New Guy Here with a CTC-5 "Wescott"
 

Hello guys. I am new to this TV collecting thing. Actually I just have one. I picked this CTC-5 RCA "Wescott" Color TV up at an estate sale last week for 5 dollars. I almost passed on it until I realized it was a 50's color TV and thought it might be sort of rare. It is mint with not a scratch on it. I am trying to make a 50's room in my house and this would be a great addition. I have not tried to turn it on yet I want someone to test and look at it first. Does anyone know if there is a TV guy in Michigan that would work on it. Here are a few pictures of it. Also any history or info on this TV would be a great help. Thanks Guys.
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Welcome to AK, pal ! DON'T turn this baby on until its been checked out by somebody who knows what he's doing-it will undoubtedly need re-capping, possibly a tube or 2.

I don't plan on it. I do have a mountain of tubes. I checked a local TV repair place that has been in bussiness for years and the guy said he would check it out for me. He seem to be excited about looking at it.

who wouldnt be excited

---

Wow, that's a great score. Santa came early this year!

Ed Reitan's website has a lot of info about early color TVs:

http://www.novia.net/~ereitan/index.html

If you go to the Color Receiver Gallery, you'll see a product brochure for your TV and a few details about that model.

As Sandy G mentioned, it is pretty standard procedure to replace the old capacitors on these sets, to ensure safe and reliable service. They deteriorate with age, and it would be a real shame to damage such a nice set if one of the old electrolytic caps fails.

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

Where in Michigan?
 

I'm down in the South Bend area.

Dave,

Welcome to AK. I'm glad you took my advice and posted here. These good folks pretty much echo my comments to you about taking care to have your CTC-5 checked out by a qualified tech. Wonderful, original condition example of this set.

-Steve D.

You are a lucky man! I am proud to own a -5; they are a different animal than the more common later sets (10,11,12,15,16) and, I feel, an important set. If the picture tube is good everything else will be downhill.

Thanks all for your input.
 

Thanks all for your input. A week ago I knew nothing about these old TV's. But thanks to all of you guys I am learning a lot. If all goes well and I get it re-capped and all that other stuff. How good is the color and picture quality on these old sets. I know it will not be as good as todays TV's but is it still clear and colorful?

Surprisingly good when they are working right. For best effect, they need to be in a dark or dark-ish room.

Welcome to AK!

John

The picture on your set should be very watchable, once it's restored.

Perhaps you already ran across this, but there is a lot more info about early TVs -- color and B/W -- at the Early Television Foundation website:

http://www.earlytelevision.org/

Phil Nelson

[QUOTE=bigolds98 How good is the color and picture quality on these old sets. I know it will not be as good as todays TV's but is it still clear and colorful?[/QUOTE]
Welcome
I like the cabinet on your set.
Here are some screen shots of a ctc5. I use this cabinet and picture tube to work on the other ctc 5 chassis. {jig} This set has a glass picture tube in it but yours should look about the same. When you get it fixed I think you will like your set.
Good luck
Ed

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6.../65Zenith2.jpg

How is that for you? Keep in mind how hard it is to take a good picture of ANY tv!

So let's see, another guy from Michigan who likes big cars? How have we not met? :D

BTW, if that set came from an estate sale I passed up in Roseville last weekend, I'm going to shoot myself. :sigh:

Great. Color
 

Thanks for the sample shots Roundscreen and Carmine. The color look GReat. I now want it to work more than ever. To Carmine. I live in Madison Heights and have a 1972 Olds 98. The estate sale was at 15 Mile and Ryan. The house was a 70's time capsul. I also bought a 1976 Sony Betamax in mint condition with the anolog timer a 40's Crosley Bakelite radio, TV, and a mint new in the box mid 60's Microwave I spent a total of 20 dollars for all of it. The bummer thing is I was at a sale a few weeks ago in Bloomfield and the house was full of old radios and I would say 8 TV's. They looked to be early 70's color though.

15 & Ryan is not a place I would have expected to find that set. My neighborhood in the Shores.... perhaps.

You take that olds up to any cruise nights? Is it a tan color?

If you see this, you've spotted me:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...4Newport-1.jpg

Wow, that was a great find! A bargain at ten times the price. :)

I like the CTC-5's. As for picture quality, they're quite watchable when working properly, but keep in mind that the 50's-era color CRTs have pretty low brightness compared with color CRTs starting in the mid-60's. [Poor brightness was one of many contributing reasons why color sets didn't sell very well back then.]

Also, since you're new, a few care-and-feeding tips might be handy once you've gotten it restored:

These sets have no built-in degaussing coil, so if you move/re-orient the TV, or you get any large magnets near it, you may need to demagnetize the CRT. (there have been various threads in the past on AK about how best to do this)

Due to their particular electronic design, the static convergence appears to "drift" pretty easily on these sets, so you'll probably want to at least learn how to reconverge the set yourself. Fortunately, all the convergence controls on a CTC-5 are accessible from the front of the set (after you remove the "pencil box" housing the secondary controls).

I'm sure there are some other "user" tips like this that would be helpful, but those are two that came to mind off the bat.

Have fun!

That is a nice looking car for 30+ years old. Cars could be huge in the 1970s. Yours has a nice vinyl top, but I always hated them(rust/mold magnets) and avoided buying any car so equipped.

Tv's to cars
 

Carmine I think I have seen your car. I go to Pampa's and Universal Mall during the summer. IT has a tan painted top. I used to have a Chevelle. But I have got into the mega huge late sixties early seventies land yachts.

