In 1934, Robert (Bob) Alfred Lampitt, then an 18 year old enthusiast, made a home-made televisor, later donated to the Science Museum collections by Lampitt. Lampitt was a member of the Television Construction Circle, and he built the televisor on a tight budget from original home constructed parts rather than from a kit. Lampitt's televisor was one of the few domestic television receivers in Britain at the time.

Robert Alfred Lampitt was born at Wolverhampton in March 1916. He received his technical education at the Wolverhampton and Staffordshire Technical College, obtaining a National Certificate in Electrical Engineering and City and Guilds Radio Communication certificates; he completed the graduateship examination in May 1944.

After completing his initial training, Lampitt was employed as a full-time lecturer in radio theory at the Wolverhampton and Staffordshire Technical College from 1941 to 1942, continuing as part-time lecturer in communications engineering until 1950. Lampitt then joined the Radio Gramophone Development Co., Ltd., as a test engineer and transferred to the laboratory as a development engineer in 1943.

A 2005 obituary in the Wolverhampton Express & Star said Lampitt served as a Radio Instructor for the Royal Air Force (RAF) during the Second World War, working on the production of radio equipment for the Armed Forces which contradicts the above details from a 1950 issue of the Journal of the British Institution of Radio Engineers.

In 1950, Lampitt was Chief Engineer of the Radio section of the Radio Section of the Ever Ready Company (Great Britain) in Wolverhampton. Lampitt later went on to establish and run his own company, Lampitt and Partners.

Lampitt was also an active member of his local rotary club and the club awards an annual Bob Lampitt award which recognises the best all-round graduating engineering student at Wolverhampton University.