Very rare RCA wide aspect CRT came home with me! - Videokarma.org TV - Video

kx250rider · #1 10-10-2006, 01:29 AM

NOT that I wanted one, nor do I have space, but I couldn't pass this one up (photos forthcoming by daylight)..

This is an RCA CTC-173 with the digital line doubler, and the 34" 16:9 wide aspect ratio convex-face CRT. This is only the second one I've seen in person, but I think AKer Colortel has one. These were only sold in 1994, and didn't sell well. Weighs a ton! My Toyota 4x4 truck, which normally has the ride of a solid-tire golf cart on a bumpy path, majestically floated home with the soft ride of a '49 Buick after loading that behemoth RCA!

NO IDEA what I'm going to do with it, I guess for now, I'll stick it someplace at work. It can keep my 8-foot-long $1 Curtis-Mathes company. But sooner or later I'll get spoken to if I keep piling stuff out there. I already have 1/2 of a Toyota turbo-Diesel full-size sedan, which I had cut in half in Japan and shipped here, sitting there. Now a buildup of TVs.

Anyway, does anyone have any interesting facts on that werid tube? I know that the wide aspect ratio tube came back in Sony WEGA sets, and other flat tube sets, but as far as I know this RCA was the only convex face 16:9 ever made.

Charles

andy · #2 10-10-2006, 02:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kx250rider

Anyway, does anyone have any interesting facts on that werid tube? I know that the wide aspect ratio tube came back in Sony WEGA sets, and other flat tube sets, but as far as I know this RCA was the only convex face 16:9 ever made.

Charles

16:9 TV have been common for years in other parts of the world. They just didn't catch on in the US until most CRTs were flat. I think you'll find that just about every major manufacturer has made wide screen convex CRTs.

dr.ido · #3 10-10-2006, 07:20 AM

Most of the European brands sold here (Metz, Grundig, Philips, Blaupunkt, etc) sold 16:9 CRT sets starting in the mid 90s. Initially they were insanely expensive. For a while some of the cheap Chinese brands were selling some 16:9 convex CRT sets (I remember the ads for a Teac set that was the first widescreen set for under $1000). Lately the cheap 16:9 CRT sets have disappeared as the flat panels have dropped in price.

Dead 16:9 CRT sets are starting to show up at the various places around here, but I haven't been interested enough to pick one up. 16:9 just doesn't look right to me. I can happily watch movies in either letterbox or panscan on a 4:3 set, I can't bear to watch 4:3 on a 16:9 set whether stretched or vertical letter boxed.

colorfixer · #4 10-10-2006, 11:41 AM

Does this monster work. I have one with the integrated Directv tuner, but it shuts down seemingly for no reason every once in a while.

1/2 cut Toyota? Why didn't you bring the whole car?

Duane · #5 10-10-2006, 04:45 PM

I somewhat recall that set,but with my fading memory,I'm certain that set was a Proscan (RCA).
Back in the 90's, use to attend a few CES shows and a few Stereophile shows.One of the Stereophile shows that was in L.A.,there were several manufactures displaying 16x9 sets because DVD was about to hit the market.Sony had their Japanese versions,I'm not sure if that's where I saw the Proscan,but the one that struck me was the Proton 16x9 set.It was stunning.I kept waiting for it to hit the marketplace,but I never saw it,at least in San Diego.

andy · #6 10-10-2006, 05:46 PM

I had a 38" RCA 16:9 set with built in ATSC and Directv tuners. It was a complex set and not known for reliability. Mine had trouble coming into horizontal sync on HDTV component signals. There was no ATSC to test it with. The original problem was a shorted diode in one of its many power supplies. I ended up selling it cheaply as it was since RCA provided no schematic of the HDTV decoder board.

It had a good picture, but it wasn't one I was tempted to keep. It originally cost about $4000 and had been repaired at least once before I picked it up in the trash of a repair shop. I think it was only about 4 years old at the time. That's not much value for their money!

Sandy G · #7 10-10-2006, 08:29 PM

I remember one of those dudes from the early-mid '90s-'94 would be about right. Seems like the dealer had a $3500 price tag on it, which is prolly the reason it stayed unsold...

colortrakker · #8 10-10-2006, 09:43 PM

oops - server-induced duplicate post!

colortrakker · #9 10-10-2006, 09:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kx250rider

as far as I know this RCA was the only convex face 16:9 ever made.

The only other convex 16:9 set I know of is the one I have and Andy just sold - the 38" with the built-in DirecTV. I agree it's quite a picture, but Thomson underspec'd the caps on it, and if left untreated that could lead to bigger problems, like diode failure and eventually loss of the tuner. No problems with mine yet, though.

