thrift stores. The only thing to ever come from it was that a volunteer at one place called me one day. She ended up giving me a several BPC sets, all broken as I recall.

Then, the other day the phone rings. It was the Salvation Army thrift store, letting me know that they had taken in 2 tube sets. Hmmm. From the brief description the manager gave me, one was a standalone set, the other a combo. Could be anything, of course. In my mind I pictured a 10" Admiral combo from the late 40s. Anyway, I drove down there today.

The back room, where they keep the TV sets, was full. Great selection of 70s-80s stuff. They get loads of Wards & Sears sets. Among the nicer things there right now are a MW 19" color including the orginal remote, looks to be early 80s & built by GE, I think. Also a pretty decent 80s Zenith console. I didn't see anything tube type on the floor so I asked a volunteer, and he knew just what I was talking about.

The standalone set turned out to be a late 70s Sears console in a cheap cabinet with sensor-tune push button tuning. I had to explain, more than once, that this didn't interest me. Then they took me in the "employees only" area and showed me the combo. I knew right away that it wasn't anything great, but that I had to drag it home.

It is a Wards Airline with a 23v crt (original, made by Sylvania), the back was off and the TV chassis is loose. Several tubes are missing & the HV rectifier socket is dangling. When they moved it they knocked the crt socket off, twisting up the pins on the crt. I think it is okay, though. I need to get them straight and put a tester on it. The chassis looks like a real project. One thing I noticed is that the flyback (which looks fine) is very loose on its core. That doesn't seem right-seems like it would be noisy, if nothing else.

One mystery is, who made it? The label is faded-the only part of the model number I can read is the first three digits, which usually tells who they sourced it from. This one is "GMW". Any idea who that would be? I only spotted 3 chassis with that prefix in the Sams index, but haven't pulled any yet. The chassis is a pretty typical RCA-style.

No photos yet, maybe I can snap a couple soon. Still in the back of my truck because: I have nowhere to put it, no way to get it off the truck by myself, nobody to help me. As usual, if somebody were to show up they could have this set for what I gave the man at the SA-$15. I would really enjoy bringing this set back from the brink, but right now chances are good that this will be parted-out someday just because of space constraints. The real story here, for me, isn't so much the TV but the fact that the Salvation Army store actually saved it and called me!