Bush TV 105R 405 line

[dazzlevision]

Originally Posted by dseymo1

I suspect that the 'convertable' sets were no more than a marketing ploy.
Of course, manufacturers had to make conversion kits available to support their claims, but how many were actually fitted?

Hello,

Most of them seemed to end up with Mr A Sylvester of Manor Supplies in West End Lane, West Hampstead, London! That's where I bought several from.

Regards,

Dazzlevision

[Heatercathodeshort]

Conversion to BBC2 was a damp squib. 90% of the programmes were utter rubbish and not worthy of television entertainment. That is what happens when you tell the public what they are going to receive rather than listen to what they actually want. Add to this the problems of keeping the actual receiver tuned to channel 33 and managing to get enough signal down that fat co-ax to produce a signal of entertainment value.
I had many customers with full dual standard receivers complete with tuners that could not be bothered to install the UHF aerial needed. A glance at the Radio Times will prove the point. The worst of the Third Programme with pictures. [Just about if you were lucky]
All this made my business literally swing with 405 line receivers. They were easy to repair, gave brilliant pictures in terrible locations [even basements] and were available in large quantities from the rental companies who's customers thought they were entitled to have BBC2 even if they never actually watched it, and they didn't. I sold good reliable receivers for as little as £10 with a guarantee and the bed sit world loved me!
Compare this with the reconditioned receiver market of 1955/56. It was virtually impossible to sell a model without the 'ITA' and service guys had to convert all manner of odd receivers with double sideband alignment, odd I.F. frequencies and all manner of problems just to make a single channel receiver saleable. He certainly earned his money. [Hello Peter. N.]

The Bush TV105R sits exactly in the middle of one of the most destructive periods of television history. Many top familiar brands either folded or were taken over during the 60-63 period. I can instantly think of six famous names.
This was all due in the large part to a long committee [Oh! help us from focus groups and the well informed] led by [Lord?] Pilkington on the future of broadcasting. The end result was an excellent decision but it took far too long resulting in red top newspapers informing readers that if they purchased a new telly now it would not work tomorrow. This halted sales overnight and the manufacturers ran out of customers and had warehouses full of unsold receivers.
This situation led to the dummy 405/625 switches being fitted to cabinets to at least give prospective customers hope that the receiver would still function when the 405 was switched off 'next week'. Little did they know that excellent, unbeatable, indestructible system would be with us for another twenty three years! It actually had longer to go than it had already gone if you get 'my drift' [Oh! I never thought I would say that]. All manufacturers had to offer conversion if the model had a dummy switch but only a tiny proportion were converted. This resulted in thousands of conversion units built for the expected conversion rush being surplus to requirements, eventually to be sold off by firms such as Manor Supplies at knock down prices. It was time to allow the young TV enthuiasts and experimenters to have some fun!
Thank you BBC for your poor BBC2 programme content. You did me proud! Happy days, John.

[alanmoore]

What an entertaing piece to read. I remember I was only five years old when BBC 2 started. My late father rented a Thorn 850 variant with fm radio in late 1963 from DER , I only have very vague memories of the set it replaced. This was also rented from DER. As you say there was very little on with any mass entertainment value. Certainly nothing for children ,exept Playschool ,for which I was a bit too old , having started school in Jan 64 . I do remember watching it though, must have been in the easter holidays. I Balham we reicived a rather noisy picture on an indoor loop aerial. This improved considerably when we had a loft aerial fitted. I think we only had BBC so early was because my father was a bit of a culture vulture, and liked classical music and opera.

[Nicklyons2]

John, a friend always used to say "Rank, in more ways than one - should have stuck to flour milling", he never forgave them for, as he saw it , running his beloved Bush & Murphy into the buffers. The Pilkington Committee; almost a thing of legend, I believe members toured the world looking at different line systems (in their native environment) so as to ascertain that a picture with more lines might be better. Perhaps they couldn't trust the BBC to arrange demonstrations of different line standards in case the 'Beeb' nobbled the results so as to keep 405. I don't know whether this is true or not but I was told during Pilkington 'hearings' one politician suggested the change to 625 could be undertaken by adding a few lines a week and viewers could just tweak the line-hold week by week until we reached 625. It's always good when politicians interfere in technology they're so well equipped to grasp the problem.....

At the end of 405 we were told that no-one was watching and when it was switched off no-one would notice; that was the 'press report'. In practice the situation was quite different, many rural areas (pre-satellite) were very poorly served by the UHF service whereas, as John has pointed out above, the 405 VHF service was good, particularly in remote parts of Scotland BBC 1 Band I was all they could get. Even in the comparatively well populated and UHF served West Yorks there were still quite a few watching right up to the end; so much so that a few weeks before the close-down a public meeting was held in Huddersfield Town Hall. One of the staff at Emley Moor was to attend & explain the position. He told me " I expected about 4 people to be there, when I went in there were around 300 all looking as if they were about to lynch me". As he pointed out, if there are so many willing to turn out - how many others might there be. Particularly in the remote areas where there was no real alternative I just couldn't understand why they just didn't leave the equipment running.

[audiomagpie]

Originally Posted by alanmoore

As you say ther which I was a bit too old , having started school in Jan 64 .

Month I was born!! I feel quite young in the company of you guys!

A clever, if not desperate marketing ploy then to fit the 'dummy' 405/625 buttons.

Greg

[FERNSEH]

Originally Posted by Heatercathodeshort

All this made my business literally swing with 405 line receivers.
Compare this with the reconditioned receiver market of 1955/56. It was virtually impossible to sell a model without the 'ITA' and service guys had to convert all manner of odd receivers with double sideband alignment, odd I.F. frequencies and all manner of problems just to make a single channel receiver saleable. He certainly earned his money. [Hello Peter. N.]

