General television...
 

OK, so, I almost didn't buy this, despite it being cheap. But I did, because it's so... generic. A General television. How's that for an unoriginal, ungoogleable name? General. Not General Electric. Just General. No other markings anywhere on the set. No tube chart. No tubes, either. Speaker and grille cloth are missing, as well as the knobs. Picture tube is a... well... glass. No indication of what kind, although it has an ion trap.

But, I mean, the chassis does look fairly well made, the cabinet is fairly solid. Which is good, because that's about all there is left.

I'll have to see if I can find any information at ALL on this thing. A schematic would be very helpful. I'll have to clean up the chassis and hope I can find some markings as to what the tubes were supposed to be.

Still - it's an interesting device, even if it is probably doomed to be unusable.

-Ian

According to Riders it was made by Telequip. The index shows three listings but none of them matched your chassis.

Steve

It looks like it has a 17BP4 CRT, which is a popular one.
They sure didn't leave much. No speaker, grill cloth, knobs, tubes, HV cage or back cover. :sigh:

You could easily get a similar set, but with 100% of the parts present, for only $10 pr $20 or so off eBay any day of the week. Takes a little longer, of course, to find one in your neighborhood, but they do come up often.

Maybe harvest the flyback, yoke, potentiometers, and a few other parts, and move on?

Oh, I know this set isn't *worth* anything, and that's really all I paid for it anyway. I just thought it was interesting, it's rare to see a set that's not at least SOME sort of name brand (Emerson, GE, Zenith, Motorola, etc). It'll be interesting to play with, and, if nothing else, there isn't a brightener on the tube, so there is hope that at least that will be usable. I'll drag my tester out later and check for sure.

And, honestly, I have buckets of tubes and parts. If I can find a tube layout for this thing I can easily repopulate it. And I've probably got knobs that fit. Fun rainy day project maybe. The underside of the chassis looks sparse, not a very complicated TV, shouldn't be hard to work on, even without the schematic.

But, yeah, I've got a lot better projects ahead of this thing, so, it'll probably be dormant for quite a while if I can't find anything on it. Still, it's interesting, in my mind anyway.

-Ian

I think at some point someone will run across a set with the same chassis. Post pictures
of the chassis layout, the tuner, etc. Someone will come across another one, or someone
will remember working on one. Or you can backtrack like the guy with the color
prototype. Draw out the circuit, figure out what tube might go there.
It could end up being quite an investigation, and a neat project. Anyway good luck with it.

Here's what the SAMS Photofact index comes up with.
A Google search shows a General Television Radio Corp. In Chicago. They manufactured radios and not a TV in sight. Their logo attached.

-Steve D.

Steve, you needed to look in the index under "General" brand television, not a "General Television" brand television.

Ian, it's in Sam's Photofact 149-13. Your picture matches the chassis picture in the folder.

The folder claims it to be manufactured by Starrett Television Corp., 601 W. 26th St., NY, NY.

The CRT is listed as a 17BP4A.

.

WISCOJIM,

A 2nd look shows how I missed the "General". It never caught my eye as I looked down the listings. Pretty much buried. The date of the "General" folder you located makes more sense. The cabinet/chassis in Ian's post and picture tube size reflect a later model TV than listed on my post. Thanks for the followup.

:thmbsp:

-Steve D.