Broadcasting Telecasting (Oct-Dec 1957)

MANUFACTURING continued FINISHING touches are put on the first videotape recording-playback machines to come off the Ampex Corp. assembly line in Redwood City, Calif., fulfilling a production schedule announced seven months ago. KING-TV Seattle and KGW-TV Portland, Ore., got two of the first four production models [At Deadline, Nov. 18], priced at $45,000 each. Prototype models of the Ampex machines have been used by networks for the past year. Ampex says it has solved the color problem and later will make electronic conversion units available. T-l steel, a quenched and tempered low carbon alloy. Features claimed for T-l are ability to withstand unusual stresses, resulting in lower space and bulk requirements and high resistance to atmospheric corrosion. Another Dresser-Ideco-designed tower utilizing T-l is the 1,199-ft. structure built for WBZ-TV Boston to replace the one it lost to Hurricane Carol. A 44% space saving was made in the cross-sectional area of the leg bars in the Boston tower because of the new steel's strength, it is claimed. T-l tower legs, thinner and stronger than those of structural carbon steel, result in decreased wind pressure in addition to material savings, according to the supplier. Fort Pitt to Drop Brewing, Concentrate on Electronics Fort Pitt Industries Inc., Pittsburgh, Pa., which has completed arrangements to lease its Fort Pitt beer label to Gunther Brewing Co. of Baltimore, is negotiating with an unidentified manufacturer of phonograph equipment to market the high fidelity products of its subsidiary, J. P. Seeburg Corp. The disclosure came simultaneously with Fort Pitt's announcement it is relinquishing its brewery activity and concentrating on the electronics work of the Chicago-based Seeburg firm. Seeburg, which manufactures record-playing assemblies for jukeboxes and for broadcast and industrial use, has a reported backlog of specialized electronic equipment amounting to $6.5 million. Electronics and missile research at Seeburg is being accelerated in view of the government's expected boost in missile production. Tv Set Output in Next Decade: Hotpoint Predicts 96.3 Million The American tv set-manufacturing industry will ship some 53.2 million monochrome and 43.1 million color receivers to market by the end of 1967. That prediction was projected by Hotpoint Co. in its annual ten-year appliance forecast last week. The Hotpoint breakdown foresees factory shipments of seven million tv sets in 1957. including 200,000 color units. By 1962, however, color should account for four million out of 9.6 million receivers. The turning point in the balance between black-andwhite and color sets should be reached in 1963, with the latter accounting for 5.2 million out of a predicted 10 million shipments. From then on, color tv sets will continue to exceed monochrome, reaching 8.5 million as against 2.6 million monochrome units in 1967. The color timetable in Hotpoint's breakdown, which seeks to depict industry growth and sales potential for dealers and distributors, follows: 1958—300,000 (out of 7,650,000 sets overall); 1959—450,000 (8,150,000); 1960 — 1 million (8.7 million); 1961—2 million (9.2 million); 1962 — 4 million (9.6 million); 1963—5.2 million (10 million); 1964—6.5 million (10,350,000); 1965—7.2 million (10.7 million); 1966—8 million (10.9 million); 1967—8.5 million (11.1 million). Neary Retires at Lehigh Dec. 1 John F. Neary, sales manager of the radio and export division, Lehigh Structural Steel Co., New York, a major supplier of towers for radio-tv stations, retires Dec 1 . He has been with Lehigh 25 years and prior to that was with Blaw-Knox and Miliken Bros. Mfg. Co. ...its words to the wise are sufficient COfiffl'MTIBS'S Ml "For the same reasons that the best ad lib is a well-rehearsed ad lib, the TelePrompTer is an essential ingredient for best on-the-air performance." Mr. Ewald Kockritz Vice President, Director of Programming Storer Broadcasting Company You can ad lib the words as well as the message with TelePrompTer 11 CORPORATION Jim Blair, Equip. Sales Mgr. 311 West 43rd Street, New York 36, N. Y., JUdson 2-3800 The TelePro 6000 is the only rear screen projector that offers complete remote control. Page 94 • November 25, 1957 Broadcasting