Curtis Mathis thread

GON

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This thread is to share any thoughts on Curtis Mathis. The thread came from a wiki posted by 4wd in Malo's "Are you old" thread https://bobistheoilguy.com/forums/threads/are-you-old.361032/

After reading the wiki on Curtis Mathis, I found the business model fascinating. My thoughts are what a shame Curtis Mathis went bankrupt. Their design to make every module replacable in minutes is pretty neat. And the USA's last electronics manufacturer.

A few highlights from the wiki:
During the next few years Curtis Mathes worked to design a modular TV and modular TV parts and chassis, so that warranty service would involve quickly switching a part, tube, tuner or picture tube. These all had snap-in connectors and were held in place by brackets instead of solder or screws. He envisioned a TV that would never require costly repairs, and early on started offering a 4-year warranty on picture tube, parts and labor.

By the mid-1970s and the advent of solid-state electronics, Mathes had achieved results. The TV consisted of 11 parts: 7 circuit boards, a tuner, a picture tube and a transformer, plus the cabinet. A repair person carried all ten electronic parts in their truck and a repair call seldom lasted more than 20 minutes. In home the fee was $20, and free in the shop.

Curtis Mathes, Sr., died in 1977. Curtis Mathes, Jr., became the Chairman of the Board and the company's public face, appearing in its television commercials until his 1983 death in the Air Canada Flight 797 fire at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.[2]

The company began to decline, going from a peak of 5,000 employees and seven manufacturing facilities to about 50 employees in 1988 when it was sold to Enhanced Electronics. At the time of this sale, it was the last remaining fully U.S.-owned electronics company.

 
I certainly remember what I considered OLD folks (at the time) speaking about CM like it was a very premium brand.
I can even recall (as a skinny kid) helping my dad take a big awkward (wooden case) RCA to Jim’s TV repair …
Wind forward many years - I’m looking at a very old guy sacking my groceries - dang, it was Jim 😞
(TV’s had become cheap & throw away) …
 
Well they were the last electronics manufacturer in the USA, so there business model worked just couldn't beat 12 cent labor in china.

The real interesting thing is the flight Curtis Mathis Jr. died on. The airplane caught fire in flight for still unknown reasons. The pilots emergency landed in Cincinatti and when the door opened the fresh air flashed the airplane in flames and a number of people died - but far from all. The NTSB blamed the pilots - like they always do - not the crap airplane manufacturer.
 
Well they were the last electronics manufacturer in the USA, so there business model worked just couldn't beat 12 cent labor in china.

The real interesting thing is the flight Curtis Mathis Jr. died on. The airplane caught fire in flight for still unknown reasons. The pilots emergency landed in Cincinatti and when the door opened the fresh air flashed the airplane in flames and a number of people died - but far from all. The NTSB blamed the pilots - like they always do - not the crap airplane manufacturer.
I met an engineer from Texas Instruments many years ago - told me he was working on a revolutionary panel style TV - it was flat and very lightweight (stores were selling heavy mid CRT “cubes” then) … Told him I was surprised that TI made TV’s …
Nope, he said they’ll just sell the design to a bigger company …
 
I'm in a big rush this morning so I haven't read any of the links but I think I remember..........CM offered a TV (or TV line?) which came with a lifetime guarantee. It was "double the price of comparable sets but worth it".

Everybody loved the idea but nobody I knew owned one.
I do recall CM being a Paul Harvey (syndicated 'rural flavored' radio news guy) advertiser.
 
I worked for Motorola in the late 60's till 1982. They offered " Works in the Drawer". The chassis slid out the front of the set and modules were easy to replace. It was great idea,
 
I worked for Motorola in the late 60's till 1982. They offered " Works in the Drawer". The chassis slid out the front of the set and modules were easy to replace. It was great idea,
My first company car (Crown Vic of course) had 2 Motorola radio’s and 2 Motorola phones … Serious money too 👀
 
I worked for Motorola in the late 60's till 1982. They offered " Works in the Drawer". The chassis slid out the front of the set and modules were easy to replace. It was great idea,
We had one of those when I was a kid in the 60s... It was a great idea... Zenith was also a very good tv at that time...
 
