Just what I always wanted, an '85 Zenith console

[Reece]

I had a Sylvania like this with a 4 x 6" speaker. Sets like this tended to have 4" or at the most 4 x 6" speakers. For $3 more the mfr. could have put in a 6 x 9" for good sound.

[radiotvnut]

Starting in the late '70's-early '80's, most manufacturers started switching to the smaller PC-board chassis designs that relied heavily on integrated circuits. By this time, they were using the same basic chassis in 13" sets all the way up to the big 25" consoles. I have an '84 13" Zenith that has the same guts as this big console.

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by Kamakiri

A better pic of the set....

I hope you get many years of use out of this TV, even though it was made in the mid-'80s. Does it still have the original CRT? If it's the original and the tube is getting weak, that could explain the color shift you describe.

I had two Zenith portables in the '80s, both 13" (L1310C with knob tuning, bought new in 1979; three years later, I bought another Zenith 13" with one-knob electronic tuning) and was pleased with both sets. Both lasted well over a decade (the first portable did last 20 years; the second, about 17 or so), and in fact were still working very well when I left them at my former residence in 1999 (moved to an apartment, no room for these sets). Both Zeniths were in plastic cabinets, the older one in a jet-black and faux-chrome cabinet, the newer one in a plastic cabinet with faux wood grain. However, I never had five minutes' worth of trouble with either set; they both had excellent pictures on OTA antenna signals and on cable, the latter with a Jerrold 13-button cable box that gave me something like 37 channels. Don't know what happened to either set after I moved, as I wasn't even present when the house was being cleaned out in preparation for sale (long story and OT), although my best guess is both sets were trashed.

I didn't think about your method of moving your set when I made my last post; however, it is one very good way to move heavy furniture (not necessarily TVs) without damaging it, if you must move it without assistance. I didn't realize, either, that your set has hidden casters under the cabinet. The converted utility cart that houses my video system also has hidden casters, which makes it look a lot nicer in my apartment. I had a larger cabinet, but had to get rid of it when I came here because the TV I had at the time (RCA CTC185 19" table model) wouldn't fit in the cabinet's TV area -- but my VCR fit the top shelf just perfectly....go figure. That particular cabinet had casters in plain view at the base, which I didn't care for once I got here, although I used that cabinet for some years at the other house with two or three different TVs and several VCRs. The last TV to occupy that cabinet was a Zenith Sentry 2 19" table model (1995 vintage), which I still have and which still works great, the last time I tried it. Still has the original CRT, which always amazes me since this set was made within the time frame during which Zenith TVs generally had junk CRTs that would short and take much of the video chain with them after only two years or so. Of course, I didn't use my set that much, only for four years (1995-1999); maybe that has something to do with why the set still works as well as it does today. I wonder how many Sentry 2s are still in use these days, with cable boxes, of course.

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by Kamakiri

There is zero real wood on this set. The front of the cabinet, where the faux drawers are, is PLASTIC.

Plastic or not, it looks darn good; could have fooled anyone into believing it was actual wood. Sure had me fooled -- until I read your post, I thought the entire cabinet was real wood or, at worst, particle board with walnut or maple veneer over it. I wonder how many people bought these sets and had them for years, never realizing or even suspecting the cabinet was essentially all plastic.

[Kamakiri]

Probably quite a bit, I wouldn't have realized it, it was only that I had it tipped over that I got to see the backside of it.

Update: after 7 straight hours of runtime, the screen went with what I'll describe as an overdriven blue, making the set look, as I mentioned, sepia toned, with very slightly brighter blue bars near (but not at) the top and bottom. Turned the set off, turned it right back on, and the blueness was gone.

(sigh)

[Kamakiri]

Originally Posted by Jeffhs

I hope you get many years of use out of this TV, even though it was made in the mid-'80s. Does it still have the original CRT? If it's the original and the tube is getting weak, that could explain the color shift you describe.

I'm not sure, but I believe so. There's a service sticker on the back of it that shows it was serviced in 1990, but it doesn't say what was done.....

[Kamakiri]

Well, after watching the Presidential debate last night on my '83 Zenith, the really bad color fluctuations in the picture that have been happening since I "adopted" it seem to now finally be gone. All of the hot air must have melted and reformed all of the solder on the circuit board traces and straightened out the blue gun in the picture tube.

Think I'll get a DVD copy of one of these for future television repair

[NowhereMan 1966]

Originally Posted by Jeffhs

It's interesting that, by the '80s, these TVs used such a small chassis in huge console cabinets. I wonder why Zenith did this in the first place; after all, it seems like an awful waste of cabinet space. Putting that tiny chassis in a portable or table model would have made more sense. Was Zenith trying to make some kind of statement, or were they just seeing if they could make a console TV with as few parts as they thought they could get away with? That this TV did not have adjustments for raster size (the optimum values may have been set by fixed resistors) should have been a dead giveaway that corners had been cut in the design of the set -- well out of character for Zenith, which for decades -- generations, even -- was known for quality in radio as well as television and high fidelity.

I don't know when Zenith stopped using their slogan "the quality goes in before the name goes on", but I certainly think they wouldn't have had any business using it after the company left the US for Korea. My own variation on that slogan is "the quality fell off the boat on the way to Korea", which, IMHO, makes more sense these days.

BTW, just because these sets had postage stamp size chassis, don't think they were as light as feathers -- I'm sure they weren't. The CRT probably weighs 30 or more pounds, and the cabinet, though made of particle board, probably weighs at least as much as the tube, if not more. I have a utility cart here (made into an entertainment center cabinet) on which my flat-screen TV, VCR and DVD sit, and I'll bet the cart was made of particle board and could weigh 20-30 pounds or more, if it weighs an ounce. Just goes to prove my point -- that even today's furniture made of particle board or pressed sawdust (!) isn't light by any stretch of the imagination. Just don't try to lift a TV in a cabinet like that yourself, unless you want a hernia or worse.

I think a lot of people still preferred the consoles so that's why you'd end up with a tiny chassis in a bog wooden case. Even today, my mother is still bummed they don't make console TV's anymore and I admit I'm kind of that way myself. IIRC, I think Zenith made consoles as late as 2002 or a little after, I remember seeing one that resemble my 1982 model. I have nothing against flatscreens, they are good for saving space, but nothing beats a console as a main set.