Hello from Portland, OR

[Jeffhs]

Your Packard-Bell combo looks great for a 58-year-old unit. I agree that the set needs new capacitors, as almost all TVs and radios as old or older than yours are bound to have capacitors that are either outright defective or are failing. I would definitely replace the filter capacitors in the power supply before they eventually short and destroy the power transformer. Of course, if the house fuses or circuit breakers open as soon as you turn on the set or even as soon as you plug it in, there is a short in the B+ (plate voltage) power supply which must be corrected before the set can be used.

Another problem I can see your set has, as evidenced by the bright horizontal line across the width of the screen, is no vertical sweep. This is caused, in order of likelihood, by a defective vertical oscillator and/or output tube, by an open vertical output transformer or even by an open vertical hold control. Be sure to turn down the brightness control to avoid burning the CRT phosphors. Once the screen is burned this way the only recourse is replacement of the tube.

BTW, one thing that struck me as soon as I saw the control panel for the radio and phonograph was the large radio tuning dial, with the long pointer. I've seen this in small Packard-Bell 5-tube AC-DC radios, but this is the first time I've ever seen it in a combination unit. The radios only had one small pilot light illuminating the dial, but it looks like the dial on yours may be illuminated by two or more #47 lamps. The tuning scale itself looks rather unusual as well, as the frequency markings are abbreviated frequencies in kilohertz, i.e. 5.5 (550), 6 (600), 7 (700), etc. Again, I would expect to see this in small table radios, but not in a console.

There seems to be a UHF tuner mounted near the VHF one, so your combo may have been sold in cities which already had or soon would have UHF stations, as well as cities with only VHF stations; however, in the 1950s, UHF TV was quite rare, with most cities having, at most, three network stations. Since Packard-Bell was mainly a West Coast TV brand, I would expect the all-channel sets to sell well in cities such as Fresno, California which only has UHF TV stations. PB also had an AM radio it called the "Stationized" receiver. This radio had the call signs of West Coast AM stations on the tuning dial, another giveaway that Packard Bell mainly did business on the West coast of the US. These "Stationized" radios are rarely seen anywhere else in this country for just that reason.

[jr_tech]

Originally Posted by Jeffhs

There seems to be a UHF tuner mounted near the VHF one, so your combo may have been sold in cities which already had or soon would have UHF stations, as well as cities with only VHF stations; however, in the 1950s, UHF TV was quite rare

Note; the OP is from Portland Oregon which was the location of the first *commercial* UHF station in the US, just after the Bridgeport tests concluded.

Interesting Zenith film here, promoting the quality of their UHF tuning strips; "Fog over Portland":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OaaCsGF61s&hd=1

jr

[TheShanMan]

Originally Posted by jr_tech

Note; the OP is from Portland Oregon which was the location of the first *commercial* UHF station in the US, just after the Bridgeport tests concluded.

Interesting Zenith film here, promoting the quality of their UHF tuning strips; "Fog over Portland":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OaaCsGF61s&hd=1

jr

Wow. Interesting! I'll watch that video when I have a little more time. Thanks for that tidbit of info!

[TheShanMan]

It does have vertical sweep actually. That pic must have been the result of perfect timing. I didn't even realize it was showing that line in it.

Yes, it has UHF. As far as I can tell it lived its whole life in the Portland area. There are a couple of loose "chassis identification" tags floating around inside which say "Portland" on them. I'm not sure if those would've come with the unit originally or (my guess) they were some sort of service tag. I wouldn't expect the Portland area to have been a big enough market to warrant the addition of UHF if it was that uncommon then, but I suppose if California was their major market then that would be enough to explain it.

In my researching I did come across the "pilot light" term but didn't know quite what that was at the time. Now that you mention it though, there doesn't appear to be any form of lighting for the dial or any other part of the radio/turntable compartment. There is on the TV tuner though.

Thanks for your response. I'm really enjoying learning about this.