The PHILCO Phorum

This last Friday, I was bringing a Canadian Viking RM-370 back toa shop for this nice lady that works there. Because of continuing construction due to more flooding and road repair work I took a different route. Saw this antique shop and decided to check it out for a few minutes.

Walked in the door and lo and behold there are TWO consoles sitting in the place. A Philco 40-180 right by the door and a little further in is a set with a big honking curved glass dial! Looked it over and chatted with the owner for a bit and left. Got back home and started checking out the other radio. It is an RCA 813K which evidently are fairly hard to find.

Soooo.....I went back today to look again and the price tag on the RCA was $75. Asked what the best CASH price was today and he said $50---SOLD!
Then his partner says why don't you take the Philco too? You can have that for $25----OK!

So two new consoles and now to figure out where they will go. Some pics of the RCA. Needs some help on the case and the tenite bezel is broken as almost all of them are. Also on the very back is a bakelite piece that is broken and I will have to figure out if I can make it usable or try to find another.








Gene

RCA, "all the way"! Does it also warn you that Will Robinson is "in trouble"?

That 813k is a nice set.
I have an 816k that looks the same, but it has 16 tubes, and the cabinet is a little bigger.
You can heat a room with these sets. They throw off a lot of heat.
Great sound also.
I re-finished mine. It looks great and sounds great too after a full re-cap etc.
Good luck with it.
murf

Great scores!

I have to move to the "right" coast. Would never find such great buys here. Really nice score.
Jerry

Thanks for the kind words!

I don't know about Will Robinson, but I thought that was kind of neat to have the words in the station preset spots. Evidently the owner never put any station id's in the spots.

Gene

That RCA is sweet, got some of that Jetson's design theme going.

Thanks,

Mike

It looks like that broken Bakelite part is a switch made by Cutler-Hammer, I'm not sure how common or unique it is though. My guess is that it's purpose is to either kill the motor when the dial gets to the end of travel, or reverse direction. Fortunately the mechanism is very straightforward compared to an Airline (Wells Gardner) automatic tuning mechanism.
Regards
Arran

Wow you will love the RCA-813. I have a RCA 816 and love it. Plays nice and strong.. Should not be too much difference to mine. And yours cost a whole lot less also.....Godd luck with it!

Agree with everyone, the 813K is a pretty good set!!

Nice score!!