|
November 1969 Electronics World
Table of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Electronics World, published May 1959
- December 1971. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
|
The monthly "Radio &
Television News" column in Electronics World magazine always contained
an interesting mish-mash of industry happenings. As mentioned many times before,
the 1960s was an era of huge transitions in the electronics and communications fields,
in all aspects including military, automotive, aerospace, domestic, commercial,
industrial, and hobby. It was a heyday for just about all involved - designers,
manufacturers, customers - except the poor service guys who had to keep everything
working. Homeowners with problematic television sets - particularly the expensive,
newfangled color sets - notoriously made technicians' lives Heck. Some outfits deserved
the grief, but most could barely turn a profit because if the manufacturer wasn't
cheating the serviceman out of payment for warranty work, housewives and husbands
would try to finagle their way out of paying for service. A search here on RF Cafe will turn
up lots of horror stories (from the technician's perspective). During this period,
a big push was underway to both license and unionize service technicians in
order to help
weed out the poor performers, and reward competence with a living wage. This month's
"guest" editorial column, written by the president of Sprague Products Company,
is titled, "A Plea For.. A United Service Association."
Radio & Television News
 By Forest H. Belt /Contributing Editor
Trinitron Makes It
After repeated new-set "announcements" over the past three years, Sony is finally
getting its 12 -inch color portable into the U.S. market. You'll be seeing ads -
in full color, appropriately enough - telling how and why the "Trinitron" picture
tube is "better" than shadow - mask tubes. The Trinitron, you may remember, is a
one-gun color tube that produces three beams. The red, green, and blue phosphors
are laid down in vertical stripes on the screen. They are masked by an aperture
grille, a sheet of thin bars that make sure the deflected beams fall on the proper
color phosphors. Ads claim greater brightness over shadow-mask tubes. American tube-makers
may challenge that, since they have the new black-surround and new gadolinium phosphors
on their super-bright color CRT's. Numbers of the small Sony sets are still limited.
A larger-screen version has been introduced in Japan, and will probably make it
to the U.S. some time in 1970.
X-Rays - Clean Bill of Health
The Bureau of Radiological Health, the new arm of the U.S. Department of Health,
Education, and Welfare, now admits it has no evidence that television x-radiation
has ever caused any illness or other harmful effect. This revelation came with BRH's
final setting of reasonable standards for color-set radiation. The schedule looks
something like this:
(1) By January 1970, all properly adjusted color sets coming off factory assembly
lines must emit no more than 0.5 mR/hr of x-radiation; that's a sensible limit,
far below any possible harmful dose, and much more practical than the 0.1 mR/hr
which was to be demanded, according to earlier reports.
(2) By June 1970, color sets must include some means of limiting x-radiation
to 0.5 mR/hr, even when badly misadjusted.
(3) By some time in 1971, chassis design must be such that radiation cannot exceed
the limit, no matter what kind of breakdown occurs in the chassis.
This still may not be the end of news about x-rays in color sets. The subject
has now become a matter of concern to the fraud divisions of many police departments.
It seems a rash of gimmick- pushers are capitalizing on the public's lingering fear
of the possibility of x-rays from color TV. Small do-it-yourself "x-ray measuring
kits" are popping up, some at ridiculous prices. In the opinion of BRH, none of
these gadgets - usually only a few pieces of film - is of any significant value
in detecting excess radiation. Maybe this new angle is something the politicians
who have been looking for windmills to tilt can get their lances into.
More Super-Bright Picture Tubes
After RCA and Zenith almost simultaneously announced their new extra-bright color
picture tubes, with black masking around each phosphor dot to cut down wasted beam
energy, other makers joined in. Admiral has one with the black-surround like RCA's;
General Electric has one with new brighter gadolinium phosphors; Motorola has a
bright-phosphor tube; Sylvania has a brighter version with "improved" phosphors;
Magnavox will buy someone's version for its high-end models. Brighter screens mean
higher prices, too. All sets using the new CRT's carry net prices higher than equivalent
models without the bright tubes.
From the Top
It's no wonder consumers complain. A lot of them get raw treatment. Service people
give them excuses why the set can't be fixed properly, promptly, or reasonably.
Complaint managers turn a deaf ear or give an unknowing shrug to questions about
warranty. Manufacturers can't come up with replacement parts, even for sets that
are a year old. Is it any wonder consumer protectionists are having a field day?
