I Might Snag This Zenith

[jstout66]

saw an ad in our free section. A little new for my tastes, but what the hell... it's free.

[dishdude]

Very nice!

[zeno]

Bought one new. It will give a damn nice pix. All of
them have broken doors by now, mine did.
Its an advanced system 3 top-o-line that year.
Uses the 9-214 main board with comb filter. As
good as any early 80's set. Many of these & the consoles
we junked in the big flat screen takeover. Most still
ran perfect or had minor problems & were never serviced.
If nothing else you will get a module kit !!!

73 Zeno

[TVTim]

Looks like a real wood cabinet!!

[jstout66]

supposed to pick it up after work, so will post pix this eve.
It's in the "richie" part of town. OH-LA-LA.... lol

[jstout66]

Okay, As promised, here are the pictures, along with my thoughts of Zenith during this time frame. (set manufactured in Feb 85)
I sold Zenith from 1978-1981. My Uncle opened his shop in 1972, and stopped selling around 1989 when the quality had gotten so terrible.
IMO, nothing could come close to beating Zenith in quality until about 1982, where you can tell a definite slip in build quality. My 1981 System 3 with built in Spacephone blows this one out of the water, in picture and quality. It weighs quite a bit more as well. The 81 still uses an American tube, which is that tri-focus design. In the Advanced System 3 era, I think they started using Panasonic built tubes. Overall.. for a 30 year old set, the picture is quite good, (altho I can tell the tube is a tad tired) This is also a high-hours set. The sound is terrific, and you have the option to add speakers. What I don't like is that Zenith used a flimsy door with the control panel within it. (all the controls work tho) The auto color has 3 positions. Off/Color Sentry/Video enhance. The picture looks best on Color Sentry. When it's on video enhance, it takes away that razor sharp focus. Picture is better than my camera can capture. After this long winded review, here are the pix.

[dishdude]

Glad you decided to grab it, I'd love to have that set. I think Zenith made a decent set up until about '93, and even then the chassis was okay it was just that bad run of tubes that really killed the sets. Even without the tube issue, Zenith's fate was already sealed.

[jstout66]

what area of the country are you at dishdude? If you ever pass thru Omaha, you can have it

[dishdude]

I'm in Arizona...there is like nothing here! Thanks for the offer though!

[jstout66]

Here's some chassis shots of the set. This one has seen HEAVY use.....

[zeno]

CRT is Rauland division of Zenith ( EIA 1101 )
No Jap tube here !

73 Zeno