Television digest and FM reports (Jan-Dec 1948)

Record Details:

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frequencies enough to cause "Venetian blind" to move fast enough to become invisible. That helped some, but apparently not enough. Synchronization is next on agenda. Princeton engineers hope to have data ready for FCC tropospheric conferences due at end of this month. If successful, system poses at least one interesting problem: Since many co-channel stations overlap, would they all have to be synchronized together in a sort of chain effect? Meanwhile. FCC engineers are working hard to complete channel studies, allowing for troposphere, for release Nov. 15 (Vol. 4:42). As you'd expect, first study, based on proposed allocation, is showing all kinds of interference; second study, based on protection to 500 uv/m contours 90% of time, and leaving present grants alone, permits almost no more grants in the East. JTAC has tendered its good offices in the troposphere matter, can be expected to render valuable aid, as it did in uhf, though it hasn't much time to gather data before conferences. SHAKING ^BUGS' OUT OF CHANNEL 13: We now have reports from all operating Channel 13 stations (WATV, Newark; WAAM, Baltimore; WSPD-TV, Toledo; KLAC-TV, Los Angeles) — and thus far only WATV reports difficulties (Vol. 4:28-38). None of rest has any complaints; quite the contrary, they report good propagation — and from no less a personage than FCC Comr. Bob Jones we have testimony that he watched good pictures from WSPD-TV election night at his home town Lima, 65 mi. away. In WATV's case, all hands now apparently are satisfied equipment isn't at fault (though RCA is replacing antenna next week to remove any shadow of doubt). So it can be deduced that site, propagation, receiving antennas, or combinations thereof, are to blame. You'll recall WATV consultant Glenn Gillett's assertion during tropospheric hearing (Vol. 4:38) that high band needs 10-15 times power of low band to equal coverage. If so, station either has to get more power or move closer to center of population, or both. In addition, public and servicemen have to be educated about need for properly cut and oriented receiving antennas. New York's WPIX (Channel 11) is doing yeoman job of latter with booklet "Did You Know?" describing problems and solutions. REPORT OH THE PICTURE TUBE OUTLOOK: Keystone of TV production problem is the pic ture tube — and signs are multiplying that, though they may not catch up to demand for several years, the tube makers are coming along nicely. "Sleepers" of the industry may be GE and Sylvania, neither of whom will divulge anything beyond obvious fact that they're expanding; coming along well, too, in field heretofore dominated by RCA (DuMont, larger sizes), are Rauland, Lansdale, National Union, Philips. Yet despite prospects of his own and RCA's metal-coned tubes (Vol. 4:45), despite assurances of both Corning and Kimble that glass blanks will be plentiful next year (Vol. 4:15,32,42), tube maker Allen DuMont sees situation next year as "worse" than this year because tube processing capacity is so limited; by worse, though, he means inability to keep up with accelerating demand, to satisfy voracious appetites of his tube customers. Dr. DuMont declined to verify a published report quoting his tube manager Irving Rosenberg as saying DuMont has sold more than $5,000,000 worth of tubes already during first 10 months of this year (vs. $1,700,000 all last year) and expects to quadruple production in 1949. Even if only partially true, it's significant. Apparently not too concerned about RCA and DuMont 16-in. metal-glass tubes, Kimble Glass (Owens-Illinois) announced it will begin producing 16-in. all-glass bulbs early in 1949. Gen. mgr. Stanley J. McGiveran asserted: "Glass, in our opinion, is the most suitable material, even for such large bulbs. Our experience in sealing glass to metal over large sealing areas has never been too satisfactory... the long-range price of this all-glass bulb should be lower than the price of bulbs made of a combination of substitute materials." McGiveran estimated not more than 10% of 1949 TV sets will use his new 16-in. bulb, which would hint at expected output of at least 150,000. As for 10 and 12)2-in. bulbs, McGiveran writes: "The glass industry has definitely caught up with the tube manufacturers' consumption of bulbs, even from the standpoint of balance as respects sizes."