What seems to annoy people most is the uncaring attitude that is so common these
days. It's bad to generalize, but this serious problem is plaguing most of the country
today. It is especially damaging to the already embattled service business. It's
too easy to give a smart-aleck answer, to feign ignorance, to just shrug off responsibility
to customers. Whatever happened to plain old-fashioned courtesy?
Something we've noticed. If you can't get satisfaction from a front -line employee,
you're not likely to get any more satisfaction "on up the line." The fact is, employee
attitudes reflect those "up the line." Over and over. you'll find that evasive,
discourteous attitudes in the lower echelon of an organization have filtered down
from above. If you feel the person you're dealing with doesn't really care that
you have a problem with whatever you bought, you can safely bet the boss doesn't
care either. Check it out some time.
Then turn around and apply it to your own relations with customers ... or those
of your employees. Do you consider your customers inconveniences, especially when
something goes wrong with whatever you sold them? If you do, your employees will,
too. Those are the kinds of attitudes that are justifying the new laws Congress
is arming consumers with. When the worm turns. will it be on you? Have you been
treating your customers, whoever they are, the way you want to be treated?
Television Satellite for Canada
The distinction of being first with satellite-beamed domestic television seems
likely to go to our neighbor to the north. Telesat, as it is called, goes into a
parking orbit early in 1972. It will hover over the equator and concentrate its
directional antenna over the entire area of Canada. The beam will touch some of
our northernmost states and Alaska. We're helping design the bird and our own NASA
will launch it. But the project is strictly Canadian. We might get some use from
it in Alaska, but no agreement to this effect has been signed.
The satellite will have six two-way TV-type channels. Two of them will be subdivided
into hundreds of communications channels for telephone circuits to remote regions.
One will be held in reserve in case another fails. Only three will carry television.
The Canadians, for the good of their outlying territories, overcame most of the
thorny political problems that keep the U.S. from having domestic satellites; we
might pick up some pointers from their way of getting it done.
Whose Fault?
Visiting in shops around the country, we sometimes get some eye-opening viewpoints
about "what's wrong with the repair business." In a midwestern shop not long ago.
it was obvious business was bad and getting worse. The owner had laid off his two
men. although one helped out evenings on occasion. Inevitably. the talk got around
to what makes the business "so bad."
This technician/owner insisted he is a victim of circumstances. We put the question,
"What does the technician or the industry do wrong ?"
He answered. "Nothing. You can't blame the serviceman. It's just a rotten business.
The customers give you hell for no reason at all. Nearly half my calls are to go
hack and fix some set that didn't stay fixed. And the customer wants it for free
this time. It's not my fault the sets won't stay fixed. If the manufacturer only
made the sets right, there wouldn't be any need for so much repair work. And the
chiseling customers won't let you charge enough to make anything even when you fix
it. No, it's just a lousy business. I'm gonna close up shop one of these days and
get a decent job."
The windows were dirty. The floor hadn't been swept in weeks. The bench was cluttered.
There were no shelves and the chassis were strewn around the floor. The owner wore
dirty shirt and trousers. The newest piece of test equipment was about 12 years
old, and a narrow-band scope was under the bench covered with dirt. There was one
drawer with a few sheets of service literature. "I do my servicing mostly from memory,"
he told us.
For him it really is a rotten business. But we simply couldn't agree that he
was doing everything right. This man isn't a victim of circumstances; they [the
circumstances] are his victim.
Flashes in the Big Picture
One complaint about inboard warranties is that manufacturer picks servicer; Midland
International Corp. of Kansas City, lets customer choose own service company if
warranty repairs become necessary... New Chairman of FCC is Dean Burch, former Republican
National Chairman; replaces Rosel H. Hyde... Station manager and owner Robert Wells
replaces James J. Wadsworth as FCC Commissioner; first time in long time Commission
has had experienced broadcaster... New booklet "How to Buy Color TV" produced by
Electronic Industries Association and Better Business Bureau; quantities ($3 per
100) from National Better Business Bureau. 320 Park Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10017...
PhilcoFord supplied thousand transistor radios to help rescue agencies get word
to Hurricane Camille victims... Electric utility companies are helping dealers in
their areas promote color-TV sales; example is Cincinnati Gas & Electric, with
theme "Color Turns You On;" helps several hundred dealers.
|
