Unsold Pre-War TV sets

[Richard_FM]

I was wondering what happened to the Televisions sets that had been made but not yet sold at the beginning of the outbreak of the Second World War.

Were the simply stored for the duration? or were some stripped of their components for the war effort?

[Heatercathodeshort]

Murphy stored their pre war receivers such as the V86 in a warehouse in Holborn, London. by courtesy of a Murphy dealer. They did this to clear space for war production. In early 1946 they were released to dealers but they had to collect their allocation from the warehouse.

Cossor hung on to their receivers hoping that the war would soon end but sold them at very much reduced prices around 1941 through a surplus distributor who advertised them in The Wireless World. J.

[Richard_FM]

Thanks for filling me in.

I was looking at some pre-war Cossor sales literature that mentioned some new sets going on sale in August 1939 & it got me thinking how many, if any actually found their way to customers before the outbreak of war.

[MurphyNut]

I would imagine anyone purchasing a TV set just before the war would be feeling rather sick, The outbreak of war in 1939 brought programmes to a sudden halt.
Unless you were well off enough to have bought a set with a built in radio.

[turretslug]

How much notice was there of cessation of transmissions, and how widely was this notice known? It must have been prominent in the authorities' minds that the AP signal would be an excellent navigation beacon, and many people would have had increasing foreboding about what was surely coming in the near future, so investment in a very expensive item with a likely limited span of usage must have seemed unwise to many potential purchasers- say from 18 months pre-September 1939.

[Heatercathodeshort]

I believe it was turned off without announcement half way through a Micky Mouse cartoon.
The Radio Show [RadiOlympia] at Olympia was on at the time.

[turretslug]

Well, well- somewhat abrupt! I suppose that folk were more deferential then and would just have accepted that that was the way things were, and that there were more worrying things going on besides than no more telly.

I'd wondered if it was felt that any announcement that the service would be cut in the event of war would be bad for morale in an era when there was enough foreboding anyway. At least hopefully that, rather than pressure from TV manufacturers not to jeopardise a prestigious market.

[bobsterkent]

I believe it was turned off without announcement half way through a Micky Mouse cartoon.

this was the popular myth. the PasB for the day shows what actually happened

https://www.teletronic.co.uk/pages/h...the_bbc_7.html

[Heatercathodeshort]

Three adverts from the Wireless World dated March, September and December 1941.

The adverts mention Cossor receivers including the 54 and 65 models including the 1210. There are other advertisements for what looks like GEC and Baird/Bush EHT transformers and other parts but no name is mentioned. I cannot find the editions but must be around this date.
I doubt if many receivers were manufactured, probably just enough to cover the Radio Show orders. John.

[FERNSEH]

Interesting to note that many of the chassis units in my post-war Ekco TSC30 were date stamped in 1939.

DFWB.

[Richard_FM]

I've heard about the sudden turn off of Mickey Mouse being a myth before, not helped by Blue Peter recreating it in a feature on the Second World War in 1989.

I wouldn't be surprised if many stored sets had their valves "borrowed" for other purposes & replaced when eventually sold.

[turretslug]

I also wonder what sort of state many of those stored NOS pre-war sets that were finally released post-war were in- I daresay that there were more pressing things to worry about in the meantime than ensuring optimum storage conditions over six-odd years and things like EHT transformers of the era must have been prone to deterioration, never mind more mundane components such as paper and electrolytic capacitors with their inherent tendency to go "off" in the best of circumstances. Presumably each set would have needed a significant dose of dealer TLC before release?

[emeritus]

According to Wiki, "Mickey's Gala Premier" has a running time of 7 minutes, which fits exactly into its designated slot in the documentary record of the last day's schedule.

[Heatercathodeshort]

The loudspeaker in the Murphy A56V at the museum is dated November 1939. It is without doubt original equipment. J.

[Heatercathodeshort]

I was fortunate enough to have a customer who visited Radio Olympia in 1939 with the intention of buying a television receiver. She told me that during the show the service had closed. She promised herself that if she survived the war and as soon as television commenced she would purchase one.
She told me it was incredibly difficult to obtain one as they were on limited back order. Eventually she badgered her local Pye dealer and had a D16T installed a day before the Victory Parade in London.
I have that very receiver complete with the guide to the parade supplied with the D16T.
It still works very well. She said one of the highlights of early television was the televising of the Olympic Games from Wembley in 1948.

She was a real character. The family business had been a large chain of off licences and a huge builders merchants that still bears the family name high in the brickwork. The shop had been built in 1880 but was demolished and rebuilt in 1906 to widen the road for the new electric trams. She lived with her brother in a large double fronted house built by her Grandfather in Colliers Wood now sadly demolished. A typical early television receiver owner.
It was great chatting Nancy! John.

[beery]

Hi all,
I have heard people mention that the little TV/Radio combos from EMI were sold without tubes, just as radios. Can anyone confirm this?

Maybe they had two speaker grills. This is what I thought may have been the case when I first saw the HMV 905 that I bought (see attached photo). This of course turned out not to be the case with this particular set, the clue being that the grills are not original HMV ones.

Cheers
Andy

[Richard_FM]

Thanks again for the feedback.

My great Grandparents were quite early TV adoptors in spite of being working class.

As there were a few adults living in the same house they could all pool enough money to afford to rent a set in 1948.

[G6Tanuki]

Originally Posted by beery

Hi all,
I have heard people mention that the little TV/Radio combos from EMI were sold without tubes, just as radios. Can anyone confirm this?

Quite possible: back then there were all sorts of 'dodges' used to avoid the punitive levels of Purchase Tax applied to what were perceived as luxury-goods, and the ongoing need for 'utility' marking

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CC41

on things like furniture, which continued until the early-50s. This sort-of mirrors the pre-WWII period when radios were often sold without valves [your dealer can supply... often imported.... valves from his 'replacement' stock] to escape the various levies-of-the-time that the BVA were able to inflict on the makers of complete receivers.

I'm fascinated not only by the technology and social aspects of the emerging radio/TV industry, but also by the economic aspects, many of which resulted in creativity just as great as that shown in the electronics.

[chriswood1900]

It is interesting to note that the adverts posted by John suggest the use of the Cossor 54 as an Oscilloscope which they were probably quite well suited. I remember having having a conversation with Mike Barker about his and the buyer was writing to Cossor about circuit information to use it for that.
Chris

[emeritus]

It could have been a dodge to avoid purchase tax, which was usually levied on the total cost, even where some items were PT exempt when sold separately. In the 1960's it was cheaper to buy a cine reel and can individually rather than a can containing a reel. No PT was payable on an empty can, but it was payable when sold together with a reel as a single packaged item.