I'd like to have this Lucite Farnsworth
 

Shown in the picture.
Does it still exist somewhere?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Early-1940s-Farn...item1c0d7dffea

Yeah, I've got the picture of that Bad Boy in an old textbook on TV...Wonder if it HAS survived somewhere ? Its "Basic Television-Principles & Servicing", by Bernard Grob, copyright 1949 by McGraw-Hill.

Well, you can always make your own Lucite cabinet, as this guy did for his Pilot TV-37.

http://www.electronixandmore.com/tel...lot/index.html

Is that photo in Chapter 1 of the Grob book? I have the 1954 edition and don't remember seeing it.

Phil

Yeah, Phil, its Chapter 1, "The Television System", on page 7, Fig. 1-7. The '49 edition must be different, & the Farnsworth, I guess, looked positively "prehistoric" to the overachievers of 1954...My book has a little bit on Color TV, but, at present, "Many problems remain to be solved...There are no color broadcasts...Much experimental work has been done...Successful demonstrations have been held" ! There's also a LOT about FM radio, because that was/is TV sound, & it was in & of itself, sort of "New hat". Imagine what ol' Bernie would think of color, HDTV, & the fact that CRTs are now passe'...

In the 1954 edition, that figure shows a Hallicrafters TV chassis. Every bit of metal on the chassis sparkles like the sun. I don't remember hearing that Halli made a chrome chassis set. Maybe they shined this one up extra nice for the photo op.

This edition has a final chapter about 50 pages long on color TV, including a schematic for the CT-100.

Phil

I believe the Farnsworth GV-260 is based on this set, and those are probably about as rare.

Lucite was always a great novelty...people like to see all the inner workings.
There was once a time of wonder.
I remember seeing the big3 display cars with lucite hoods and lucite motor displays.
The Dan Armstrong Lucite guitars..everyone was fasinated at what was inside.

Just like the "Invisible Man" model.

How about a Visible Variac? A friend put it together for me and asked what case color would I like -- red, blue, black, etc.

"Clear!", I said.

Phil Nelson

http://antiqueradio.org/art/temp/VisibleVariac1.jpg

There are still some "Clear" TV's made, I have this cheap little piece of junk, and of course there are those see through "Prison" sets.

Here is one we just had made, a replica of the 1939 RCA display:

http://www.earlytelevision.org/lucite_replica.html

I've laid hands on the original, which is up in the MZTV museum in Toronto. Not much is left of the original Lucite case, in fact I think only the lid is original. Some story as I remember from the curator about the set being packed in a warehouse in Jerusalem or something, and a forklift truck crashing into it :eek:

Wonder how in the world it ended up in Jerusalem ? An' then, how did it get back home ? I've often wished that my old boatanchors could talk, what stories they could tell...

The story I heard (from Danny Gustafson) is that the set was shipped from Israel to New York at a time where there was a lot of labor unrest at the NY ports. The set was insured for some huge amount, and some forklift operator decided to take his anger out on the high priced merchandise.

http://www.earlytelevision.org/lucite_replica.html

(Missing "l" in the previous link.)

An amazing project.

Thanks, Phil. I fixed it in my post.