Early tv techs faced color challenge
 

When color came out, one of the challenges was to have trained techs ready to service the new technology. For the most part Rca did an excellent job of preparing Rca authorized service techs to face the new technology.

If you were just some guy changing tubes in the field, color weeded out the men from the boys. Just the set up adjustments for color was enough, let alone learning the chroma circuits and what made them tick

I have oftened wondered what percentage of radio repairmen went out of business rather than go into TV repair, and what percentage of TV repairmen were never able or willing to go into color repair. There were certainly a lot of color books in the fifties but I wonder how many readers "got it"?

Or how about how many gave up when radio and tv started going to solid state?

I'd bet the switch to color had a much slower impact, since it didn't explode in sales very quickly like b/w TV did. Of course it's not like color tv wiped all repair-needing b/w tvs out of peoples houses, nor did b/w tvs eliminate everybody's broken radios that needed fixing. However I can see where if you decided you were only going to fix radios or b/w tvs, you would start to lose existing customers to someone who could service the things that you couldn't.

I often wonder what it was like for guys repairing sets back then. As much as I like watching early color sets, I do prefer working on b/w, which is why my ctc-10 has been sitting for so long while I've fixed b/w sets all summer. And by the time they went to solid state I don't like to work on them at all, I really don't have much idea what I'm doing anymore, and I can get just as good of a picture if not better out of the tube sets. I've wondered if any of guys back then thought like I do and got out of tv repair in the mid-70s when everything was going solid state.
It's interesting to hear how people were so excited by color tv when it was new, if anything I've had the opposite experience, when I first got interested in tv's in the mid-80s I thought it was exciting and different to have b/w when everyone else had color. But when I get my ctc-10 going I'm going to get some early 60s color shows on dvd and try to recreate the experience of early color. Now if I could only get a few modulators that operated on different channels, then I could still get some use out of the remote, I find that I hardly ever use remotes anymore because I'm always running my sets either off a dvd player and rf modulator, vcr, or uhf converter.

Where I live it seems that ALL TV technicians from the old days became EXTREMELY happy with the fact that at some point there were no more tube type televisions to repair. I know a bunch of them, some are still in business, other are retired, and they all but one seem to absolutely despise tube televisions. It is rather frustrating and irritating, really. Since I know just a little of electronics, I need someone with knowledge to put my sets working again. Those who are collectors and/or restorers of these old beauties lives just very far from me - in other states, so I would have to ship sets to other parts of the country. The old techs near me all seem to think that tube TVs only gives troubles, and that SS are way easier to repair. In no way they want to repair any tube type TV set anymore. I think that they are ungrateful, because, in my understatement, the period on which TV techs made more money were the days of tube type televisions. According to a fellow vintage TV collector "those were the days when the TV techs made a lot of money, these sets needed frequent maintenance [ he said that the average 50's TV received the visit of the tech something like 5 times a year ], a guy repairing TVs could easily [ his words ] pay his house, educate his children and get a car" .

I just remember the conversation I had with the man who was the first Admiral authorized servicemen here in my city. It was years ago, when I began my collection, I had just bought my first antique TV, the 17 inch bakelite Admiral from 1953, and I was very excited. Talking to him was like getting a cold shower - with my clothes on. He scorned the brand, saying: "Admiral? It was something to ADMIRE when it worked right!" And then went with the same bla, bla, bla, that I would became very used to hear on the following years that "those sets are worthless the trouble to repair, etc" . Last question I made him had also a sad answer - It was a long time since he sent to the dump all promotional material from Admiral he had from the days he had his shop.

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Well for what its worth, in my experience with modern, so called "tv tecnicians" only a very few these days even have the board/component level skills to even remotely repair a set. In the late 70's and 80's, you just changed the modules. Of course it was easier and of course they made more money on SS due to the designed simplicity of the module system. Tube sets took patience and solid troubleshooting skills to track down a problem therefore it took more time and money to locate that problem

Of course there were many techs who knew better and repaired the module but the system was simply designed to cut down on labor costs. Now of course, there is no repairing modern sets and they are just throw away at this point. They are such junk anyway, who would want to repair it?

Many of today's techs are no better than the old B/W tech that just swapped tubes. Not trying to offend anyone, that is just my opinion from my experience.

Of course, tube technology was not as reliable in reference to mean time between failures, but often it was just a tube and you moved on, continuing to enjoy the television set.

The few techs that do still know how to repair at the board level, don't want to touch a tube tv due to our very litigious (sp) society. I remember a tech that used to help me with my CTC-21 back in the 80's. He constantly told me to "get rid of that damn thing, it is nothing but trouble." He often got burned on repairing a tube set and after he repaired the failure, a short time later, something else failed, ususally a cap and he got griped out as if it was his fault. Ultimately, since he was trying to give good customer service, he would have to go back and pick up the set or chassis and find the problem. The customer didn't and often doesn't understand the reality of aging electronics and would gripe him out about having to pay for an additional repair. He often ended up making the repair either at a minimal cost or free of charge and ended up losing money on the repair. He finally quit accepting tube sets period and was so hacked off with the situation, he wouln't even talk about tube sets again.


