show us your early remote control sets!

[drh4683]

Lets see your zenith space command 600s, 300s and rca crk9's etc!
To start, here is my space command 600, a 20Y1C50 from 1968

[drh4683]

here is a 1964 25MC33, space command 400

[polaraman]

Here is a S/C 300 I bought a few months back. Paid a whopping $20 for it!

polaraman

[polaraman]

50's Space Command 400. My Chromacolor II has the Space Command option also. My Space Command 600 Combo is in the other Space command 600 post by Captain Moody. Well that is it for my Space Command collection.

polaraman

[drh4683]

Here is my space command 300, same as polaraman's. Its a 16D21Q chassis, model D3005W for 1960. This is the first generation 300, as it has the rocker space command control and a tube type chassis which was transistorized by around 1961.

[drh4683]

heres the back of the 300

[drh4683]

heres a space command 200, which is actually the first television that used the ultrasonic remote in 1956

[drh4683]

Onto RCA sets, first off is a ctc11E RCA, 1961 with the 7 button "CRK3F" remote unit

[drh4683]

a 25" table set RCA CTC31 with the CRK9, 7 button remote for 1968. Known as the "shelby" FL532WR

[drh4683]

a 1967 RCA KCS160 with a 3 button mechanical remote, VOL DOWN-OFF., VOL UP-ON, TUNE. This is actually a very practical remote compared to the zenith 300. There is a gear on the volume knob in which a little metal spring attached to a solinoid clicks the volume knob up or down just a bit, so you actually control the volume knob.

[drh4683]

Here is a 1968 magnavox remote set, which is actually an 8 button system allowing automatic tuning across the entire UHF band. This system works by a motorized UHF tuner that stops on a UHF station, and it works well too. It stops exactly when the color locks in. Very cleaver design, probably the best design of the remote sets.

[drh4683]

Not a remote set, but close to be one. Zenith made some "touch tuner" sets which is basically a remote set without the remote. Everything was motorized drive (VHF tuner). This one dates to 1965. Dont remember the chassis.

[Carmine]

Mine...

[Carmine]

Mine too.

[Jeffhs]

I had a Zenith Space Command 300 b&w 19" portable TV in the late '70s. Rescued it from the curb in my hometown, and it worked well when I got it home--but, wouldn't you know it--the remote hand unit was missing, so I never was able to find out if the remote receiver worked. Didn't have the set that long anyhow, as the horizontal output tube went gassy after about a year, overbiasing the grid of the AGC keyer tube, causing a very weak, washed-out picture. Couldn't find a new tube anywhere, so I put it in my basement and bought a new (non-remote) Zenith 12" solid-state portable the next day. That set lasted the next 22 years; I'd still have it today, but I already have two TVs in my small apartment and don't have room for a third.

BTW, I like the pics of all those Zenith and RCA remote TVs. I especially like the Magnavox console with its power UHF tuner. That's the first TV I've ever seen with power up and down VHF and UHF tuning. The UHF tuner must have had a special arrangement to stop it right at the center of the channel for the best color picture (which wasn't easy to do with those earlier continuous UHF tuners when tuning by hand, let alone with a motor drive). An early signal-seeking arrangement, perhaps? Today it's all done electronically, and every new set has search tuning; however, I'm curious as to how that set's power UHF tuner operated so well (as far as setting the tuner exactly to the center of the channel is concerned). Was there a separate signal-seeker chassis mounted apart from the tuner (part of the remote receiver)?