The tube also made an appearance in a very similar German set made by Loewe. That one cost $5,000 as opposed to the $3,000 the RCA went for.

I think RCA and ProScan both had models of the 34" and 38" sets.

dtuomi · #10 10-10-2006, 10:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by colortrakker

The tube also made an appearance in a very similar German set made by Loewe. That one cost $5,000 as opposed to the $3,000 the RCA went for.

I actually have one of the Loewe sets. Uses a rather different connector for its antenna, but yet its an NTSC compatible set. I use it all the time, I've only had to replace the flyback once.

David

***Eric H*** · #11 10-10-2006, 11:12 PM

Charles, what inputs does this have?
What was the source supposed to be since it predates DVD, Laserdisc?
And lastly,

kx250rider · #12 10-13-2006, 12:14 AM

Sorry for the delay in photos... I haven't brought it in yet. When I picked it up, it took 3 of us (Gary Miller, who is about 6'8" @300 lbs, myself (dead-lifted 401 lbs once in high school, and work out now with 245 on bench press), and a third guy to get it into my truck on its back. I need a couple of neighbors to help, so for the meantime I backed my truck up to my girlfriend's truck, back to back, and slid the set into her truck. There it sits in the carport. The brochure says it weighs 430 pounds!!!!!! Hey Tom R., That's only 80 pounds less than your monster Sony KV-3000R! And also according to specs, it sucks up 300 watts. So I guess I won't have to light the pilot in the furnace this winter... 300 watts will belch out plenty of heat

It looks like it has a VCR and a full-size laserdisc player in it for the brochure photo.

Hopefully I'll get the set inside soon, and will get photos. If not, I will take some with it where it is. Meantime here's a scan of the brochure:

Charles

kx250rider · #13 10-13-2006, 12:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by colorfixer

Does this monster work. I have one with the integrated Directv tuner, but it shuts down seemingly for no reason every once in a while.

1/2 cut Toyota? Why didn't you bring the whole car?

The set works fine overall, but according to the original owner it may have cold solder joints in the tuner. He says it goes to snow and you have to rap it on the back of the chassis. Of course that's a very common problem, and usually easy to fix.

As for the 1/2 of the Diesel car, I wish I could have brought the whole thing... But you can't until a car is 25 years old. US Customs law. So if you want a non-USA market car here and legally registered, you have to have it destroyed abroad and ship it in as parts. Then buy a USA counterpart (Toyota Chaser is same as Lexus SC400 coupe). Then strip and gut the USA Lexus, for instance, and reassemble it with the non-USA engine and parts.

This is the Chaser turbo-Diesel that I have sitting there... Note how the steering wheel is on the Rt side

Charles

Tom_Ryan · #14 10-13-2006, 12:36 AM

Well, Charles you a man of your word...you actually went for it...question is where will you put it! Maybe we all need to converge on SIMI valley and tail gate at your place for the unloading

My vote is that your newly acquired RCA is definitely heavier than it looks, unlike my Sony KV-3000R which is as heavy as it looks! I get a heurnia just thinking about it - and that's with wheels under it! Sony must employed Suma wrestlers to move them around on the assembly line. Surely, these heavy sets present some critical challenges to the logistics of any assembly line. On the bright side of the equation when a TV gets really weighty most can be actually difficult to drop - they are just too heavy to lift off the ground!

kx250rider · #15 11-17-2006, 03:14 AM

FINALLY in the house... But at a cost!

WARNING: Link is a graphic photo of the banged nail!

http://i104.photobucket.com/albums/m...ffNov13_06.jpg

OUCH! I had put the set in another truck that I don't use, for storage, and then on Saturday I switched it into my regular truck to move it to the new house. The doggone thing, being 430 lbs, forced the the tailgate of the first truck down onto the bed of truck #2... With my Right big toe between! I thought I just had a routine banged toe, but it started to hurt more along in the evening. Nail was loose. So it got so bad that I had to just grab it and yank it off. Ouch again! And OUCH again and again every time I take a shower. A drop of warm water feels like a blow torch on that skin under the missing nail!

What the (4-letter cussword) is it with RCAs??? I had a compound fracture of my left middle finger, with nerve damage, on an RCA 9PC41 '49 projection set in the 80s. (The lid spring broke and the projection housing scissored down on my finger). I think I'm going Zenith from now on!

The RCA wide set did in fact arrive safely at the new house, and is working fine! Now some day I need to see about a DSS system, because there's not diddly-squat of a signal out there in Somis/Moorpark.

Charles