And here is an example of one those odd TVs from the early '50s that was converted to ITV. A Masteradio T852 fitted with a Masteradio incremental switch tuner.
The early days of my business are a total contrast to how John did things. I was obsessed with 625 line TV, got to get rid of 405 at all costs. I converted to dual standard just about any set I could including the Bush TV115, although I drew the line at the 405 only TV105.

DFWB.

[audiomagpie]

I've removed the tuner to see what has happened to the push buttons, 3 of which were just floating on their respective shafts. The buttons have a plastic insert with a 'cross shaped' hollow, enabling them to mesh with the splines on each of the four tuning shafts so they can be turned to adjust accordingly.
As can be seen in the photos, the hollows have become round holes with wear and tear, so now spin and do nothing.

Wondering how to get around this, I might just set the tuner to the Aurora channel and stick the tuner back it, with the push buttons looking the part but not doing anything else!
If it was a rare or valuable set I might have a bit more incentive to come up with a more permanent solution!

Greg

[AC/HL]

That was common, the fourth button survived because there were usually only 3 channels available. The temporary fix (and it was just that) was to pack the knob with paper or some such.

[Heatercathodeshort]

I'll have a look. No promises but you never know! J.

[Nicklyons2]

I've got 4 knobs of the same type here: 2 are hopeless 1 isn't too bad and the 4th is pretty good. PM me if you want to give the best 2 a go and if HeaterCathode can come up with another you may get sorted.
Nick

[alynG1TBL]

One fix is to use Milliput in the worn hole, and make a new cross-shaped hollow. Repeat for the other worn push buttons. Alyn

[Heatercathodeshort]

Just about every push button but yours! Unbelievable!
Ideas that come to mind. Alyn's above will make a solid job.
What about cutting some slots [cross] in some steel washers and fixing them with maybe Superglue to the knob bases or some cup washers that will actually fit over the ends of the knobs suitably filed out. I think the replacement knobs supplied by RBM had aluminium ends but it was a long time ago. It was the constant fiddling when customers had room aerials that wore them out.
J.

[dazzlevision]

Hello,

If you are still stuck for these Bush TV105R VHF tuner pushbuttons, let me know how long (front to back) they are and I will have a look in my "stores".

I take it they are brown in colour.

Regards,

Dazzlevision

[audiomagpie]

Thanks for your offers of buttons and also taking the trouble to look through your supplies.
I've come up with a solution. The results aren't pretty, but robust and can't be seen with the tuner unit back in the set. I've got some large paper clips lying around. I drilled a 2.5mm hole in each shaft (was easy) and each pushbutton, cut off sections of said large paper clip, threaded through and folded. Probably wouldn't have been seen as an acceptable solution in the trade for a customers set, but as once tuned to the Aurora the buttons won't get much use anyway. Pleased with my little improvisation (read- bodge!)

Next task is to remove chassis and tube to clean behind front glass.

Greg

[FERNSEH]

Nothing wrong with that job. Excellent.

DFWB.

[ALANS ANITAS]

Was it LL-J who suggested using the original type of (fibre) Rawlplug to pad out the buttons.

ALAN

[audiomagpie]

The chassis, then tube were easily removed so I could now clean the inside of the implosion screen and the tube face. Most of the debris that had collected in there was indeed rotted foam strip (just like draught excluder) that the manufacturers had put there to keep any debris out! I'm sure the foam did it's job for many years. The manufacturers weren't expecting some sad anorak to be playing with it in his workshop some 50 years hence!

On the inside of the front glass, there is a black strip that has 'bush' and 'nineteen' printed on it, in the same fashion as a radio tuning scale. Whilst cleaning away with lashings of window cleaning spray, I noticed some black coming off onto my cleaning rag. Yes, I'd started to disolve the ink. Using some high quality black insulating tape, I managed a repair, phew! See the piccy's.

While the chassis was out, I replaced a few tired looking waxies while access was good. I slightly touched the PL36 line output valve with the vacuum cleaner nozzle and it just cracked and came away from it's base. Fortunately had another in stock.

On reassembling it all, I now have no picture, A1 volts at the tube very low at 40 odd volts. Talk about doing one job and creating another! So I'm going to retrace my cap replacing steps very carefully first in case I've done anything daft! 'Said it was all going too well!

Greg

[Heatercathodeshort]

Put the dusters away and stop poking things!
Don't feel bad about the PL36. The Bakelite base appears to expand less than the glass envelope and very often the cause of 'no picture' was a neatly cracked PL36. This was common in all makes but I remember it more often in the TV105/125 series.
That foam gets everywhere and most of it ends up in the vacuum cleaner. The AW47-90/91 CRT is one of the best so the results will be brilliant.
The chassis looks very original and was probably working when consigned to the loft. Good luck with it. Regards, John.

[audiomagpie]

So there's a reason for everything. It worked before I removed the chassis, now it didn't, what had I done?

I found C111, brightness stabilizer cap from the wiper of the brightness pot, which I had changed, should be 0.25uf. I should have fitted a 0.22, but had fitted a 0.022! This would have upset the bias to the tube grid and also have an effect on the frame blanking part of the circuit (I think!)

Anyway, all back together and up and running again. Had enough this evening but next time will run it warm and tweak the pots for the best picture, although it 'aint far off. Doesn't show on camera but 2.5 Mc/s resolution pattern is quite clear. Yes it is a good tube John, picture has a good crisp black and white contrast rather than (dare I say it) fifty shades of grey! And the push buttons work a treat!

Greg

[Heatercathodeshort]

Well done Greg! They made 'proper' tellies back then. Cheers, John.