Curtis Mathes was considered the top of the line back in the day. In the early 80’s my mother bought a short console 25” set. It ended up being one thing after another. We heard through the grapevine that CM wasn’t like it used to be. Even with the warranty she was without a television during the times they took it back to the shop. Eventually she sold it for another brand.
 
The interconnects between the modules were a significant reliability issue. It was a source of trouble that a unitary design did not have. With a reasonably conservative design (not cutting costs to the bone), a solid state chassis could be expected to work at least until the picture tube wears out, at that point it is more economic to replace the whole set.
 
as they used to say...Curtis Mathes the most expensive television in the world....and darn well worth it....:)
 
I had a CM tv and it had a great picture. Never had a problem and gave it away when i bought a larger tv.
 
My Grand Parents had a CM TV. It was housed in a beautiful wood cabinet. The reliability of the the TV itself was terrible.
 
My parents bought one in the late 60s. It had a good picture and was troublefree until we had a really close lightning strike to our antenna. We had it fixed but it was never the same after that,
 
I'm a retired electronics tech up here in Canada.
We didn't have Curtis Mathis televisions here but a very popular brand was Philips (Dutch company) and for 20 yrs they had their "modular 4" chassis with plug-in modules. Zenith had many modular chassis models too. I did quite a few Motorola and Quasar TVs.
Nice trip down memory (what's left of it) lane
 
GON, been many months since I've logged in to this site, but your post made me log in and I thought I'd put in my $.02 on this.
I grew up with this CM color TV. As a youth, I remember many times hearing the commercials where they'd say "The most expensive TV in America, and darn well worth it!" It has about 30 vacuum tubes in it and really created the heat. As to the previous post where they were not reliable, it's because of all the heat that was created inside of it. Once you permenently took the back off and let the heat out, it became quite the good set. (As a kid, the house thermostat was on the wall behind the TV. During the winter, there was so much heat coming out of it that the furnace wouldn't come on in the house until we shut it off and went to bed. :)) Funny story: I actually hauled this set to my dorm when I was going to college. People would come into our dorm and laugh when they first saw it on. They would say: "Ha! that TV has a round picture tube!" Then they would look at the really good picture, hear the great sound coming from three speakers and suddenly (in awe) would say: "Oh, it's a Curtis Mathes!"
This set is still in my mom's basement. It's got a (approximately) 25" round picture tube, large wood cabinet, and would probably still work if I would put back in the 12AX7 audio tubes. (They got robbed by me because those tubes were taken for my tube audio projects) Of course, it wouldn't pick up today's digital signals unless you added a converter box given out by our government quite a few years ago. In their day, these TVs were the cream of the crop.
Back to my hibernation.
 

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GON, been many months since I've logged in to this site, but your post made me log in and I thought I'd put in my $.02 on this.
I grew up with this CM color TV. As a youth, I remember many times hearing the commercials where they'd say "The most expensive TV in America, and darn well worth it!" It has about 30 vacuum tubes in it and really created the heat. As to the previous post where they were not reliable, it's because of all the heat that was created inside of it. Once you permenently took the back off and let the heat out, it became quite the good set. (As a kid, the house thermostat was on the wall behind the TV. During the winter, there was so much heat coming out of it that the furnace wouldn't come on in the house until we shut it off and went to bed. :)) Funny story: I actually hauled this set to my dorm when I was going to college. People would come into our dorm and laugh when they first saw it on. They would say: "Ha! that TV has a round picture tube!" Then they would look at the really good picture, hear the great sound coming from three speakers and suddenly (in awe) would say: "Oh, it's a Curtis Mathes!"
This set is still in my mom's basement. It's got a (approximately) 25" round picture tube, large wood cabinet, and would probably still work if I would put back in the 12AX7 audio tubes. (They got robbed by me because those tubes were taken for my tube audio projects) Of course, it wouldn't pick up today's digital signals unless you added a converter box given out by our government quite a few years ago. In their day, these TVs were the cream of the crop.
Back to my hibernation.
Kruse,

Thanks for the contribution and sharing your experience and knowledge of the CM television. Interesting to note that heat was the primary issue of CM television issues. Funny that the TV put out so much heat it gave the nearby thermostat a false reading.

Hope you don't hibernate to long.
 
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