My RCA TK-41 arrived today!

[3Guncolor]

The biggest issue I see is coming up with a way to operate the IO pickup tubes without the CCU and power supplies. Finding a color encoder is easy. It would be interesting to see what it would like through a tube camera high end encoder from the middle 80's. It's sad that most stations only saved the camera heads and junked the support equipment.

[dreyfoos]

Thank you Julian. I never thought I'd see a "living" 1954 Admiral color TV again. But there it was in that WLVT feature. In 1955, my brother and I used $65 saved up from our newspaper route to buy our own Admiral "colored tv" back in Wichita. It was very low mileage - the seller had won it in a contest and had no use for it. When I saw yours, in the Tennessee Traveler story, the memories flooded back. We must have parted with ours as soon as we could get our hands on a 21" color - which happened to be a new 1959 Sylvania -heavily discounted because it was gathering dust - not a hot seller then but also very rare now (if even one survives). When my brother and I got our driver licenses, our interests changed and along the way we traded off both the Admiral and the Sylvania. I wish I had a serial number to check to see whether our beautiful buxom blonde Admiral with the big copper chassis somehow managed to avoid a landfill and make it to Tennessee. All I remember is that I had to change out a fried focus pot and that it had to be ordered from Admiral. Somewhere, I have a photo of it displaying a color picture from NBC's "Haggis Baggis" daytime game show. If I ever find those photos I will share! And, again, thank you for sharing a glimpse of yours. Dare I enquire as to whether the 15GP has gone to air?

Roger

[dtuomi]

Originally Posted by 3Guncolor

The biggest issue I see is coming up with a way to operate the IO pickup tubes without the CCU and power supplies. Finding a color encoder is easy. It would be interesting to see what it would like through a tube camera high end encoder from the middle 80's. It's sad that most stations only saved the camera heads and junked the support equipment.

Its my understanding that the TK-41 didn't come with a color encoder. The camera output was pure RGB. You had to purchase a separate encoder (usually from RCA I'm sure) that would do the job.

I'd expect that once you have the power supply ratings (and have the camera recapped and ready) it will probably just power up. The problem will be in figuring out the control signals, because I'm sure that even in an early camera like the TK41 there were probably lines devoted to the remote control of various items like focus current, etc. Additionally, what are the returning RGB signal levels, and what pre-emphesis was applied by the amps in the camera? You have to reverse that and amplify the RGB signal again to modern RGB levels so that you can feed a modern encoder. I'm sure there's more that I don't know of. Its definitely not for the faint of heart.

I once played with a TK-41 on its tripod, but have never operated one from the CCU side.

David