My RCA TK-41 arrived today!

[julianburke]

My long awaited RCA TK41 color camera arrived today and it looks great. I finally found one lurking around New York. When I find an appropriate pedestal for it in my warehouse, I will clean it up and get some pictures of it. Thanks to all who tried to help me in this search. This camera now gives me a fairly complete collection of all RCA color cameras through the TK47. One if its' "COLOR" emblems on the side is missing. Be nice if I could find a replacement.

In looking in one of my warehouses, I counted 10 round CRT's in their original boxes, 6-21AXP22's (2 NOS and one NOS with experimental stamped on it) and 4 more NOS and used 21FJ's. I also have a 15GP22 marked experimental from a CBS prototype set. I always save tubes of all kinds and have been saving them for years and need to get some of my early color TV's restored and running. (about 35 or so) I'd like the city to help me into a property (tax exempt) for a museum. I can fill it up right now!

[jpdylon]

Holy God! 35 early color sets!!!!

Now I have another place I want to visit before I die in addition to the ETF museum.

Be sure to shoot us some pictures of your TK-41 --and of your warehouse!

[JB5pro]

That camera must be a sight to behold! I love the early color pictures produced from such like as seen on The Dean Martin Show, etc. Maybe that show first used the TK-41 and later might have gone to something else?

[julianburke]

I hope that I can find some ID marks on it like I found on my TK11/31 camera when cleaning it for the first time. Up under the top overhanging the viewfinder I found a WOR (NYC) property tag! My TK60 was a lease unit when new and found many notes inside it. The TK41 is in a crate on my big truck and my back has been hurting lately and it is supposed to rain the rest of this week. I do need to get it out so I can get it on my camera shelf in my garage here at home.

In the early 60's when I lived in Seattle is when I was really exposed to color TV. I hung around mainly two of the three TV station transmitters when they would let me. Channel 4 KOMO was great and learned much from them and channel 5 KING was OK. KOMO had a TM-10 RCA 15" monitor that was a big deal to me to watch at the transmitter site. (I have one of these as well as a RCA TM-20 21" monitor) KING had a CT100 for a station monitor that didn't work. I later found out what happened to it in a roundabout way that is truly another story! Since, when I could, would save anything to do with color TV, I have been collecting (accumulating) color TV stuff more seriously since 1967. My first was a CTC5 Aldrich. Now I have four buildings (12,000 SF total) that a credit card cannot find its' way in! (not all TV stuff but military vehicles (jeeps-humvees-TOW missile carriers (2), military radios, parts, tubes-about 40K of them from 40 years of buying them when found or gifts, other strange electronics, telephone stuff, switchboards, microphones, early computers-PDP8 Dec's other early DEC's too, early Intel from the 70's, and a host of a ton of other interesting stuff I've picked up in my travels. The key to it is having a truck when you need it. I have 4, 2 with tommy gates. It is getting harder to find the good stuff so it is not coming in as fast as it used to.

If you want another great story and good material, google "jp patches", a local clown show that was highly successful in Seattle. This website will keep you spellbound for at least 2 hours! They don't make them like this anymore and what a shame. Chris Widas was JP, no one else could do it better and I think the parents enjoyed it more than the children! I talk to him every now and then and what a personality!!

About 20-25 years ago when I would attend the radio meets, I would pull a small UHaul trailer and just fill my caravan and trailer up with the $5 or less stuff and every one would always say "what do you want with that stuff?" I was thinking that this would be good profit items back home but ending up never selling anything. Harry Poster tried to do a TV auction at Elgin one year and attendance was very low. Most collectors had little interest because it was after all, a radio meet! I bought a nice blonde CTC5 for $10 as no one bid against me and I still have it today. This is also a curse in some respects, but I want more, more and MORE!!!!!! Did I say I want MORE?

Yeah, there's the wife thing too and she's concerned & says we have more than enough but has been with me all along. But you know, when she's there and a good item comes up or available-she'll say you better buy it or demands I get back there quickly and snag it!

If anyone is interested, google "tennesseetraveler" and the first hit you get should say "WVLT" in it. Click on it and in the many stories you can scroll (sideways), click on "mic collector" and "TV collector" (two TV collectors but mine is the latest) These are two items for a six part series on my super collections. It is getting harder to keep up with it all.

[Sandy G]

Julian, if I wasn't so crippled up & useless, I'd be more than happy to come give you a hand on the TK-41...I wasn't ALWAYS a feckin' invalid like I am now, used to I was "strong like bull". Now, I just "Smell like Bull" or "Shoot the Bull"...I still wanna see yr collection someday, I promise to bring my own Drool-Bucket...

[ohohyodafarted]

That was very neet Julian. I enjoyed seeing your collection, but I am guessing that what is in the video clip, is but the tip of the iceberg. It must be neet to have started collecting back when things were more readily available than they are today.

My big problem is finding enough time and money to devote to this hobby. I am up to over 50 sets now, but need to be able to devote my full time to the restorations. If I could afford to retire, I would, and devote all my time to restoring these neet old tv's.

