Mysterious socket - help please! - Page 2

nodrogd · 20-03-2010, 00:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris

Rediffusion was originally a cable radio service, but it got into cable TV in the 1950s and 1960s. While I was house-hunting in Hemel Hempstead (many years ago now) I came across something very like what you have in a living room. IIRC the owner said he believed it was a Rediffusion terminal.

Spot on Chris. These were the sockets for British Relay TV that was installed in Hemel when the New Town was built. Four TV channels (BBC1 & 2, ITV London & Anglia) and BBC radios 1 to 4. Service was eventually taken over by Visionhire and was closed in the early 1980s when the local council stopped subsidising it.

multiskilled · 20-03-2010, 21:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by LondonRoad

What Chris said.

Used to have them in the new town of East Kilbride in the 1960s. It did give a better picture than an aerial in those days of 3 channels and provided a fourth channel; Grampian TV. Since the output of Grampian was 95% the same as STV it wasn't a great benefit. The little box that you got had a mechanical switch that only had room for 4 channels so expansion wasn't being considered.

See my avatar Rediffusion switch.Never seen a Rediffusion socket like them and I used to work for them.

**Chris** · 20-03-2010, 23:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by multiskilled

See my avatar Rediffusion switch.Never seen a Rediffusion socket like them and I used to work for them.

I think Nodrogd may have the answer - they were installed for a service similar to Rediffusion, but not Rediffusion itself. British Relay TV, by all accounts.

LondonRoad · 21-03-2010, 00:39

Just to add more fog to the waters! It was indeed a British Relay system at our house in East Kilbride but I remember my Mum paying her TV rental at the Rediffusion shop! These must have linked together at some point.

While having a quick google on this subject I came across this which is very interesting reading in a nostalgic sort of way. A monopolies commission report from 1968 on the proposed merger of Thorn and Radio Rentals.

http://www.competition-commission.or...ext/047c01.pdf

I'm glad I read down to page 14 where I'm informed that a 19inch colour set retails for about £260-£300, a 25inch set for between £280 - £350!! Flipping heck!! No mention if that was for an HD ready set

As a proportion of earnings that was probably the equivalent of a small family hatchback car today.

multiskilled · 21-03-2010, 22:15

Here is some interesting info on the Rediffsion wired system including the testing of a fibre optic system in 1973. with pictures of the headend as well.

http://www.rediffusion.info/rcs.html

Hiroki · 22-03-2010, 21:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by multiskilled

Here is some interesting info on the Rediffsion wired system including the testing of a fibre optic system in 1973. with pictures of the headend as well.

http://www.rediffusion.info/rcs.html

Love that site, been meaning to email them for ages!

My dad used to work in one of the main branch thing in Gateshead and has loads of photographs of that and the shop in Felling

Used to have one of those dials on the window sill when I was a kid and used to mess around with it all the time

multiskilled · 23-03-2010, 14:58

Was he a tech? I may have known him, though I was at the Blyth workshops.

Hiroki · 23-03-2010, 21:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by multiskilled

Was he a tech? I may have known him, though I was at the Blyth workshops.

Yeah I think he was a tech, he used to work there and the south shields branch as far as I know. I'll ask him some more info in the morning