Dumont entertainment center

[walyfd]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/186280428066?i ... R5D3_oLOYw

Here's a rare one... its got EVERYTHING you could expect but it's obviously mono...

[William]

Wow, what an impressive unit and DuMont besides. It's in Michigan, and on the side of the state where one of our forum members lives. That's a hint by the way!!!

After doing a little search I found this:

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/dumont_la ... ii_ra.html

Bill

[walyfd]

That thing had to have cost a fortune new. Didn't even think you could get a r2r then unless you had a radio station or were a spy.... and who made it?

[William]

Nosy me, when looking at the photos I noticed the two letters laying on top of the unit. They were answers to questions I customer wrote. If you enlarge the letters, it will tell you who produced the R to R and changer. Another thought, can you imagine what that thing must weigh? According to the link I provided it was produced the year I was born.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/dumont_la ... ii_ra.html

Bill

[walyfd]

I see the manual is there for it along with the rest of the paperwork. Missing the head cover. Westminster is probably easier to fix than that magnecord rca used in the 6HF1.

[electra225]

What a beautifully-built piece of equipment! I would love to have something like that and have always wanted a Dumont TV. I'll bet it weighs 400 pounds.....

[Ken Doyle]

The record changer is a Webster-Chicago model 100 3-speed record changer.

I've never seen that tape deck before.

[electra225]

A tape recorder in an early 1950's device must have been fairly exotic. Look how neatly everything is laid out compared to my Stereo Theater. There are no dangling wires anywhere. It the tuner has the ceramic shaft, that might present a challenge to get sorted. I sure hope somebody rescues it and gives it a good home. Better yet, somebody on this forum rescue it, then share the restoration with the forum.....

[Conelrad]

Back in the 70's, I worked for Channel 13 in Yuma, AZ.

They had a 'late 50's 5kW VHF Dumont transmitter at their remote TX site. It had 5 or 6 cabinets, and was a work of engineering art.

Unfortunately, we had to take it out of service due to the unavailability of tubes for it. The station had a parking lot sale, and I bought several power transformers from it for my ham transmitter.

The most curious device in that transmitter was a 'wobbulator', a small variable capacitor turned by a servo motor in the main oscillator circuit to develop the 6MC wide signal bandwidth.

DG

[19&41]

It looks like the television had continuously variable tuning. One of Dumont's peculiarities. That one looks old enough to have gotten the great one in theCavalcade Of Stars.

[TC Chris]

Crosley also used continuously variable tuning. I have a 1951 Model 11-459 MU (I think the suffix is for mahogany and the U maybe for table model). It's tuned like a radio. I haven't had it open n years but I recall that the tuning is via a coils of silver metal of about pencil-width, with rollers between the coils. Maybe an example of induction tuning by shorting out portions of a coil? Others may have more recent knowledge.

Chris Campbell

[19&41]

I'll bet that tuning system saved wear and tear on a separate fine tuning function.

[electra225]

Dumont also included the FM tuner in the TV tuner. If I was closer, I'd own that thing......

[walyfd]

If I were retired, I think I'd make a road trip for it.

[Conelrad]

Here's how it works...

https://www.radiomuseum.org/forum/mallo ... tuner.html

I have a specimen of that around here somewheres...

D

[TC Chris]

If you click on the link and get the article & photos, the lower device, the one with the large spirals, is the one used in my Crosley TV.

That is, by the way, the TV that I watched us land on the moon on. In those days, video devices had long useful lives.

Chris Campbell

[walyfd]

Imagine this new... was it possible for the lady of the house to audio record "the Guiding Light" while shopping or at a county club event? Or the man to tape a game?

It was 30 years later that home video recording came out. And a 30-year gap.

The only other unit I can think of that rivals this is that Nieman-Marcus totl from 1963

http://www.cedmagic.com/history/ampex-signature-v.html