Setchell-Carlson

[William]

Here's one you don't see every day.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/203929826025?h ... R6DszPbEYQ

Bill

[walyfd]

Never heard of that company. Not sy with the speakers!

[William]

Setchell-Carlson was around for a long time. When I was a wee lad, and I got my first real job at the Gamble Store we sold the Gamble home brand which was Coronado, but we also sold Setchell-Carlson as our upscale models. Their cabinetry was all real hardwood, and their chassis were all their "unitized chassis". They were well built and worked pretty well, but truth be told, we had less service calls on the Gamble Coronado brand. Here's a brief history of SC.

The Setchell Carlson Company was a manufacturer of radios, electronic equipment, and televisions from 1928 until the 1960s. The company was founded in St. Paul, Minnesota, in 1928 by Bart Setchell and Carl Donald Carlson under the name "Karadio Corporation", and its first product was a car radio. The company took the name Setchell Carlson in 1934, and produced consumer radios.

During World War II, the company switched to war production, and its most prominent product was the BC-1206-C aviation range receiver.

After the war, the company moved to New Brighton, Minnesota, in 1949, and produced televisions, which continued until the 1960s. In the late 1960s or early 1970s, the company moved away from consumer televisions and focused on equipment for institutions, such as schools. It eventually became a subsidiary of Audiotronics Corporation.

Bill

[Firedome]

Another nut job hawking a mediocre console in poor cosmetic condition for a ridiculous price.
They'd been around a long time but evidently this S-C (unlike Stromberg-Carlson, who actually used good spkrs) believed using a large number of cheap-o speakers made for good sound. Looks like that record player is not original, its considerably newer than tube-era stuff.

[hermitcrab]

I was going to say that too... looks like someone threw in a BSR , and the 45 adapter was from a VM table...

[Hi-Fi-Mogul]

Bill,
That S-C may sound pretty darn good.

It has an interesting chassis, using four 6CM6 power
pentodes.

I had never seen that tube before.

Take note of the interesting round OP transformer housings.
Could those be toroidal ones ?

The original record changer was a V-M 1200A series per
Sams, but it would have had a 1201, since this is stereo.

I'd really like to hear it play after all electronics are serviced.

[electra225]

I'm not familiar with the 6CL8, either. Interesting design that appears to be well-built. I've never had anything by Setchell- Carlson that I remember. I'd say it was the equal of Stromberg-Carlson or Magnavox in build quality. It looks like they used a later model BSR changer which would not be horrible. Finding a good more-original VM wouldn't be all that tough, either. Somebody ought to save that instrument. I couldn't read the codes on the speakers. I'll bet it would sound pretty good as well. Nice find, Bill.....

[William]

I did a little research and there were actually two different version of this unit. One being the one Mr. Mogul provided the Sam's for, and the other like the one in the ad that uses 6BQ5 tubes. The 6BQ5 tube chassis had normal looking output transformers. The articles that I read all stated these stereos sounded great. And like you Mr. Mogul, I would love to hear one sometime.

Bill

[TC Chris]

At least the vendor is very thorough in the photo department....

Chris Campbell

[Firedome]

I do like the style and the 2 pc configuration, it's a potentially nice looking unit with proper restoration.

Stromberg used really high quality speakers made by them, typically their consoles has the RS-501 speakers shown or RS-405s, I had one and they were outstanding. Their speakers are the "acoustical labyrinth" type built in individual boxes that can be removed, they aren't built into the console, they're contained within the console on each side sitting on isolating pads. They typically sell for high prices, and here they're being sold as stand-alones. Here's the impressive Stromberg 12" woofers.Tweeters are dome radiator type, rather rare in consoles. Compare this to the 4 probably outsourced rather mediocre smallish-magnet 8"ers and conventional 4" cone tweeters in the Setchell.

[William]

Those Stromberg-Carlson speakers remind me of Electro-Voice speakers.

Bill

[Firedome]

They were made in-house, they made a full line. My Cabinart Rebel 5's have S-C tweeters in them, very heavy magnets,