CRV59-AAE Military Iconoscope Camera restoration

[dtvmcdonald]

I am beginning the restoration process on the CRV59-AAE Military Iconoscope Camera (and spare Iconoscope) that I bought at the May RTF meeting.

Some time ago I ordered uo from Mouser the needed list of parts.
The only odd ones are for the power supply. First is the power transformer
for the +405 and -50 volt supplies, which is a Hammond 290EX Guitar Amp transformer. It has the requisite 50 volt (RMS) tap for the -50v. The +27 volt
filament and bias supply is a Meanwell LRF-150F-24 switching supply to which I intend to add a bit of switching crap filtration.

Last night I had again inspected the chassis, tried to remove the bad-looking iconoscope, and tried following wires and testing pots.
I could not get the iconosocpe out. It looked like the yoke was set to make that impossible without removing pots. Today I bought new batteries
for my flashlight and inspected better: yes, there is an adjustment and if moved a bit the tube comes out safely.

All the stuff I tested looks OK especially the low-ohm pots I was able to test in-circuit. Except that the bias lamp appears
missing entirely, no lamp, no wire, no socket. Huh??? The shutter was removed previously.

With the old iconoscope out I was able to test it in a tube tester for
emission and gas (transconductance too, but that's expected to be very very low). I had previously tested the new one, and it looked OK. The old one
is clearly very very gassy, and a retest of the new one under identical settings shows no gas.

There is hope!

Next up is lots and lots of photos and more circuit tracing.

Has anyone else around here other than McVoy had any experience with one
of these?

Doug McDonald