CRT woes
Steve is trying to get kilt messing with the CRT on his dad’s old depthfinder. Reminds me of a story (almost anything can remind me of a story) about a friend of my dad’s.
Arky was a guy who, though he never exercised, looked like Lil’ Abner. Muscles for days. So strong he sometimes had to move slow lest those muscles cramp up on him. Not a tall man, maybe five eight, but built like a rock.
Arky bought a new Zenith TV from Ed’s TV and Appliance. Now in those days, there were a couple things about tv’s people today forget. I mean, aside from the fact that there were only four channels and some crap on UHF.
No, at that time, a new TV was an event. People welcomed them into their homes like pieces of fine furniture. They were made like furniture. They had wood cabinets. Yes, folks, actual cabinets. Made of actual wood. Some of them looked like pieces of fine furniture. Some didn’t even have remote controls. Or pushbuttons. SOme had big dials to change the channel.
Unquestionably, the most amazing thing about those antiques was the fact that they required installation. Someone would come out, hook up the TV, adjust the antenna if necesary, and tune the set so the color balance was just right. Differences in climate could change the set, so some people had their TV’s reset yeach year, sometimes more often. A tech would come out and fiddle with the set for sometimes an hour.
Anyway, Arky got him a new TV. It was beautiful, a nice french provincial cabinet. a 24″ screen! A HUGE tv. We’d never seen one so big. Ed himself came down to set up the TV. And with his big hiproof box of tools, settled down to set it up.
Unbeknownst to Ed, there was a little rusty thumbtack sitting point up on the hardwood floor just behind the TV, a leftover from that year’s christmas decorations. Ed carefully unscrewed the back, plugged his little test cord in, sat his VTVM (that’s a vacuum tube voltmeter, for anyone under 45) on the floor, sat a mirror on the floor so he could see the TV screen from his position behind the set, and sat down on the floor.
And prompley jumped up, rusty tack in his ass, and drove the screwdriver he was carrying deep into the innards of the set.
I wasn’t there, but Arky assured me that flames came out of the back of the set, and Ed lost a lot of facial hair. Closest thing to a shave Ed ever had on a wednesday.
The set was ruined. Ed took it back to the shop and replaced a lot of parts, but it never worked quite right. It would be perfect, then somethnig would warm up and the screen would go black. Ed did his level best, but he was a small shop, and replacing a whole set (especially a big one like this) would have set him back a lot of his income.
Anyway, I told that story to tell you this one:
Arky;s favorite show was Hawaii Five-0. Hell, at the time? We ALL worshipped at the altar of Jack Lord. He was a man’s man. Dad was helping Arky try to get his crappy old Mustang to run right and we were there at the time Five-0 came on, so we all went inside to watch. We had just gotten to the point where the the elder Vashon is blackmailing a homosexual lawyer, whenthe tube went black. Now, this being a three-part episode, of all our favorite show, Arky got up and spanked the TV fairly hard, trying to get the picture to come back, and utterly caved in the side of the set, at whcih point smoke began billowing toward the ceiling.
Arky picked up the TV (not a small set!!) and carried it outside, ripping the cord out of the socket as he did, and threw the whole thing into the beat up old Mustang, without even opening the door or rolling down the window. Got in, drove car, TV, and all, right to the dump, where he left it. Walked three miles home. Never said another word about it.
11 comments Og | Uncategorized
Hey! I’m under 45 (barely) and not only do I know what a VTVM is, I own one.
I also remember TV’s as fine furniture, and not just fancy plastic boxes that squeak and squawk.
You know, I think there’s a correlation there. As the quality of TV set construction has declined, so has the quality of the product delivered from same.
Although I don’t miss testing a dozen or more tubes to see which one went bad when the screen goes dark….
You’re a ham. Of course you know what a VTVM is.
When I was an embryo, my parents got the Magnavox (forever known to me as the Magnet Box). Solid maple wood cabinet (no pressed wood Ikea crap then), too heavy for peg legs, so it had rollers. Prolly cost as much as a Chevy Nova. It had a remote that made a wheezing ping sound. Kssk, kssk.
The remote being a sonic remote and not a beam was something I discovered when I accidentally banged two tiny leggo metal bars together and saw the channel change. I did it again, it changed again. I had tons of fun for a week changing away from General Hospital to the Cubs game until my mother figured that the glitch in the tv only acted up when I was somewhere around. The TV man was on the verge of coming out to fix it when she caught me playing games, red faced from holding in my laughing, two tiny steel pegs in hand. The wooden spoon came out, and that was the end of that.
But the Magnet Box was a source of supplemental income to the Hoffman’s Repair Battalion. Forever in the shop. One time the tv man who came out was staggering drunk when he showed up – my father threw him out of the house, called the shop to complain, then found out later that the guy banged up the truck on the way back to the shop, so free repairs for a time being.
Yeah, I remember once upon a time when tv stations would sign off for a few hours *during the day* then sign back on. Dad taking the tubes to the drug store to the tube tester to see which s.o.b. was causing the picture to roll or fuzz this time.
But everything old is new again. With the new $1000 high-d sets coming out, the days of the disposable model are gone, and maybe we’ll see the second coming of the tv repair man.
We had a 24″ screen, vaccum tube TV when I was growing up too.
It had a remote.
That remote was me. (“Billy! Switch it to chennl four!”)
I too was a remote (until my brother got old enough and I was promoted to “beer fetcher.”)
:)
What do you mean, TVs “had” wood cabinets? Mine does. 19″ floor model, weighs about a ton. I don’t remember how old it is. All I ever watch is the weather at night (so I can see if I can ride the next day), so it works just fine. Guess I’m screwed when they go all-digital, but oh well.
Ya know… The cabinetry in my parents old Zenith was nicer than my bedroom furniture is today.
Damn, the President’s on TV….. All three channels.
hehe! Yep.
I remember it was a minor sign of coming of age … when you were allowed to take the tv tubes to the hardware store (or tv repair shop) and check em out yourself. Just one step shy of gaining control of the remote *grin*.
I’m 46 and I know what a VTVM is. But I was an electrician for 20+ years before I got seriously (ie for a living) into computers :)
I also remember checking tubes at the Rexall drugstore, of all places.
Ok, the human remote thing was common enough. But how many of you were the human *antenna*?