Manufacturing C.R.T.'s... "Philips"-"Mullard" way
 

Well, I did stumbled on this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32yYfTVIzBE
"Mullard" was owned by "Philips" since the '30's and they probably invested in creatinf the C.R.T. plant, but crafstpeople where still need then (and I think lately in the C.R.T. era). The production seems to be as far as automated as the times permited.
One thing that I noticed is that they are rectangular C.R.T.'s, not round ones. Did "Philips" was one of the 1st to introduce in mass production such tubes, because as far as I known some U.S.A. tv sets had still round (conic) C.R.T.'s in 1950-1952

My understanding is CRTs went rectangular in the US pretty much around ‘50 or so for many makes (RCA sure was offering it in ‘51, in those goofy 17 in rectangular metal tubes. ). Color, of course, was round into the 1960’s.

AGREE!
An american TV repairman I visited in PA said, that color roundies were made up to 1965.
Regards
SIXMILLION DOLLARMAN:stupid:

That repair man didn't have the full story. We did introduce rectangular color in 1965 and it was basically dominant within a year, but it is documented and backed up by surviving sets that roundys remained in production until atleast 1968 as bargain sets (Philco that year offered a metal cabinet roundy that was the cheapest color picture per inch) others here have found ads for Muntz roundys from 1973.

But why so late colour roundies?

In UK/Europe all colour CRTs in TVs sold to customers were rectangular. Round colour CRTs were only used in experimental and prototpe sets. Most likely imported from USA.

Not sure when last round B&W tube was used in the UK. They were certainly used in 1953 and were obsolete by 1956. Smaller numbers would have been made for maintanence after that, though that may well have been by rebuilding old CRTs.

Probably the 9 inch Ekco TMB 272 is a good contender for the last from 1955-56
It was a mains/hefty battery "portable."

The factories still existed, demand for color had increased, there was a shortage of CRTs for the color TV sales rates, round tubes were cheaper than rectangular.

One year (maybe 1967? - have to check) RCA ran a color TV ad earlier in the year with top spots on the page for round sets and secondary places for rectangular; then later in the year ran exactly the same artwork except the positions of the round and rectangular sets were interchanged.

I think you're right. A unique problem with a unique solution that was most easily solved with an older CRT.

[QUOTE=old_tv_nut;3235130]The factories still existed, demand for color had increased, there was a shortage of CRTs for the color TV sales rates, round tubes were cheaper than rectangular.

One year (maybe 1967? - have to check) RCA ran a color TV ad earlier in the year with top spots on the page for round sets and secondary places for rectangular; then later in the year ran exactly the same artwork except the positions of the round and rectangular sets were interchanged.[/QUOTEuse In IIRC 1967 demand for color TVs was so high even relative to manufacturer expectations that there was a color CRT shortage... Major brands that didn't make their own CRTs would switch suppliers from week to week, depending on who had inventory to sell them, in order to keep up with orders.

Some makers like RCA tried to phase out roundys as fast as they could...Their last roundy the CTC-20 was a CTC19 rectangular chassis modified to drive a round CRT so they could use up left over CTC16 masks, cabinets and CRTs.