Philco Town and Country restoration

[bandersen]

Yes, I'm off the variac. I could be that one or more electrolytics are leaky and dragging down the B+.
I need to track down the service info then I'll do a full overhaul.

[DavGoodlin]

There was a show in the mid-70s called "whats Happenin" and Rog's family had one of these sets. Same color too.

I had a few of these I rescued years ago, easy fixes with the usual paper cap replacements. One thing to be particularly aware of is that aquadag coating peeling off the CRT. I had one of these arcing, left the room and the CRT imploded due to the poor grounding contact. I should have been more aware and would have used one of those long springs hooked to the CRT straps.

[holmesuser01]

I bet this one played until something happened that took out the 17DQ6.

It's such fun finding those odd voltage tubes these days.

[dieseljeep]

[QUOTE=bandersen;3040567]I was hanging out with some friends this afternoon and spied this in one of their garages. He said 'sure you can have it' so I brought it home. The front plastic bezel has been damaged, but otherwise it looks OK.
I thought it might be a Philco Seventeener, but I'm not sure.
Can anyone identify it?
I picked up one on e*** a few years ago. It was in Niles Il. Instead of having it shipped I drove down and picked it up.
All it needs is re-capping, especially in the vertical circuit.
I thought it was one of the best looking, most streamlined portables of it's time.
P.S. The set uses one of the 11JE8 tubes as an audio output. Strange!

[electroking]

Originally Posted by holmesuser01

I bet this one played until something happened that took out the 17DQ6.

It's such fun finding those odd voltage tubes these days.

Actually those series-string tubes are quite common, although it is
true the 450-ma ones are a bit less usual. Any restoration challenge
is interesting, especially with such a good CRT IMHO. Regards to all.

Note to original poster: I can look up the 11JE8 in my big stockpile,
if I find it you can have it for postage costs.

[DavGoodlin]

Originally Posted by electroking

Actually those series-string tubes are quite common, although it is
true the 450-ma ones are a bit less usual. Any restoration challenge
is interesting, especially with such a good CRT IMHO. Regards to all.

Note to original poster: I can look up the 11JE8 in my big stockpile,
if I find it you can have it for postage costs.

Yes, what electroking said, I have many of those oddballs myself.

[holmesuser01]

Originally Posted by DavGoodlin

Yes, what electroking said, I have many of those oddballs myself.

I do gotta admit that I have lots of oddball tubes, too, just none of what would go in this Philco. 13GY7 anyone?

[bandersen]

Thanks for the offers, but I do have a few 11JE8s on the way already Service info too.

[bandersen]

Originally Posted by DavGoodlin

There was a show in the mid-70s called "whats Happenin" and Rog's family had one of these sets. Same color too.

I had a few of these I rescued years ago, easy fixes with the usual paper cap replacements. One thing to be particularly aware of is that aquadag coating peeling off the CRT. I had one of these arcing, left the room and the CRT imploded due to the poor grounding contact. I should have been more aware and would have used one of those long springs hooked to the CRT straps.

Thanks for the tip. I received a nice little shock every time I touched the screen bezel during my power up tests. If I can get the set working, I'll try recoating it with slip plate and using a better ground spring.

[bandersen]

My NOS 11JE8s arrived today and wiscojim kindly supplied a scan of the Sams

Now that I know where to probe, I did indeed find that the 275 B+ was only around 200 VDC + 50 vRMS of ripple!

Time to swap out some filter caps

[bandersen]

I pulled the set apart last night and finally the filter caps are accessible.


I like the funky silicon power rectifiers.


The CRT needs some new dag.

[Glenz75]

Wow! They sure knew how to cram things in with this model? I'd imagine there would be quite a bit of heat generated when its running. And that short necked shallow CRT....it looks wrong!

I've been following your videos on this and amazing how many tubes you found that were bad and yet the CRT is good.

I recently did up a TV to use in the workshop which had being lying dormant for years and half of the tubes in it were also weak or bad but this set has had very little use due to the lack of discoloration on the circuit boards and certain electrolytics that usually fail were still ok and virtually no dry joints on the tube sockets so go figure on that one? Just another strange aspect of old electronics....

And those silicon diodes...they are weird.... look like caps!
Cheers Glen.

[AUdubon5425]

Well, if you wind up needing anything let me know. I saved the whole chassis plus the speaker and yoke.

[bandersen]

Thanks for the offer. I haven't done much testing yet, but I definitely need knobs.

[bandersen]

Originally Posted by Glenz75

Wow! They sure knew how to cram things in with this model? I'd imagine there would be quite a bit of heat generated when its running....

We'll see - it does use "cool chassis" tubes Also, the new caps I'm using are quite a bit smaller so there should be better air flow.

Surprisingly, it's fairly easy to work on once you get the CRT output the way.
Once the ground lugs have been unsoldered, you can even work on this board without removing any of the attached wires.


I hope the other board is as easy to work on.