[radiotvnut]

At the flea market, I saw a Sears console color TV that looked fishy to me. It is a 25" solid state set with a touch tune varactor tuner with the channel buttons arranged vertically. They had $75 marked on it and the tag said it was from 1972. I said to myself, "No way this is from '72, maybe late '70's or early '80's. Then, I pulled the set around to look at the back as best I could; and, sure enough, I found a "MANUFACTURERED xx, 1972" sticker on the back. I was trying to look for a chassis number to see if the set was made by Warwick or Sanyo; but, it was too dark. I did, however, find the "No user serviceable parts inside" warning; so, that tells me that it's not a tube set.

I'm convinced that the date sticker that I saw was one that someone printed up in order to make the TV appear to be 40 years old to the untrained eye. I could be wrong; but, I know of no Sears touch tune color TV's from the early '70's. The closest thing I've seen was a Warwick build hybrid console from the mid '70's that had the buttons in a horizontal row above the CRT face. I've also seen some warwick and sanyo built Sears consoles from the mid to late '70's that had the touch tune buttons in a horizontal row to the side of the screen; but, these sets were all solid state.

So, what are your thoughts? Is this flea market Sears legit or is it one where someone is trying to pull a fast one?