Land Yachts:thmbsp:
You can see my 72 Centurion up above, before that I had a 72 Impala. Sometimes I look around the internet reading car forums, but I have never found one that really suited me and my preferance for mostly stock big cars from the 50s - the 70s, so I just talk about cars when the subject comes up on here. It's rather odd, but it seems alot of us old tv guys like these kind of cars. That ctc-5 was a great find I've never come across anything here older than the ctc-15, here's a pic of my ctc-15 working.

Cars, TV, Radios
 

I know this is off topic now but I like the big old cars because they don't make them like that anymore. I was out in LA back in September and I love it when I go out there because you see cars like ours all over the place being used as daily drivers. The bummer thing here in Michigan is it cloudy 290 days out of year and it is either raining or snowing or both. They use salt on the roads and the big cars are getting harder to find in good shape. Mine is in the garage 9 months of the year. So your a big Buick guy, I am the Bigolds guy, Carmine is the Big Chrysler guy. Now we need to find out who the Big Ford guy is. As for collecting I am all over the place. I like old radios a lot and have a cool looking Grundig console tube radio that I have on everyday, I bought an old Recordio just because the cabnet is really nice. I have a couple of old Fisher Studio Standard recievers that are nice. I just get this stuff because now that everything is cheap China crap there will be nothing cool to look at or collect 20 years from now.

Bigolds:

Yours was the car I'm thinking of... Among a sea of Chevelles, Roadrunners, etc. at the local cruise nights, yours is one of the few I remember, or ever spent much time looking at. :thmbsp: In fact, I've even pointed it out to my girlfriend... "If I ever went GM...."

In the interest of remaining semi-on-topic, I will mention that AK has a car forum now... probably a good thing since most of us like old cars too. If you check this link, you'll see a bunch more of the cars I've had to Pampa, Continental, etc. (those are cruise spots/nights for the rest of ya) If I see you at a cruise, we'll talk old tvs to make up for this, lol.

http://audiokarma.org/forums/showthread.php?t=89144

The Newport pictured above actually is my winter-hooptie, through slush/snow and other forms of MI fun. It will be taking me to work in about another hour. (Can't sleep tonight, sinuses) Seeing as how I rescued it from demo-derby on eBay (for all of $1500) I figure whatever I do with it is better than that. However I am very good about keeping drain holes free, and spraying off salt when the weather is warm enough.

My vinyl top is a little shot up-close, but not because of rust issues... just age. I might re-do it this spring. If you keep the moldings free of decomposing sh*t from trees, they aren't so bad.

RE: Cheap China Crap... I think you're preaching to the choir on this site! Most of the time I either fix something old, find a version on eBay, or do without. I don't think I'm missing out on much just because I don't have a plasma.

Another Olds 98 fan here --- I have a '73 98 Regency that my father bought new!

Someday, I'd LOVE to have a '76 Cutlass Supreme Brougham like the one I had back in the day...You almost NEVER see them cars anymore...Yeah, it's kinda funny how so many of us old roundie guys are attracted to the big Yank Tanks, too...

Yep, I always went for the big, excessive American cars. My other project is a 68 Impala SS ragtop. When I was a kid my best friends mom had a black on black 76 Cutlass Supreme. Still remember that car well. True, you never see them anymore!!

I guess I'm the big Ford guy. I drive a '99 Lincoln Town Car, before that, a '94 Mercury Grand Marquis. It's not vintage but I hope to keep it until it is. You are right about the old stuff, today's gear can't match the warm feeling I get from my 1937 Philco tombstone radio, 1974 Pioneer 626 receiver and PLA-45 turntable and hopefully my 1965 Zenith roundie (if and when I get it working).

Well, I guess I qualify as a vintage FoMoCo guy-a '69 Lincoln, a '67 Lincoln convertible sedan, & a '65 Lincoln limo.

As long as we're discussing cars, thought i'd drop in a photo of my Imperial. Hey Carmine, that's a very nice Newport you have there :)

That Imperial is cool
 

I almost bought one of those a few years back. It had the most plush interior I ever seen. This summer I cam across a 72 Impala 2 door at a estate sale with 24,000 original mile on it. Unfortunately the old lady that owned it must of hit everything in her path. The car was brand new looking but had about a 1000 small dents in it. I also came across a 1981? Imerial Frank Sanatra edition With all the Frank tapes still in the car. My favorite big Ford is the 63 Lincoln Continental convertible. As for newer TV's and audio I like The sound and picture quality from both but why does everything have to be in cheap black plastic. I love how back then we built things to last and look good. Thats why I like all this old stuff. Why can't we do that today? I also was out today doing the estale sales I had no luck finding anymore CTC-5's. I think that was my one luck find this year. If I find that kind of stuff I will let you guys know.

Hey COMPUCAT my friend has a 2001 Crown Vic and love the thing. It is a nice riding car. I too have a old Grundig Majestic console tube radio that I am listening to right now. My home stereo is a Fisher 634 and I play my records on a Pioneer PL-530. The funny thing is is sounds better than my newer Sherwood reciever.

Just finished re-capping/restoring a CTC-5N chassis. Soon I will re-unite all components and slowly "fire it up" (pun intended). Pretty easy job, but it should not be rushed. Plenty of room underneath for replacement 'lytics, as compared with my CTC-4. Best of luck with your great tv find!!!!
Kevin G.