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Old 02-26-2012, 09:25 PM
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Jeffhs Jeffhs is offline
<----Zenith C845
 
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Fairport Harbor, Ohio (near Lake Erie)
Posts: 4,035
Hi Timmy -

Another console--first the Maggie combo, now this one! I hope you have room in your basement or elsewhere in your house for both sets, as combos take up a lot of room.

The front panel of your RCA kinda-sorta reminds me of a CTC-12 clone Silvertone 1964 VHF-only 21" roundie color set I had in the 1970s. It was a good set and worked well enough to watch while it lasted (the picture, however, was terrible; out of convergence, hum bars, no color sync half the time, etc.), but a circuit board cracked in 1973 and made the set instant junk (I did not know much of anything about repairing cracked circuit boards or much else related to color TV servicing, being only 17 years old and in school at the time). I've told the entire story of that mishap several times in this forum, so will not repeat it here.

As others have said, good luck restoring your new-to-you RCA combo. These sets were very good when they were new, having been made by the original RCA Victor Company which pioneered NTSC color television in this country, so they are not junk like today's cheap offshore-made sets (grrrr) with the "RCA" block logo slapped on the front panel -- almost as an afterthought.

Your RCA combo will serve you well once you restore it to its former glory. These sets were built well and will last years once they are at peak operating condition, so be prepared to see that wonderful RCA color picture once your set is working. Hook up a converter box between your antenna and the set and you will also have remote control of the set's basic functions, which I do not think your set has as it is. You will also receive many more channels (besides your locals) with the converter box, depending on how good your antenna is. You are in the New York City television market so you'll be getting all the NYC broadcast channels plus Antenna TV, MeTV and any other digital subchannels your local stations offer. The LiveWell Network (LWN), for example, will be on a subchannel of your area's ABC channel 7, WABC; as to the other digital subchannels you'll just have to scan around and see what you can find.

For now, if you have cable, your set will receive channels 2 through 13 without a cable box; just connect the cable to the set's antenna terminals (through a 75-to-300-ohm matching transformer if necessary) and use the set's VHF tuner to select the station you want. However, if and when your cable operator decides to move all channels (including broadcast) to one or more digital tiers of service (as Time Warner Cable has done with some channels, but not the broadcast ones and many cable channels, on its systems in my area near Cleveland), you will need a cable box, with the TV's own tuner set to channel 3 or 4. Don't try to use the TV's own tuner to select channels with the cable box or converter box connected; if you do, you will lose the signal immediately.
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Jeff, WB8NHV

Collecting, restoring and enjoying vintage Zenith radios since 2002

Zenith. Gone, but not forgotten.

Last edited by Jeffhs; 02-26-2012 at 09:30 PM.
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