[Geist]

Hi All;
I would have to slightly dis-agree.. "We're just lucky the engineers took a few decades to learn just exactly HOW cheaply they can be built and still survive their predicted lifespan ."
When you look at the first set by RCA, is was and has been stated in this forum an overly engineered set and well built to last.. I think they were afraid of it not being accepted because of breakdowns, too many service calls and not good enough reception.. And it was only after the wide reception that they had in the early days and using tubes that were multipart (two tubes in one) that they were able to reduce the tube count and come up with better circuits.. If you look at the early 50's there were alot of new/better circuits.. If you compare the Set of 1938-1940 with the 1946-1948, you can see a large difference in the circuits that they used.. They had, had the time to work out and improve what they had.. Yes, World War 2 was a Great proving ground, But, even still it was about a year after the War that the first TV's came out for public use..
I would say that the above statement was more true in about the late 50's and from then on.. But, not in the early days of TV..
I think the same thing can be said of the Automobile industry in the late 1930's to the 1950, cars were built like Tanks, and it was starting in the 1960 that they cut corners and built them very cheap.. I had a 1948 Pachard Hearst and it was built like a tank, I bent a Very Heavy duty Jack trying to lift it to fix a flat tire.. It never got lifted off the ground.. Later I had inheirited a late 1960's Corvair.. and it was made of thin sheet metal and other cuts..
THANK YOU Marty