Blond or Yellow? - Videokarma.org TV - Video

***Eric H*** · #1 10-18-2003, 04:46 AM

Is this 621-TS a real blond or did someone paint it yellow??
I don't recall them being so bright, or maybe it's a bad photo?
The price would be tempting if were an original finish.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...&category=3638

kc8adu · #2 10-18-2003, 07:07 AM

i dont see any woodgrain so it is probably painted.

Dave A · #3 10-18-2003, 09:58 AM

Here is what a real blonde 621 should look like.

Dave A

captainmoody · #4 10-18-2003, 05:03 PM

I sold a blonde one on ebay during the summer of 2000. Looked just like the one above. Was all blonde finish, Not two tone like the one up for bids.
Mine sold for an unbelieveable 1200.00!! It was an original unrestored one.

Rob · #5 10-18-2003, 09:28 PM

Captain,

Too bad you let that go. They are quite collectible, the first post war TV. There was a small run of these sold before the 630TS hit the marketplace in 1946. $1,200.00 is not too much for one of these.

captainmoody · #6 10-19-2003, 07:52 AM

It had a bad power transformer, Missing back and needed refinishing. It was more than I wanted to do, I like to find clean originals to start with.
My pet peeve is when someone refinishes a set like this when it is not needed, It destroys the originality as far as I am concerned.
When the finish is flaking off and veneer is delaminating as with my set there is no choice as to what has to be done, I just didn't want to go through all that.

#7 10-26-2003, 03:33 PM

If those are the original knobs, the set may not have been blonde to start with; RCA had different part numbers for the lighter knobs, described as "toasted walnut" as opposed to the "standard mahogany" ones.

I'm curious: the removable top cover, screen mask and speaker grille are solid wood on my two mahogany sets; the rest of the cabinet is veneer over laminate. Does anyone know if the blonde sets were just bleached and then a blonde stain applied to complete the lighter effect? Especially since these same solid pieces are noticeably darker than the rest of the cabinet. I did a 40-155 Philco that way once. My original intent was to remove a number of cigarette burns to the top but the bleached effect was nice and looked like just another variation of this common set so I never went back to the (darker) mahogany stain. I've toyed around with the idea of bleaching one of the 621 cabinets but don't want to do anything too drastic. If I can get a reasonable fascimile and some different knobs, I just might be tempted to try.