The New York herald., 1922-04-16
RADIO SETS 80 P. c.
OF PRESENT DEMAND
Amateurs, Inspired by
Broadcasting, Send Over
whelming Orders.
WANT STANDARD STYLE
General Electric Plans
Quantity Production of
New Model Receiver.
PARTS WILL BE FITTED
Can Be Added to as Can a Sec
ti0nal Bookcase to Fill
Requirements.
PARTS WILL BE FITTED


SCHENECTADY. N. Y. April 15.-The
General Electric Company, the giant
OF the electrical industry, last autumn
found itself an infant powerless to
s.ruggle under the tremendous de-
mand for radio equipment that came
sweeping in from all over the country.
To-day, after months of the most in
tense effort. the time can he seen ap-
preaching when quantity production
will overhaul the fast multiplying de-
mand. That time is coming, but it is
not here yet.
Tho United States is a country Of
booms. There have been gold booms.
oil booms. automobile booms. city
booms. but officials of the General
Electric are confident that there never
was such boom as the radio boom
since the days when the United States
was regarded as merely an annoying
barrier on the road to the East Indies.
For the radio boom has 110,OO0,000
people to work on.
So thorough has been the boom that
even within the General Electric fold
itself few people are immune from radio.
Executives, mechanics. stenographers
garded electrical equipment with any
thing but a business eye, now are talk
ing radio, thinking radio, working radio
and playing radio. Pocket sets are being
constructed by all classes of @. Il. work
ers. and one man, the hero Of the plant.
has built one that Ats into the barrel OF
a fountain pen.
A Radio Boom Town.
The city of Schenectady is equally
radio active II you ask the conductor
of a street car IL he is going to Albany
he is more than likely to ask you II you
have heard of any place to buy headset
or what kind OF an antenna you are
using. In the department store raaio
sets are selling much faster than spring
clothes.
II is not the Schenectady plant alone
that Is relied upon by the General Elec-
tric to keep pace with the demands
made upon the Radio Corporation OF
America, it's selling agent Tor raoio
cuuipment The whole organization is
working on that problem. The Edison
Lamp Works at Harrison, N j., ana
the National Lamp Works at Cleveiana
are both busy turning out vacuum tubes
of the smaller sizes. The Sprague
works at Bloomfield. N. J., are working
IN tupe bases. Lynn. Mass; Fort
Wayne. Ind, and Bridgeport. Conn.,. are
fighting the demand for small trans
formers, motor generators. sockets ana
other pieces of apparatus Tor wnicn tne
citizens Of Tombstone. Ariz.. and Passa
dumkeag. Me-. are clamorlng Win equai
intensity. 49,
one of the principal reasons for the
anna expressed by General Electric OIL
ficiaIs that there is light ahead through
Tho storm clouds of demand is the fact
,hat the Schenectady plant has TINS
week gone into production, after months
of experimentation, on an ef1icienl anu
carefully tested radio receiving set
which can be produced on quantity
production basis and which can DC
added to precisely as can secliohai
booIccase as the amateur desires 70
reach out further and further into the
ether for signals.
This set is in addition to a small and
Inexpensive receiving set on which the
General Electric went into production
,uro months ago. Already 5000 of these
first sets. which sell for SIS, have been
cold The company Is now turning these
ont at the rate Of 500 week and hopes
SHORTLY to double this rate. These sets
vii, nick up music and lectures within
n range OF fifteen miles.
Clearing a Sore Spot.
B,r. before the matter of radio sets Is
discussed further 1t may be well TO go
into ths matter of vacuum tubes. de-
tectors. Amplifiers, modulators, trans
mitters, &c.-the little lamps which have
linked the globe together-the rarest
and most sought for of all mechanical
things of the twentieth century. These
lamps are a sore point In the radio
situation, for the General Electric COM
many as well as others has been ac-
cused of holding back the production or
the tubes in order to increase the de-
mand. That accusation has caused
great deal OF Indignation at Schenectady
for two reasons: first. because officials
feel that IL Is a particularly bad time
10 accuse men of holding back their
hest efforts when these men are suffer-
tng from overwork and second, because
Is an insult to their intelligence to
accuse them OF trying to increase an
Unsuitable demand.
This Is how Il. p. Edwards manager
OF the radio department of the company
and the busiest man who ever carried
the heavy end OF boom. outlines the
vacuum tube situation:
"A year ago this company was autho-
r-zeu py the owners OF the licenses for
vacuum tubes (the Radio Corporation OF
Arnerica) to produce these tubes. Nos.
roe and 201. detector and amplfer. at
sse rate OF approximately 10000 a
r-onth. Nine-tenths of the demand for
tubes is for these two models. This rate
Of production was reached In February
~ 1921 and maintained until the middle
~ the summer. at which time II was
tsund necessary to reduce the rate to
approximately 5000 tubes month be-
cause the market was not absorbing the
production. The 5000 rate a month was
maintained until about November. 1921.
-rnen broadcasting hit us. After that
week after week. demand scared SKY.
ward and production also scared. but II
was absolutely impossible to keep
abreast of such a sudden and unexpected
move hent.
AT the time testified before Mr..
Hoover's radio committee about month
ago / estimated that the demand for
tubes was at a rate OF 10000 month
We were then producing 10000 tubes
a month. To-day we are turning out
100000 month and ~ May we will be