In a Nutshell
The last of my Philco 17" Predicta Princess swivel TV's from 1959 in its most attractice color vermilion red is as good as it ever can get: recapped with strong picture tube, serviced aligned and working, in mint cosmetic condition

Introduction:
Philco's iconic 1958 vintage TV "Predicta" remains one of the most remarkable design achievements of the last century. At least two companies (Telstar and CB Electronics) decided to rebuilt Predictas. Herbert Gosweiler, manager of Philco's product design group from 1954-1960 and marketing vice-president Henry Bowes pushed the concept of this futuristic TV design by Severin L. Jonassen, Richard J. Whipple and German emigrant Catherine Speyer Winkler. It was introduced to the public on the Philco sponsored Miss America TV show in September 1958 by Miss America 1959 Mary Ann Mobley. The public's reaction was enthusiastic, inspirations ranging from "looks like a women's wasp waist" to "looks like the mushroom cloud of a (then abundant) Bikini atomic bomb". Collectors like the Predictas for their "space age" look, restorers hate them for their finicky electronic tempers, that plagued especially the 21" series from their very beginnings and, amplified by the advent of color TV not only led to a very short lifespan (1958-60) of the Predicta, but even caused the bankruptcy of Philco in 1962. The 1959 17" second generation compact models "Princess", "Siesta", and "Debutante" came in a perforated and finned metal cabinet painted in "dramatic" colours (vermilion, beige and mahogany), were less finicky and were sold for $280 (about 2 week's salary, or $2200 today). For sale here is the third 1959 Predicta H3410 Princess in vermilion red, that I thoroughly restored and serviced and that is now in mint cosmetic and working condition.
The quality problems mentioned are the reason that when searching the internet for "Predicta" mostly repair services and very helpful extended repair reports (like e.g. ref.2) turn up. Sam's photofact folder is free (ref.1) and very useful for diagnosing, repairing, recapping and aligning the chassis. An oscilloscope is mandatory and a signal generator helpful - a Predicta restoration is not for the beginner or faint-hearted though, since there are very high voltages (15 kV!) around.

Additional information:
ref.1: http://www.earlytelevision.org/images/Philco_H3410-Predicta-Princess-Sams-466-1.pdf
ref.2: http://antiqueradio.org/philc12.htm
ref.3: http://www.radiolaguy.com/info/tv.htm

About my Princess:
The TV is in mint visual and working condition with all parts being original (except replaced capacitors and resistors of course). The chassis has been gone through, all tubular capacitors, and tubes and resistors as necessary were replaced, all printed circuit boards painstakingly cleaned from grime and dust. The two critical components, the CRT and the 15kV flyback transformer were in perfect condition. The TV has been aligned with the help of an oscilloscope and a Hickok signal generator, after a warm-up period of 10 minutes. All controls work as they are supposed to. The set was tested with a VCR connected to the antenna through a 300 Ohm adapter (included in sale). Watch a video (click on pict.45) with the TV playing a section of "The African Queen" with Humphrey Bogard and Katharine Hepburn from 1951. The picture has good brightness and contrast and only small distortions, the sound is perfect. The (color-)striping visible is caused by Macrovision's ACP copy protection on the VHS tape. As all vintage TV's also this Predicta is not supposed to be used 24/7 like a modern TV. Please heed Sonny Clutter's advice (ref.3) how to operate a vintage TV. Please e-mail me (Kris) for any questions, ich spreche Deutsch, je parle Français.

Footnote:
The designers of the Predicta series are known as: Catherine Winkler (Pedestal) [1906-1989], Severin L. Jonassen (Tandem) [born 1913], and Richard J. Whipple (all models) [1916-1964]. When searching for Winkler, one finds her Philco assignee patents signed with Catherine S. Winkler. There is another link to a page with many futuristic 1950's TV designs for Philco by a C. Speyer Winkler (pict.52, from www.wadictatv.com/winkler57.html, with kind permission of Ross Marshall). It is suggestive to assume that both persons are the same. Information about her is contradictory: German emigrant or Italian-American designer?

Here are the specifications:

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