japanese roundie

[Aussie Bloke]

Wow, that's a cool looking set. Thanks for the pics, nice to see some real rarities. The only other pre-1965 Japanese colour TV sets I seen is a 1960 Sharp colour set on some Japanese technology history site.

Cheers
Troy

[crooner]

"General" was a name brand used in many electronics Japanese goods, perhaps a more marketable and "american" sounding name, for sure.

Obviously that gear never made it to the US under that name because of General Electric.

Another classic example of this is the "National" brand used by Matsushita Electric Co. for many years. In order to sell the products in the US they had to relabel the products "Panasonic" because "National" was registered to the National Radio Co. a manufacturer of Shortwave radios.

National Radio went out of business, and I guess Matsushita could have attempted to use the name "National" here in the states. Instead they completely switched to "Panasonic", even in Japan. For some time during the mid to late 1970s, they labeled their products as "National Panasonic", a transitional period for them, I suppose.

Regards,

crooner

[crooner]

I found some interesting read on early Japanese color TV, courtesy of Toshiba. Apparently Toshiba was the first to market them in Japan. First using a RCA picture tube and with their own design shortly thereafter.

Here's a link from Toshiba's Web Page:

Toshiba Early Color TV History

Here's a pic of Toshiba's Roundie Color TV:




Regards,

crooner

[ita]

This is the RCA color monitor inported from USA.

front pix

[ita]

back pix

[Chad Hauris]

That RCA monitor looks like a lot more robust design than the consumer sets...it appears to have a regulated power supply with 6080's and dual horizontal output tubes. Also the CRT looks like a later replacement (60's or 70's, judging by the modern RCA logo on it.)

Some RCA television monitors were actually built by Conrac, wonder if this color unit is actually Conrac. Their B/w monitors that I have, have extra special features such as a regulated power supply, HV regulator tube, etc. that no consumer B/W set has.

[Sandy G]

Wow !! That thing's as clean as a hound's tooth !! ita, I sure hope both of these bad boys are in a good home-preferably yours !! <grin> -Sandy G.

[Telecolor 3007]

Well, in Bucharest, at the Universitatea "Politehnica" are some 2 Japonesee roundies, but not in working condition. One of it haves an 21CYP22A picture tube made by "R.C.A.". That roundie looks like an "Hitachi" CT-150.

[nasadowsk]

Darn. One of those RCA studio monitors must be the ULTIMATE roundie. I bet they're as good as a modern TV, or darn close.

Anyone know where I can get one?

(wouldn't mind an old conrac B&W monitor either...)

[RetroHacker]

Originally Posted by nasadowsk

Darn. One of those RCA studio monitors must be the ULTIMATE roundie. I bet they're as good as a modern TV, or darn close.

Anyone know where I can get one?

(wouldn't mind an old conrac B&W monitor either...)

Yeah, no kidding. Just look at all those tubes... Man, I'd love to find one of those. 'Course, I'd love to find a roundie period, but, one can dream . I wonder how good the DC restoration on something like that would be. That's one thing that kinda bugs me with some cheaper sets, is the way the picture shrinks and expands, darkens and lightens as a function of the overall brightness of the image. Sure, I've added diodes and caps to help compensate, but even then it's hard to get good, crisp high contrast stuff on some sets.

I've been hunting a Conrac monitor for some time as well, haven't found a tube one on eBay, but some of the older solid state models show up from time to time. I'd love to be able to have a tube set that took composite video reliably. I've modified small black and white portables to take composite video, and used them as monitors with very old computers (Apple II, etc.), but it's a pain working around a way to safely direct-couple video into a stage in a hot chassis television set...

-Ian

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by RetroHacker

...it's a pain working around a way to safely direct-couple video into a stage in a hot chassis television set... -Ian

Ian, the way I always coupled anything into a TV set (or any kind of electronic equipment), whether or not it had a hot chassis, is to use a blocking capacitor in series with the circuit or instrument I was connecting to the set. Over thirty years ago, I learned a lesson I'll never forget when I tried to connect an oscilloscope to a color TV with a transformer-powered chassis, to monitor the video signal. I went across the contrast control, without using a high-voltage blocking capacitor in series with the lead to my scope's vertical input. Turned everything on and--whoops!--I heard a loud noise coming from inside the oscilloscope. By the time I heard that noise it was too late--the voltage across the contrast control in my TV had arced through the intensity control of the scope. Didn't really ruin anything (the scope still worked amazingly well for several years afterwards), although from that moment on, whenever I'd adjust the intensity control and the movable arm inside the pot contacted the burned area of the carbon resistance element, I would hear a noise very much like a rifle shot. To this day I am amazed the scope didn't blow a fuse, or the power supply was not heavily damaged, the first time that happened. Hmmm.

[Pete Deksnis]

Quote: "On a side note... have you ever wondered about the power cords used on vintage roundie sets? The cords usually look kinda wimpy considering the set uses 300+ watts!"

----------------------------

Wimpy is right. Last night, or was it early this morning, a CTC2 (s/n B8000194), an early production chassis that I’m restoring, was powered up using a late-’50s cheater cord that has never been uncoiled since it left the factory. The cage is gutted so no HO circuit load exists, only the front end, the oscillators, video, chroma, sync sep., and so such.

It was on for about 30 minutes while checking voltages and stuff so I listened to audio from over-the-air ABC channel 7 from NYC while running the ABC video on an HDTV in NTSC mode. One of the things I did was check the power draw with a wattmeter – just short of 300 watts. A fully operational CT-100 is rated at 475 watts.

When I killed the power and removed the cheater cord from the CTC2 after the thirty minute run, that cheater cord was actually warm to the touch!

Pete

[Telecolor 3007]

"R.C.A" 21-CT-55 eats "only" 525 watts!

[old_tv_nut]

The Conracs had very good DC restoration and regulation - and when looking at the tube count, you have to remember they had extra sweep functions for offsetting the V or H timing (or both), and expanding the V interval so you could see if the sync pulses were correct on your signal ("pulse-cross" setting). A real monitor would also allow you to turn the color notch filter off when the color was turned off, and had a phase-compensated peaking ("aperture compensation") control using a tapped delay line. No comb filter in these early beasts, though, and IIRC no I/Q demods either - just very good R-Y, B-Y.

[Charlie]

Damn! I bet that color monitor sucks up some serious wattage!

On a side note... have you ever wondered about the power cords used on vintage roundie sets? The cords usually look kinda wimpy considering the set uses 300+ watts!