B&W TV 1980 BUSH BN 6521- Radio-TV-Cassette

You'll rarely if ever find me in this section of the forum, no restoration I'm afraid, but there's a reason for being in here and a tale to tell.

/Boredom Alert! Skip to end to avoid

Let's set the scene, the UK had just experienced the winter of discontent (Nov 78–Feb 79) great timing for me to leave school just a few months later with 3million+ unemployed. Finding a job was not going to be easy, and it wasn't, it took until Feb 1980 and 25 interviews to land a job in my chosen profession computing. I won't bore you with all the detail, the short version (yes this tale is short) being I started as a computer mainframe operator and ended as a technical architect in the design team, I remained at that company for the next 30-years until early retirement.

This tale of this Bush, however, starts right back at the beginning, in 1980. As a computer operator, I worked a three-shift rota, days, evenings and nights. I was the youngest in the team at 17, most if not all were at least 10-years older. Working the evenings and nights were very relaxed, no phones ringing, no management so it was very chilled out. Some of the guys/gals occasionally brought in portable cassette players, so we had music on in the background.

As I was a float operator, it meant I never worked with the same team for more than a week. This got me thinking now I was earning, it would be nice to have one myself. My mums friend ran a Grattan catalogue, so one day I leafed through the electrical section and spotted this Bush BN6521. That was it, an order was placed, and what seemed like an age later it arrived.

That day I was on night shift, (23:30 - 07:30) so into my sports bag it went, and off I walked to work. This was about a 20min walk, halfway into this journey in the opposite direction, was an approaching bobby. Yes, back in the days I'm sure you remember they walked a beat, had pointy helmets, and commanded respect. Mr policeman stopped me and asked what was in the bag, I explained it was my radio and sandwiches. I can't remember all the details, but he seemed to think I might have been a naughty chap and lifted it. I explained I was on my way to work, it was for background entertainment while we worked, and he was welcome to walk with me another 10mins to confirm this. He declined the offer and sent me on my way, I recall thinking what a cheek, so do I look that dodgy?

Needless to say, it and I became very popular to have on shift, especially in the evenings when we could have the telly. I used to rest it on top of the Master console of our ICL 2900 series, just to the right-hand side of the two main in built VDU's. Here's a picture of the exact console, and the larger one with hundreds of switches to the right is the configuration panel.

That was 44-years ago, time marches on, and I've absolutely no recollection of what became of the Bush. I happened to be leafing through eBay and up one popped, I viewed it and was flooded with nostalgia, for a time when I finally got a job after months of trying, had money and was working with a fantastic bunch of guys N gals. I miss those days and the people. I just had to buy it.

Not a lot to say about the actual device other than it fully works, TV, radio and even the cassette which did surprise me as I expected the belts to have perished. I looked for the data in my library but nothing for the BN6521, however, I do have the TV clock radio BN6520. This is virtually identical, just the cassette data missing.

/End Boredom Alert! Over

If you did not skip, l did warn you about death by boredom.

Here are some pics. All I had to do was tune the TV, set Vert/Hoz hold, adjust bright/contrast, clean the tape heads , and that was it.

Yes, touching it, powering it on, seeing the test card and listening to a tape, gave me a misty eye. Somehow it seems just a short while ago, I was just 17, now 44-years later I'm 61...... where on earth has the time gone!