HI   i am in NEW ZEALAND and was hopeing to find information about an Ex BBC camera .The camera is a (MARCONI MRK 4 ) SN 177 Series A.
It came to NZ in the late 60,s with  others , when the studio in London was converted to Colour. I got most of the information from the late BRIAN ROBERTS ex BBC engineer who packed it up for its trip .What i am after is the Studio it was used in please ( BRIAN ROBERTS was at} please ?He was one of the Colour experiment engineers for the BBC.

I don't know where the camera is / was, but Brian Roberts was based at Avalon, near Wellington

If I remember correctly Brian Roberts was the Shift 2 Studio Engineer in TC3, which was equipped with 6 Marconi Mk 4 cameras (altho the sixth was only a spare - these cameras died pretty frequently and the hot spare often needed to be put into service during a show)

The next door studio, TC2, had four of these cameras.  No others at Tel Centre used them.

The old days of black and white 405 tv were exciting times.  Most programmes were live but the kit was somewhat less than reliable.  I preferred the studios with EMI cameras as they were easier to mend in a hurry.  Marconi's were rather complex - so more stable in operation but a pig to work on!

Hope this helps

Micro

If I remember correctly the Marconi cameras were originally installed in about 1959/60 as 405 only.  Later on they were modified to operate on 405/525/625 with a large number of little relays that were rather unreliable in order to cater for the new 625 only BBC2 channel.  These relays gave the engineers quite a few headaches!
Micro

Thanks for the info Micro ,Are these the only 405/525/625 Mrk 4s the BBC had as all the Cameras Ive seen are 1 format only .This camera according to the caps is 1959/60 vintage .Also the CCU has BBC mods (Valve Inserts).
Thanks Michael, I know its NZ history   Interesting you heard of those places.I