Showmen's Trade Review (Oct-Dec 1949)

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SHOWMEN'S TRADE REVIEW, October 15, 1949 E-7 Flood of New Projection Aids Presented at TESMA Exhibit Arc Lamps, Screens and Drive-In Speakers Lead Parade of Improved Equipment for Presenting Better Pictures and Sound New equipment for projection and sound constituted the star exhibits at the Chicago Tesma-Teda convention of September 28th-30th. An account of that convention, and of the many other items of theatre supply and equipment displayed there, will be found elsewhere in this issue of Showmen's. New projection and sound items, described here, accounted for nearly half of all the displays unveiled — a surprising number of new and original items. New lamps, new screens and new drivein speakers led the parade of projection and sound displays. Prominent among the new lamps shown was the Strong Electric Corporation's "Mighty Ninety" pictured on this page and described in detail elsewhere in this issue. C. S. Ashcraft Manufacturing Company also demonstrated their new Superhigh lamp (STR for September 17th, Page E-25). And among others were the latest model Forest Electronic lamp (STR for May 28, Page E-18), the newest Motiograph-Hall (STR for February 5, Page E-17) and the very new Brenkert Supertensity. Ballantyne and Robin arc lamps were likewise on display. New Kinds of Screens A wide variety of news screens was exhibited; some of the conventional perforated type, but made of new and superior plastics whereby they can be shipped folded instead of rolled (they will not crease) ; and some of entirely new materials. Among the latter were the Starke Cycloramic, woven of three plies One of the new motor-generators displayed by Motiograph. It is rated at 70-140 amperes and vertically mounted to minimize floor space required. A 115/230 ampere model, horizontally built, was also displayed. Harry H. Strong, President of Strong Electric Corporation (left) and Harold Plumadore, business Agent of Local No. 228, Toledo, Ohio, inspect the newest Strong lamp, the '"Mighty Ninety" just unveiled at the Tesma-Teda Trade Show. Lamp is described in detail elsewhere in this issue. of chemically-impregnated cotton (STR for September 17th, Page E-28) and the Nu-Screen Corporation's Glascreen of woven glass fabric (STR for August 20th, Page E-20). Williams Screen Company was represented at the Ballantyne booth by a new seamless screen (distributed by Ballantyne) claimed to be practically tearproof and rupture-proof, to recover automatically from dents and depressions, and to be immune to expansion or contraction caused by moisture. RCA showed a new Snowhite with an entirely different perforation pattern and heavier weave; Da-lite Screen Co., Radiant Manufacturing Corp. and Raytone Screen Corp. were all represented by new and superior products. The whole trend in screen development appeared to be (a) toward the use of new and different materials, such as woven glass or chemically-impregnated cotton or (b) toward the use of conventional materials of superior quality, that is, the newer and better plastics. Drive-In Equipment Items Continued expansion of drive-in projection and sound equipment was also a prominent feature among the Tesma exhibits. The popularity of drive-ins as a new and prospering factor in show business is doubtless one reason why so many of the new lamps shown this year have either water cooled or specially air-cooled positive carbon holders (The Huff positive carbon cooler was also on display; DeVry Corporation, as will be noted later, demonstrated a projector m_echanism with forced air cooling of the aperture; and Century Projector Co. had a new watercooled aperture.) Numbers of new in-car speakers were shown: among others, Autocrat, Inc., Diecast Aluminum Speakers, Inc., Drive-In Theatre Equipment Co., Drive-In Theatre Manufacturing Co., and DX Radio Products Co., offered models not previously introduced. A trend was evident in direction of using larger speaker cones, for better sound quality, in the later models of in-car speakers. Whitney Blake Company showed a number of moisture-proof underground wires and cables for the most economical wiring of drive-ins, and coiled cords for connection to in-car speakers. The blower-equipped projection port for drive-ins, (STR for August 20th, Page E-24), designed to keep dust, rain, flies and bugs away from the projection lens, was displayed by Drive-In Theatre Manufacturing Co. Air-Cooled Projector Mechanism DeVry Corporation showed their new ■'Koolite" system in which the DeVry Model 12,000 combination projector-soundhead is fitted with two small, motordriven fans. An air blast is directed over the aperture rails and past the film face, while the exhaust unit both removes heated air from the projector and additionally cools the shutter blades. The tested result, according to the manufac(Continued on Page E-17) DeVry 12,000 projector-soundhead with aircooled aperture. Air blast cools film face and aperture rails and (after it has been exhausted from projector) also cools the shutter blades.