Presently, restoration is taking a back seat to the 15GP22 project. But I see the 15G project as a stepping stone to the restoration of my 2 CT100's because I don't have any functional 15GP22's at this time. Once the 15G project has become successful, I will get back to the restoration part of the hobby more seriously.

Bob G.

[vintagecollect]

...

[julianburke]

I'll get on the pictures-soon! Julian

[dtuomi]

Congratulation on finding the camera. I was curious to know if you got any of the CCU and cable equipment to go with it? In those early cameras as much of the camera was in the racks in the back-end as was in the head itself, perhaps more so. Anyway, congratulations again.

David

[julianburke]

I did not get the CCU. If I don't find one, I will work on building a solid state CCU for this camera. Cameras like these were often "handed down" and traveled to sister stations. There is also a possibility this one came out of Washington DC and ended up in New York or maybe vice versa. I will do what I can to investigate this. Regardless, they were all special and expensive so it could have had a very "colorful" history!

[dtuomi]

Originally Posted by julianburke

I did not get the CCU. If I don't find one, I will work on building a solid state CCU for this camera. Cameras like these were often "handed down" and traveled to sister stations. There is also a possibility this one came out of Washington DC and ended up in New York or maybe vice versa. I will do what I can to investigate this. Regardless, they were all special and expensive so it could have had a very "colorful" history!

I've often wondered about doing this myself. These cameras are, at heart, very simple, and it shouldn't be impossible if you know what you're doing. Of course with a TK-41 there is 3 of everything for each of then color channels. I might recommend trying to build a prototype CCU for a TK-31 first though, just to judge the feasibility and how well the cameras take to being driven by such a device. By doing it with a B&W camera you should work out valuable experience without having to bash your head against the extra complexity of a color camera. Anyway, if you do achieve that, I'll want to visit. I've always been curious about hybridizing the technology since there are far more camera heads out there than CCU equipment.

David

[bgadow]

Congratulations on your find! And some interesting background info. I see several keys to the building of your collection, things which have also been helpful to me in my "little" pile: 1) Make the right connections, 2) Be in the right place at the right time,3) Have a way to haul it, 4) have a place to put it.

Horror stories abound of stuff that was junked because nobody was interested in it. A piece of the puzzle is knowing what you are looking at. Maybe 6-7 years ago I attended my first hamfest; there was a club there selling donated items and late in the morning they announced that everything left was free for the taking. A lot of it was DuMont broadcast equipment chassis'. I have no idea what they were. That day I was tagging along with some friends (in a Mazda Protege) so I couldn't grab 'em.

[3Guncolor]

The biggest issue I see is coming up with a way to operate the IO pickup tubes without the CCU and power supplies. Finding a color encoder is easy. It would be interesting to see what it would like through a tube camera high end encoder from the middle 80's. It's sad that most stations only saved the camera heads and junked the support equipment.

[dreyfoos]

Thank you Julian. I never thought I'd see a "living" 1954 Admiral color TV again. But there it was in that WLVT feature. In 1955, my brother and I used $65 saved up from our newspaper route to buy our own Admiral "colored tv" back in Wichita. It was very low mileage - the seller had won it in a contest and had no use for it. When I saw yours, in the Tennessee Traveler story, the memories flooded back. We must have parted with ours as soon as we could get our hands on a 21" color - which happened to be a new 1959 Sylvania -heavily discounted because it was gathering dust - not a hot seller then but also very rare now (if even one survives). When my brother and I got our driver licenses, our interests changed and along the way we traded off both the Admiral and the Sylvania. I wish I had a serial number to check to see whether our beautiful buxom blonde Admiral with the big copper chassis somehow managed to avoid a landfill and make it to Tennessee. All I remember is that I had to change out a fried focus pot and that it had to be ordered from Admiral. Somewhere, I have a photo of it displaying a color picture from NBC's "Haggis Baggis" daytime game show. If I ever find those photos I will share! And, again, thank you for sharing a glimpse of yours. Dare I enquire as to whether the 15GP has gone to air?

Roger

[dtuomi]

Originally Posted by 3Guncolor

The biggest issue I see is coming up with a way to operate the IO pickup tubes without the CCU and power supplies. Finding a color encoder is easy. It would be interesting to see what it would like through a tube camera high end encoder from the middle 80's. It's sad that most stations only saved the camera heads and junked the support equipment.

Its my understanding that the TK-41 didn't come with a color encoder. The camera output was pure RGB. You had to purchase a separate encoder (usually from RCA I'm sure) that would do the job.

I'd expect that once you have the power supply ratings (and have the camera recapped and ready) it will probably just power up. The problem will be in figuring out the control signals, because I'm sure that even in an early camera like the TK41 there were probably lines devoted to the remote control of various items like focus current, etc. Additionally, what are the returning RGB signal levels, and what pre-emphesis was applied by the amps in the camera? You have to reverse that and amplify the RGB signal again to modern RGB levels so that you can feed a modern encoder. I'm sure there's more that I don't know of. Its definitely not for the faint of heart.

I once played with a TK-41 on its tripod, but have never operated one from the CCU side.

David