DuMont 108 and Admiral Tele-bar finally home
 

I finally made the trip to Buffalo this weekend and brought home my DuMont 108 and Admiral Tele-bar. VERY pleased with the cosmetic and chassis conditions of both sets. Both picture tubes test good as well.

Started cleaning up the DuMont cabinet today and looked over the chassis while at Tim's place in Buffalo. Will be a challenging restore to say the least. So I hope the fellas online who I know have restored DuMonts are open to answering some questions. :D I will probably reach out to some of you VERY soon via private messages.

Here are some photos for you to enjoy. The Tele-bar is in pieces (all there) and I will have to play "put together the jigsaw puzzle." :scratch2:

Cleaned one of the DuMont knobs and it came out very nicely using Brasso.

Beautiful sets! Looking at that Admiral is making me thirsty.

Lucky that it has all the glassware too. :beerchug:

I just finished restoring an Admiral 21K1 chassis and the Tele-bar is a 21L1 chassis. Almost identical. So this restore should be fairly easy.

Just think, with that Admiral you could have a Bar and a Fishtank all in one! :D
Just kidding of course, it looks very elegant in black.

:nono:

:yuck:

...kill him!:smoke:

I got the cleanest knobs around . . . :D Something to do while waiting for a few parts deliveries.

Like freshly polished brass buttons on a blue blazer.

On mine, i cut off the end of a control shaft, chucked it into a drill, and spun polished them in no time flat. Works wonders with other type control knobs as well.:smoke:

That is a great idea! I did mine with the old toothbrush. Each one took about 10 minutes.

Great idea, Bob. And if you have a small drill press, you can use that and have hands free. I used that with my HH Scott knobs as well.

Sweet pair of TV's you have there. :yes:

Funny thing is that I found all 3 here. I can't wait to visit Al, I'm gonna feel more at home at his house than I do in mine :D

Yep, all 3 are Buffalo sets. For some reason, the immediate DC area seems to be void of old sets. Think b/c it is such a transitional town that folks just do not stay put long enough to fill up a basement or attic with family heirlooms. Now, an hour or two outside of DC into VA, Western MD or PA - different story.

One more thing about spun-polishing. When you do it with some Brasso and soft cotton towel it buffs it to such a high and uniform degree of luster that, 5 years later, they STILL are just as shiny.

BTW as we all know, BRASSO has changed its USA formula. I think the old stuff is still being manufactured in Canada. I was recently in Melbourne, Australia and saw BRASSO in Leo's Grocery Store. It was a round can and smelled like the old stuff. It costs about AUD$9. I have an unopened Canada can so I didn't bring any home. Just a suggestion for our Australian members (Down_Under comes to mind ;)).

If you need a really good polish, try MAAS from Germany. It's a bit expensive, but worth it. It works great on brass and many other metals. A little goes a long way and you don't have to deal with the residue left by products like Brasso.

Thanks for the tip. Will try it.

There is (was?) another German-made polish, Happich Simichrome, that smells like it will work too. :yes: I use it to clean the chrome trim on my 69 Pontiac.

Pontiac what...?:smoke:

Big thumbs up for Simichrome. Not only for brass - it also does a great job on bakelite.

Well the nice weather has tempted me to spend more time outside than in the basement the past week or two. However I have gotten some work done on the Admiral Telebar set.

The radio has been recapped and reassembled. Ready to plug into the TV chassis for the first power up attempt (whenever that may be).

I also completed the turntable restore last night. Last step was to re-flock the platter. Used a fine wire wheel brush on a drill to remove the old flock and adhesive. Then brushed on the new adhesive and sprayed on new flock. Came out really nice actually. More like a felt finish now. Not as fuzzy as the original because the flock was not electro-statically charged when applied. But I think it looks fine. Whole job took only 15 minutes.

I also have been collecting period bar items for the set too.

I second the MAAS recommendation. I restore vintage brass instruments (Conn and Benge mostly, plus the occasional pre-war Committee) and this is hands down the best polish for brass out there, and the only polish I'll buy. I play a '41 Conn 22B and a '49 Committee, both in raw brass, almost daily and I haven't had to buff either out in over two years. They still look great despite the heavy handling.

A little more work done tonight.

First, finished installing the picture glass and picture tube bezel around the glass.

Second, tested the picture tube. 20DP4 tests STRONG!!!! Love it.

Third, installed the gold speaker cloth finally (my wife liked it better than the black). I saved the black cloth and can swap anytime I want.

