Philharmonic Laureate Grand oddity

[Alex R. Whitaker]

All,

I just purchased a Philharmonic in a Laureate Grand from Stanton Auctions, last week.  I noticed something odd about it, right off the bat.  It has a 7 knob Philharmonic chassis, which should have a pointer dial.  However, it has the next year's "Red Dial," with no pointer.  The "Red Dial" Philharmonics are 9 knobs (at least all the ones I've ever seen are).   It has a serial number of KK-243 (Kent, for your database), which seems to point to early 1938 (?)  Has anyone else seen another one of these?  Or, did the original dial get broken and someone put a "new" dial on it, either in 1938, or a collector did that later.  I will probably put a pointer dial Philharmonic in it, to duplicate the picture with E.H. Scott on the cover of "Scott News."  That has always been my dream set.  Pictures of the chassis and serial number are enclosed.  

[Kent King]

Alex -

I had noticed that even before it sold. There are really only two possibilities: (1) the first "red band" sets still had 7 knobs, or (2) the entire face and tuning mechanism was swapped at some point. The only way to tell will be to compare the internal wiring of the chassis with the 1937 model and the later Deluxe diagrams. The serial number does lean into early (first half) of 1938, so it may be a transitional set. If so, it's an oddity. 

On a related note - if you want a true pointer set for it, I have a chassis available. I'd consider a swap if you are interested.

Kent

[Norman S Braithwaite]

The pointer dial sets had a circle of light that followed behind the dial pointer on the selected band.  The beam-of-light dials had a narrow arrow/line of light that identified the station on the selected band.  If you see a circle of light identifying the station, it is a pointer dial chassis with a beam-of-light dial.  Otherwise it is either an early seven knob beam-of-light set (they did make them) or much less likely a pointer dial set with the entire dial assembly swapped on to it.

Norman

[Alex R. Whitaker]

Thanks to both of you for your answers.  Norm, I never thought of that angle to figure out if the set had originally been a pointer dial.  I'll have to power up the chassis here in the next week or two (when I get a chance) to check that.  I was thinking the same as both of you......that it was either a transitional set, or someone had swapped a dial out when the original was broken.  I did notice that the frequency ranges on the pointer dial and the red dial are the same, and are pretty much spaced the same.  Kent, I may take you up on the swap offer.  I'll talk to you about it off forum. 

[Kent King]

You know...you can't put a Beam of Light dial glass onto a pointer tuning drive - because the pointer shaft sticks through! So, the drive is definitely a BOL drive, and unless the entire face was swapped, this is probably a transitional set built in 1938. 

Kent