Just my two cents

I grew up watching Admiral sets.. the tv repairman made a small fortune off my parents. When he got divorced my mom stated that they payed for the divorce. I watch a 1954 Admiral as my main old set, very reliable. But I have to admit, I still call the tv repairman by first name, and he is still in business, and must be close to 80. In fact he recapped my Admiral when I got it last year. I collect old radios also and there were probably 10 tv/radio repair shops in Quincy IL in the 1970's when I started collecting. Now there are 2. And neither repairs radios anymore.
Dan
ps I still have a Motorola portable purchased by my parents in 1962 to fill a void of a dead and being repaired Admiral. It has been a great set and I still watch it a few times a year with no service done on it in 40 years at least.

Probably the most commom early 50's TVs here in Brazil are those bakelite Admirals. It looks like they were imported by very large numbers. Most important, the bakelite cabinet, being termite-proof, ensured that they survived in much greater numbers than their wood cabinet conterparts. I have been warned that the 17 inch models indeed have terrible performances, but that the 21 inch version was quite a good set.

I am not at all convinced of what the old man said, that "Admiral was something to admire when worked right" , because if that was the case it would not have been such a successful brand here - they sold so many TVs in the early 50's that around 1958 they actually opened a factory here, that produced not only TVs but also refrigerators and air conditioners. In fact, I remember that when I was a small boy, on the early 80's, I still saw some 1960's Admiral TV sets on the living rooms of some neighbors, and old Admiral air conditioners were something commom to see in use.

When I worked in television shops almost 30 years ago, I was sent out in
the field with a De-Gaussing coil and a tool roll for playing around with the
screens/guns/convergence, Etc. I'm not sure how good I did but the people
seemed happy :) .... I'd flip ye ole set-up switch in the back or get the
bar generator out an play around for awhile ---- Darn those old flybacks
could bite though !!! ---- That darn De-Gaussing coil made me so much
easy money, and knowing to flip that set-up switch did too --- Then there
was the usual, horizontal output regulators/Vertical and retrace regulators...
You really couldn't go wrong with the SAM's and the fricken library in my town had so many ......... Those were the daze ...........
http://www.childrenfirst.nhs.uk/teen...v_homepage.gif

They weren't very good sets, they were just cheaper to buy. A lot cheaper than RCA or Zenith.

AWE-YES ---- Then there was the illustrious BeamScope !!! ---- That 25 inch diagonal magnifying glass that had prism like grooves in it......
The claim was that you attach it to the front of your tiny little black and white portable TV and it would enlarge the picture and make it color too !!!
All the guys at the TV shop that I worked at laughed themselves silly over that one .... I wound up with one and tried it out just for laughs :)
It magnified the picture all right, and there was this colorful corona over all of the images and around the edges of the television set... truly an under-
appreciated device :lmao::lmao::lmao: I took it outside and melted a hole right through a popcan with it !!!! .... Then I melted a lead tire weight !!!
I set it up on two chairs and barely focused it on a griddle with I cooked
everything on that either turned out totally scorched or half raw......
I forget what happened to that gem ??? ...:thmbsp:

Yes, we had an Admiral refridgerator, I believe 4 Admiral tv's and seems we had a fan that was an Admiral also. I know my Dad was the type to buy what was built in Illinois, and I believe most of that stuff was built in Chicago.
Dan

Some "old radio guys" in this area sub-contracted their color repairs to guys with the training. My Dad fixed color and solid states sets for two other shops, both owned by guys that went into radio repair after WWII, but never got beyond tube-swapping in B/W sets. When color (and later solid state sets) came along, they got others to fix them - and for Dad it was good money - the set always got picked up and paid for, much better than some of his own customers that cried the mantra "I'll be in on Friday to pick it up." Most times, that Friday never came!

Some guys got by with minimal training and equipment - mostly by tube substitution. Some others here (mostly younger guys in start-ups) bought into the "gotta have every gizmo" to fix sets and quickly went under when they couldn't pay for their equipment.

Still others (and most of the successful ones) worked for shops gaining experience before striking out on their own. They then networked with the other shops for advice, parts, and loaner equipment. This worked well in this area - Dad and five other shops all worked together to help each other out.

It sure was a fun ride - now it's all factory-authorized shops that are thriving, thanks to RPTVs, LCDs, Plasmas, the need for specialty eqipment (Thomson Chipper-Checker, anyone??) and the high cost of service information (Sams only goes so far these days).


Cheers,

I had a friend that closed his TV & radio repair shop in the early '70's because of the switch from tubes to solid state. His health was declining and he said he just was not up to being re-trained in solid state & having to buy new test equipment. Also, he was starting to have trouble with people not picking up their sets.

I remember reading a description of techs who didn't know how to really fix things: "tube-pullers and knob-twiddlers". :)