7412533629

1

1

By JOHN T. FRYE

{

BARNEY always moaned and groaned a good bit about having to "slave away" in Macs Sorvic? Shop; but aftcr having been on v*acation two wccks. hc found himself strangely eagor to got back into his shop-coat. Naturally. he would never admit this. Instead. he camc bounding into the service department this Monday morn-ing litcrally bursting with wild tales of how reluctantly he tore himself away from the nrms of the gorgoous, amorous females surrounding his un-cle’s Colorado ranch.

"Howdy. pardner—he started to greet his employer and then broke ofT short as he spied an affair of gleaming aluminum standing in the middle of the floor. "Oh. oh!." he said accusing-ly: "you went and got something new while I was gone. You do it every time. What on earth is it?"

"What does it look like?" Mac asked quizzically.

"Weil." Barney reflected. "at the bot-tom it looks like an office chair; in the middle. like a metal lathe; and at the top, like a praying mantis—king-size. that is."

"Very good!" Mac said with a chuckle. "Actually its a Tel-a-Turn.* manufactured by the Rogrrs Manu-facturing Compuny of Lindsey. Ohio. You might describc it as a rolling scrv-ice-bench-and-chassis-cradle for holding and turning through 360 degrces 7n a horizontal axis any radio. TV. hi-fi, transmitter. turntable. or other chassis ranging from 9" to 25" in width and weighing up to 200 pounds. That four-legged castcred floor stand does look like* the bot tom part of an office chair; the fiat bench with the two up-right stands at the ends and the chas-sis-rotating wheel on the gear stand reminds a person of a lathe; and a *L.uxo* lamp. such as the one mounted on top of the speaker stand, always reminds me of a praying mantis."

"Why do you cali this one a 'speaker stand*?"

"Because a lit tle PM speaker is mounted here in the base behind this slotted cover. These two leads from it are chpped to the speaker terminals

A Good Turn

of a radio or TV chassis held in the cradle. Here above the speaker are a couple of outlets for plugging in a solder gun, v.t.v.m._f etc. This switch above the sockets breaks both sides of this choater cord that connects to a TV set in the cradle. That is good for working on 'hot-chassis* sets. When the chcater cord is cnergized. this red pilot lamp at the top of the speaker stand lights up and w-arns you."

"I guess the chassis is clamped in these two arms sticking out from the tops of the two stands."

"You guess right. A versatile and clever clamp arrangement permits you to fasten any typc of chassis, flanged or unflanged. between those two arms. Then turning this wheel on the gear stand revolves its arm. and the chassis with it. through 360 degrces. The arm sticking out from the speaker stand is simply a ‘followcr* that supports that side of the chassis. The revolving chassis can be stopped and held firmly at any point for most convenient serv-ice. The gear stand can be set to any one of three positions on the ahimmum bench to accommodate chassis of different width. and the abiliły of the followcr shaft to slide back and forth through its bcaring provides an addi-tional 'fine* width adjustment."

While Mac had been talking. Barney. who learned most easily by doing. had been busy clamping a TV set in the "Tel-a-Turn." An appreciative grin spread over his freckled face as he turncd the lit tle wheel on the gear stand and the chassis turncd ovcr on its back and presented its rat’s nest of sub-chassis wiring to the sharp light of the “Luxo" lamp. Barney clipped the "Tel-a-Turns” speaker leads to the chassis and inserted the chcater cord in the chassis reccptacle. An antenna was clipped to the set and the switch on the speaker stand flipped on. As the set began to play, Barney turncd the wheel so that the picture tubę turncd back to its normal posi-tion.

"Hey, a TV for wheeling out on your patio!" Barney exclaimcd as he pushed the "Tel-a-Turn" easily about the floor with one finger. "No house should be without one!"

"Weil, now, I w-ouldn't go that far,” Mac demurred; “but I think we're going to find a lot of use for it here in the shop. You know how’ hard it is lots of times to prop up a TV chassis so that you can see and work where you’ve got to. You usually end up working in an awkward. strained posi-tion. holding your breath all the while for fcar the thing will topole over and smash tubes or damage other parts. Putting such a set in this cradle should end all that. You can work comfort-ably and safely and see cxactly what you*re doing. Tools and smali test in-struments can be placed on the aluminum bench. or the w-holc set can be pushed over to the scope. sw-eep generator. and other bench instruments."

"Yeah. and after the w'ork is done but we want the set to ‘cook’ a while to make surę nothing elsc is going to show up. we can just push it to one side and let it run w'hile w'e go ahead with work on the bench." Barney sug-gested. "If any thing does show up. we can pouncc on it at once. Every part. top or bot tom. is immediately acces-sible. The thing is a ‘natural* for working on intermittents."

“You’re rcading my mind." Mac accused; "and don*t forget how' handy it will be for working on record players."

"Where did you run across the thing?** Barney asked curiously.

"You rcmember Red Baker, the scrv-ice technician at Hinesdale." Mac an-swered. "You know' he has a left arm badly crippled by polio. He does all right with smali radio sets. but man-bandling heavy TV chassis was prac-tically impossible for him. Weil, I dropped in there a couple of w^foeks ago. and he had one of these. Thanks to it. he‘s in the radio and TV business. After his son helps him mount a TV chassis in the cradle, he can handle it as well as anyone. He leaves the chassis right in the cradle until it is ready to go back in the truck. The ‘Tel-a-Turn* is morę than just a handy gadgel to handicapped people. pcople who can t do hcavy lifting, or those with vcry limited bench area. Being madę almost entirely of aluminum, it weighs only 37 pounds and can easily be taken right into the customer’s home for performing a fairly extcnsive home-repair job. Using it will cer-tainly be a lot morę convenient than working on your knees on the floor; but far morę important. I*m surę. is the impression it w'ill make on our customer. Since this impressive affair of gleaming cast aluminum is something he can understand. seeing it in action will do far morę to convince him that we are ‘really equipped* to do service work than w^fould our using a seven- or eight-hundred dollar oscil-loscope. People are funny."

"Here in the shop we won*t pul every chassis in the thing. will we?"

"Of course not. That would be fool-ish and time-wasting. It will b= re-(Continued on puge 108)

66

ELECTRONICS WORLO