Oddly the same eBay vendor that listed the Mercury TV brochures also has some trade show pictures featuring S.M.A. , Chicago:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/TELEVISION-P...MAAOxyThVTX-ny

jr

There's another thread here about Mercury sets, seems Brando is seen with one in Streetcar, or maybe it's On the Waterfront? it's different model however.

http://videokarma.org/showthread.php...ghlight=brando

http://videokarma.org/attachment.php...0&d=1325413209

Not to worry - there's a steel band underneath the cloth.

I think I see this tuner down at the bottom.

That is impressive. Most guys just give their chassis "yellow" disease, unless it is a particularly rare and valuable set.

It is the same Mercury as the record company, they began by manufacturing radios, televisions, and phonographs, and in 1947 founded Mercury Records. And were purchased in 1961 by Philips of Holland. A beautiful early postwar set, and a very scarce set.

I got the set up on the workbench today. Looks like serial # is X4136. I wonder how many were made ?
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1547/...58818f9d_z.jpg

Super clean inside the HV cage. Interesting focus and centering magnet assembly. It is both a permanent and electromagnet.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1475/...5351a7c4_z.jpg

I pulled the 5U4 rectifier and tried a power up. I quickly discovered a blown fuse and replaced it.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1605/...4af6a539_z.jpg

Success! Unloaded HV secondary is around 750 VAC.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1565/...89f90134_z.jpg

Encouraged, I decided to give it a brief try with the rectifier in while carefully monitoring the B+. Things looked good but after a coule power cycles, the 5U4 died. I then worked on the frozen tuner a while and was able to free it up. I popped in a new 5U4 and gave it another go. It held up and I was able to pick up some FM stations :)

I also removed the weak CRT and installed a 8XP4 bench CRT. I have to keep it at an awkward angle because the grounding strap makes contact with the HV button.
No luck - 0 HV. Still not bad for a first power up. I'll get to recapping next.

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1506/...506a99fc_z.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1693/...247ff9f0_z.jpg

Mercury Records produced the finest sounding recordings ever made, in
many people's opinions. The main reason was the exact polar pattern
vs. frequency curve of the microphones they used ... plus the extremely
low noise and high dynamic range (up to 140 dB!) of the tube used as
the microphone cathode follower. Google "Wilma Cozart".

I replaced the four corroded sand coated power resistors and recapped the horizontal circuits. I gave up on restuffing after the first two cardboard cap tubes crumbled.

There is a funky assortment of resistors like I've seen in other early 50s sets. Perhaps due to Korean war shortages plus the huge demand for TVs.
Also seeing some deviation from the schematic like this 39 ohm plus two 1M in parallel. The schematic shows a 47 ohm and single 1M. I figure it's best to stick with the values I find in the set.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1495/...7276df11_z.jpg

Did another power up and started hearing some arcing in the HV area. Some investigation revealed a splice in the HV lead and a dirty HV rectifier socket.

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1642/...e7407469_z.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1582/...b4606e08_z.jpg

Eventually, I also discovered the 1B3 had a crack in it. Not sure if it was always there or if the arcing caused it.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1548/...1c25f9c1_z.jpg

With that sorted out, I finally got raster :)
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1684/...4f667604_z.jpg

Swapped out a bunch of weak or shorted tubes and got better sound and contrast. Think I'll focus on the vertical circuits next.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1528/...dd379259_z.jpg

I replaced the electrolytic caps in the B+ supply and vertical output circuits. All four of the can electrolytics in this set have cardboard covers over them which I was able to remove with a little heat. Then, I cut them open and installed the new caps. Once I'm done, I'll pop the cardboard back on to hide them.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1718/...ab6c73dd_z.jpg

Now I've got full height and good linearity. I also installed a new, longer HV lead so I can flip the test CRT around and avoid that grounding strap.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1579/...6771f370_z.jpg

I finished recapping the set and popped the original CRT back in. Since it had tested so poorly I wasn't surprised that the best I could get was a dim, out of focus image. I had to dim the lighting to take this photo. The brightness control has virtually no effect.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1609/...171a21ae_z.jpg

Replacing it with a good 16RP4 made a very noticeable difference!
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1582/...2077b475_z.jpg

Tweaking the controls improved the focus and brightness is most definitely much better. I do have some streaking though. I'll check the peaking coils and video amp circuit.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1607/...ba48f63e_z.jpg

https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1650/...d450aff0_z.jpg

That chassis looks similar to the RCA 630 set.

Starting to look pretty good!

Amazing what new caps can do. :D

Looks good! Nothing like seeing a set that was dormant for so many years come to life.

Here's a look inside the continuous tuner. They use a three position cam to skip the FM band and move it to the end so it goes 2-13 then FM. That also gives it a nice wide FM tuning range so it's not all bunched up.
Power to the flyback is also killed while in the FM band so the screen goes dark.
https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1679/...91670a6c_z.jpg https://farm2.staticflickr.com/1461/...681c36f1_z.jpg