Last, tested the 3 resistors in the deflection yoke while I had it off the crt neck cleaning everything. Resistors need to be replaced. Should I do the mica cap too while I am in there?

Time for bed! :boring:

Thanks kvflyer, I'll keep that in mind! I use Brasso quite often. Maybe I should buy a case of the stuff before the formula changes over here too!:yes:

The jigsaw puzzle is ALMOST done. I have run out of most parts and everything has gone together nicely. Only thing left on assembly is to wire and install the speaker. Do not have the original speaker chassis plug, so going to have to improvise something over the next few days. Thinking bullet connectors may work. Although the two holes in the socket are different sizes. Radio and turntable are ready to go! Once the speaker is in and the deflection yoke resistors are replaced, time to turn full attention to the TV chassis inspection, restore and then a power up. Maybe by next weekend . . . :D

I have a soft spot in my heart for early 50s Admiral sets. Our first TV was an Admiral in 1951. And as a teenager, I was given a model 26R12. It as well as the 1951 Admiral went to the dump over the years. But now I have another 26R12 that I restored (it worked when I got it!).

Looks nice and that CRT is in great shape... and Aluminized!

Good on 'ya Mate.

Thanks. Seems I like the early 50's Admirals too. I have a 21K1 console that has been my daily driver for a year now. Tim (Kamakiri) found it in Buffalo and recapped it. Then I found a better testing CRT for it, replaced all the resistors and tweaked the heck out of it. I have put hundreds of hours on it this last year and it is a WONDERFUL performer. I was thinking that if the Telebar performs as well (at least the TV) I would maybe sell the 21K1, but I dunno?!?!? It has worked its way into me heart as a lot of these sets do. Especially since this was my first working vintage set.

DuMont 108 dial plastic installed . . .

Finally under the Telebar chassis. All the electrolytic and bypass caps have been replaced. Electrolytic caps are all terminal mounted under the chassis. Job is very neatly done as far as I can tell. Half dozen resistors replaced as well. There are two candohm resistors in the set. A single value one which tests fine. Then a double value one which is open for both values. So that will need to be replaced. Missing about half the tubes for the set, hopefully I have most of them in my stash.

Looks good. Where did you get it?:smoke:

Guy named Mark in Atlanta custom made it. He does radio dials mostly, but sent him photos and he did it no problem. Had to send him the brass ring, but he even used the original rivet points to attach new plastic. I was the prototype, so I had to pay for him to make the mold. If you wanted one for yours, it would be cheaper for you since he already made plastic mold. I just told him to fit to brass ring, make it convex about 1/8 inch out and put a hole exactly in the center for dial knob.

Looks awesome and it's heavier plastic too. Hard to get a good picture of it b/c of all the reflections. :D

Dial plastic turned out great. :thmbsp:

And I can't get over the original finish on that set. Someone must have taken very good care over all those years, not to mention it must have spent it's life in a very controlled climate. Seems here in rural Wisconsin people tend to use up their old furniture.

The finish on the set is amazing! Almost 100% perfect. Tim found it in Buffalo at a random Estate Sale one weekend. $25! Must have been inside (not an attic or basement either) it's entire life. :D

Al, do you still have the original first pics I sent you of that set when I was at the estate sale?

I ended up picking up the set in West Seneca NY. Estate sales around here usually have half price on Saturday, and the set was marked $50. It was cold as hell that day and it snowed the night before pretty good, so I think I was the only "fool" interested :)

I happened to see a cabinet in the photos for the sale that looked like it *might* be a television, and I had nothing going on, so figured what the heck. It had clothes piled all over it in the corner of a very large bedroom that was desperately in need of a paint job. I don't think that set had moved from that spot in my lifetime.

Texted Al with a pic, then a pic of the model number, the whole time not realizing that it was the EXACT set that Al had been looking for! Good thing I happened to bring my dolly.....$25 and 15 minutes later it was in my van.

Sometimes luck just hits you like that :)

Not sure if I still have those first photos. Gone through a phone swap since then. I will have to look. Luck is not the word! :D

It's fortunate that those clothes piled on top did not amalgamate with the finish. I don't understand the chemistry involved, but some fabrics and lacquer just like to melt together.

Tried to take some better photos of the new dial plastic on the DuMont 108. Other photos had bad reflections. Hard to even tell the plastic is there in THESE photos. Guess that is a good thing?! :D

Hi!

Very nice sets and great work too!
If you want to make the modern electrolytics look vintage you could remove the plastic foil. I always do this in my sets because it looks much better and older in my opinion:thmbsp:

Greetings Josef