RCA CTC5 in "custom" cabinet
 

After a month of FB tag, I finally bought this very interesting set today and pick it up in 2 days. Of course, today I did not bring my truck but there were several times I did and then later appointments were cancelled. :sigh: I was patient as I imagined how many dumb responses he probably got to the ad. Apparently, I was the only local response who knew what it was!

It was in the dining room of a very interesting 1910 townhome only a few blocks from work. The owner was close to my age trying to downsize, 1st generation Italian with many antiques and seemed relieved someone actually understood why the RCA's cabinet was changed.

The owner's parents had renovated a basement rec. room as so many did in 1964. Apparently the original cabinet (photo-finish mahogany) and looked dated among the more "modern" walnut furniture of the era. His father built the cabinet and somehow moved the tuner and brightness/volume to the rear.

I was not able to examine the rear but was surprised the tuner was not placed elsewhere. He offered to power it up, saying it recently played a movie from a VCR, but I declined.:nono:

Attachment 206120

:yikes::yikes:

an set with an 21axp22a??

under vacuum?
or was it replaced with an all glass type? :O

Can you repost the picture again? It didn’t come up for some reason…

I see it OK :yes:

Me too

That cabinet looks heavy

Yes, and very rustic / retro.

And if it indeed has a GOOD intact 21axp22a, then that's a very rare / lucky find!

Is that the metal cone crt if so then that set should be kept in climate control, lol

the specs say it came with an AXP, which is a metal cone crt, but it can be converted with some degree of difficulty.

But the metal cone didn’t stand up to well with temperature changes. So if this is a metal cone crt and it’s good I would say it is rare.

I'm still not getting the pic, but if it's the one I think it was (on FB), then it looked like a 5. I tried contacting the guy, he ghosted me :(

FB marketplace sucks like that.

Congrats on getting that oddball set Dave. I don't see any pictures here either, but I remember it from Facebook.




What's so odd about a good 21AXP22?.... I've got 8 TVs thusly equipped, and a good spare. Granted I have seen 3-4 AXPs that were unusably gassy/down to air (one of which due to necking).

They're not as failure prone as a 15G, but also slightly worse than an all glass tube...I've seen /had ~3 all glass color roundys go gassy too but the sample group for those is bigger.

I do know that back in the day they would use a copper cap of sorts to seal in the vacuum but later melted over the glass tube to keep the vacuum in which was so much better how could they think a copper cap would last.

http://suzaku.live-evil.org/Custom5.jpg

you should be able to see this! :P

the stupid bbs is corrupting the name..


fixed

ElectronicM:
Interesting that you've seen glass roundies go gassy (as opposed to cathode wear-out). I think this may be the first mention i have heard of it.

I don't have a good feel for 21AX's (or any metal cone tube) higher failure rate being due to temperature cycling. Anybody here really know? The leaky 21AX I donated for helium testing at ETF turned out to have physical damage in the metal to metal faceplate seal, which Scotty (the rebuilder in Iowa) did not suspect. He was more suspicious of the metal to glass seals, which were fine. (The damage was a tiny ding, the size of a pen point.) Granted, the leak was obviously much worse than it could have been prior to rebuilding, but that was after the extreme temperature cycling of the rebuilding process, not likely due to daily cycling in use.

The problem with some not being able to see the above pic may have to do with the file name and autoHyperlinks and URL stuph...

The above in the first post is “Custom 5.jpg” and I had a problem posting it from my site, cause this BBS truncated it, had to rename it to Custom5.jpg to make it work, not sure, but it might be the problem with some people's systems.

Thanks much, I can see it!

jr

Oh, it's a hyperlink. I tend to mis those and sort of hate it when people use hyperlinks instead of wrapping BB code IMG tags around the link to embed the picture properly....Let me fix that.

http://suzaku.live-evil.org/Custom5.jpg

Yup, was asking the guy about it, he never got back to me. Glad to see it went to a hood home!

(And not crying, it’s a 5!)

.

That tv has been in there for a while on-and-off - I figured it was sold & they just left
the ad up and abandoned it.....


.

I do wonder what that bottle is in the lower right corner! :D

I understood why he did not tell me where it was. Many distractions and inept at FB checking, I can sympathize at my age.
I sat on the porch waiting, once I FINALLY got an address!!! Got the tour of the first floor while he was still on a call.
About 30 mins late, with a few other guys, all part of a catering business. Not a lightly-taken gig in this town of poe-lytical patronage:D

I trusted, paid cash and hope it works out picking it up. I asked that it be "moved out" from its ornamental setting, fearing having to do it myself :smoke:\

PS- No worry missing a 5, pretty sure its a "special" and I have a spare CTC5D chassis.

Sure looks AX-blue to me:D

I did see a picture of it "on" but declined any demonstration. It will be transported face-down on pads in a truck bed, chassis taken out of course.

[attach]Attachment 206122[/attach]Attachment 206123

Can't really see clearly, but it does not look like a metal cone type, not sure. :O

I have a 66 yo NOS metal coned 16GP4 that's due to go to air ANY MINUTE NOW...

If you are serious, get some Vacseal on the seams, it is $$$, but it may save it!:yes:

I'm pretty sure its a 21AXP22, most of the tubes are original dated 56-48 etc.
Attachment 206125

This could be a problem then. :tears:
The shield around the metal part of the tube. :(

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenite...rvation_Issues

If people thought the decay of the plastic on the Philco Predicta was nasty, this may be worse! :scratch2:

IIRC from the CTC-5 I converted, the plastic insulator shroud for the metal tube (clearly visible in the photos) doesn't fit over the glass tubes.

Collectors who have vacsealed 15GP22s have experienced vac sealed tubes go down to air....Whether they applied it properly and also got the brass evacuation nipple under the base (which is the one commonality of the all glass color roundys I've seen go to air as well as a common thing on older metal tubes) or not is not known.

Vacseal may or may not have any effect.

Does all the glass color round tubes have the brass nipple because I thought the early ones had that nipple but the later had the glass tube melted to seal. What actually holds the brass nipple on the tube is it vacuum alone.

I've seen both the brass evacuation nipple and the glass evacuation stem on different all glass roundy CRTs...I don't think it was the year so much as whether the OEM or rebuilder favored using one stem type or the other.
All the gassy all glass ones I've seen that didn't fail due to necking were copper nipple.

The copper nipple looks like it's attached to a piece of some other metal probably steel or invar(shadow mask alloy) and the other metal is fused to the glass like a metal cone would be ....So it's sort of a misnomer calling a 21CYP/FBP/FJP/GUP/GVP22 all glass if it has the copper nipple....It won't fall off if vacuum is completely lost (ask me how I know).

[QUOTE=Electronic M;3253794]IIRC from the CTC-5 I converted, the plastic insulator shroud for the metal tube (clearly visible in the photos) doesn't fit over the glass tubes.



I have never seen a CTC-5 up close before, or a 21axp22 other than pix of ones outside the set, I was not sure what I was seeing in the above shot that he showed :o

D'oh - thanks for posting that - completely forgot about the ones with copper nipples.

I tested the CRT and it seems like it was barely used. I have to ask this guy if his folks had it on just for color programs. Most of the tubes are original too. Low hours indeed.

My BK445 reads a little higher than some other 440/445s I have seen, but that's OK too. The R-G-B are so close too and cutoff is fantastic compared to most color tubes.

The best thing about this acquisition is the fact I have two spare chassis, one of them is a CTC5N DeLuxe. The main difference over a "special" being three separate Y demodulators and second stage of sound IF. I forget the other differences but the CTC5D super/special DO use same parts otherwise.