RCA built-in TV, 1960

[old_tv_nut]

I've seen ads for other brands of built-ins, but this is the first I've seen for built-in RCA TV and stereo.

[ctc17]

I had a guy with a house in beverly hills bring me the black and white one to repair. It was still installed in the house and he wanted it working. IIRC it was a KCS 50 something. Had a metal cone crt that had gone to air and filament was open. It was just a regular set with a wall mount metal box.

[Captain Video]

Those homes with the built-in TVs do looks really cool. They are very "Jetson's 50's futuristic style" which is something that I find very pleasant to the eye.

[ChrisW6ATV]

Very cool!

[Eric H]

All you needed was a wall with three feet of empty space behind it!
Or the back of the set could stick into another room I guess (if you need me I'll be in the Bathroom checking tubes).

These had to be installed in a space that was designed from the start to accommodate them.

Has anyone been watching Mad Men? Don Drapers' Manhattan Apartment has a built in set, no doubt just a prop.

It's a Color set but the Screen shape says B&W.

[Sandy G]

Kewl ideer, but then you ARE pretty much "Locked In" to THAT size/style/placement of TV..And I sure wouldn't wanna be the poor schnook who had to SERVICE/wrestle a 1960 era Roundie outta a Hole-in-the-Wall...Whaddabout in 1966, say f'rinstance, when they got cable, or in '72 when the CTC-11 took a Dump & croaked ? Will the NEW set fit the old Gooleyhole ?

[sampson159]

when i was in the basement business a few years ago,i saw quite a lot of built ins.mostly homes built in the early 50s in prominent neighborhoods.not one was a working set but there were still plenty.a built in color set would have been good to see.

[bgadow]

Long ago my father bought an old mobile home from the late 40s to use as a hunting cabin. It had a built-in radio in what I guess you'd call the 'dinette'. I wanted it! Probably still there, if the trailer is. And downtown there is an old storefront that was a jewelry store until about 20 years ago. He had a built-in Zenith AM-FM radio from the 50s right behind the counter. It was still there the last time I was in the place (now a thrift store). I've yet to have the pleasure of seeing a built-in TV, though.

[Dave A]

How about all the Nucomm built-in intercom/AM/FM sets from the day. GF's mother has one still working in her Pennsylvania stone farmhouse. The two box speakers hanging in the living room look a bit out of place with a stone fireplace with original cooking andirons. So 70's...1870 and 1970.

And somewhere around here I have a NOS AM AA5 built for about an 6-gang wall box.

[bgk283]

man, my dream would be to live in a house like that.....

[kx250rider]

I've seen only a handful of built-in color sets, and I don't recall ever seeing one "meant" to be built in. I removed a CTC-5 from a built-in, on Tower Road in Beverly Hills in the late 80s, and it was just a regular retail CTC-5 "Special" table model in a custom-built wall recession next to the fireplace, and with the back of the set accessible from a fake kitchen cupboard behind. The controls were reached through one of a set of recessed book shelves, which ran the rest of the wall to the right of the TV face. There was a 10 or 12 inch speaker and grille mounted above the TV, and wired in. Really cool to remember seeing that! It was still working and in use!!! Only reason we removed it for the customer, was that the owner had bought a VCR, and didn't like the flagging. He had to go down to a 19" screen to fit the wall box.

Charles

[sampson159]

there was a built in roundie at the livingston grille in columbus ohio.closed up in the mid 90s and the roundie was still in the wall over the walk-in freezer.rca ctc11 set.my dad would cash his paycheck there and bring home the best cheeseburgers ever.food was wonderful and the middle big booth was the perfect place to view osu football.mercury keller tv was 2 blocks away and bob would have it serviced every 3 month by a tech.once the tech told us that a vent was installed up there from the freezer.it kept the area around 60-65 degrees at all times.not sure if this had any effect on the set but it had a fine picture on it.one crt replacement in the late 70s.it is now the nefertiti lodge.not sure if the set is still there.area is rundown and very dangerous.

[wa2ise]

2 doors down from my mom's house was a house where a friend lived, both of us kids in the 60's. His basement was done up late 50's real wood paneling, and had a built in black and white TV set. No idea what brand and model. We'd watch afternoon cartoons and such on it. And a bar, and such you'd expect for a late 50's man-cave. House came up for sale a few months ago, dropped in, the paneling and bar and man-cave just like it was in the 60's, but just a hole where the built in TV was. The releater's for sale sign is gone but I haven't seen anyone in the place yet.

[Jeffhs]

An episode of "The Odd Couple" '70s TV series, titled "Oscar's New Life", had a scene in which was shown a 3-screen TV installation in Oscar's new office, with the TVs in the wall hidden by a large (and no doubt very heavy) motorized door when not in use. The door was opened and closed by a switch on a rather complicated control panel.

Oscar was showing Felix the installation one day, and he pushed the button to reveal the screens. "Three major networks, plus educational television," Oscar said when the three screens became visible. Later on in the show (near the end), however, Oscar is shown watching a baseball game on a very small-screen portable battery-powered TV. Felix asks him why he is watching the game on that set and not on one of the TVs in the wall. The reason was the three TVs were now gone, with only the wiring hanging out from the CRT masks. "A tube blew out and the repairman had to take it all back to the shop," Oscar answered. "They took out the whole wall! . . . (TV repairmen) make a fortune, don't they?" Felix marveled.

Back in those days and with a complicated setup like that, I'm sure they did, and continued to make their fortunes until the end of the NTSC CRT TV era. However, with today's flat screens, the 21st century equivalent of the multi-TV wall installation in Oscar Madison's office would have four flat screens behind the door, rather than CRT sets. When one of the sets went bad they would be thrown out and replaced, so no more than one channel would be out of service at any given time. Makes a lot more sense to me than having to pull out four CRT sets, leaving the customer with no TV and four gaping holes in the wall.

[DavGoodlin]

Speaking of built-ins, if you want to make big money today, figure out how to fix or circumvent the MEGA-BUCKS sub-assemblies in basic home systems (plumbing-heating-A/C-Appliances) that have been "improved" by adding electronic controls.

When my gas range's oven wouldn't "light", I lifted the cooktop up and bypassed the faulty igniter switch on the gas valve with a push button from RadioScrap, mounting it next to the valve.

I will stop short of recommending this for today's cars and check-engine lights to pass "inspections", since that skullduggery is well-established, tightly controlled and extremely hard to get around!