BVW70 just picked in Havana

[RJMiranda]

The good VTR maintenance guys at Cuban TV lent me an extender board. As soon as I put the suspected demodulator board on the extender, I noticed the missing RF signal didn´t even got to it. So it was not the DM-board´s fault after all.
At the bottom of all these VTRs there is a motherboard that interconnects the different PCBs. I followed the signal path from the preamplifier board (that was working perfectly up to the output connector´s pin) to the motherboard. The connecting cable was not at fault. The motherboard looked OK even at a close inspection: the soldering points looked well, the board was not bent/cracked/damaged, even the varnish was like new... but it measured open and the ohmeter doesn´t lie. So I soldered a little white jumper in place and presto!
It is the first time in my experience of many years that I have found this kind of trouble in a professional studio VTR. Maybe in a field camera that may get banged accidentally... but this VTR does not show any kind of external damage, and its four legs sit flat against the table... not as if it had been dropped sometime so damaging the circuit.
Let´s hope that this VTR has not additional occult troubles like this. We have a very saline atmosphere in Cuba, but no other Betacam or even UMatics that I know of has had corroded circuits (and as I say, the varnish looks pristine).
Well, it is working perfectly now... thank you very much to all VKs/visitors that looked, and specially to baursam, kf4rca and fsjonsey for their offerings and valuable advice. If coming to Cuba, let me know!

[fsjonsey]

Originally Posted by RJMiranda

The good VTR maintenance guys at Cuban TV lent me an extender board. As soon as I put the suspected demodulator board on the extender, I noticed the missing RF signal didn´t even got to it. So it was not the DM-board´s fault after all.
At the bottom of all these VTRs there is a motherboard that interconnects the different PCBs. I followed the signal path from the preamplifier board (that was working perfectly up to the output connector´s pin) to the motherboard. The connecting cable was not at fault. The motherboard looked OK even at a close inspection: the soldering points looked well, the board was not bent/cracked/damaged, even the varnish was like new... but it measured open and the ohmeter doesn´t lie. So I soldered a little white jumper in place and presto!
It is the first time in my experience of many years that I have found this kind of trouble in a professional studio VTR. Maybe in a field camera that may get banged accidentally... but this VTR does not show any kind of external damage, and its four legs sit flat against the table... not as if it had been dropped sometime so damaging the circuit.
Let´s hope that this VTR has not additional occult troubles like this. We have a very saline atmosphere in Cuba, but no other Betacam or even UMatics that I know of has had corroded circuits (and as I say, the varnish looks pristine).
Well, it is working perfectly now... thank you very much to all VKs/visitors that looked, and specially to baursam, kf4rca and fsjonsey for their offerings and valuable advice. If coming to Cuba, let me know!

RJMiranda, I'm glad you got it working!
I've spent the night working on recapping this:

While smoking a few Bolivar Royal Coronas.

I was at my Cousin's wedding earlier this afternoon and handed out about five or six of them. They had it in a rustic lodge in a state park here in Ohio. The Aroma of the Bolivars went great with the smell of the fireplace burning. As you probably know, Cuban Cigars are coveted by Americans that don't usually smoke cigars. They have no idea how easy it is to get them, forbidden fruit and all.
One more quick question. Are there any Chevy Corvairs running around in Havana still? I just finished restoring a 1962 Corvair Monza 900 4 Door sedan this spring. Unfortunately, a Drunk Driver decided to plow into it back in late August.


The drunk who hit me was found liable and his car insurance is going to pay to fix it, but it's still a shame. This was a spotless, rust free car from Arizona.

[RJMiranda]

Hi fsjonsey! Great looking TV, good job!
I am very sorry about what happened to your Corvair.
There are some Corvairs in Havana (I can´t tell you much about other provinces) but MOST of them have replaced the original engine with a Russian Lada 4-cyl mounted at the front. Don´t ask me what they did to the steering system, nor how they mounted the engine without proper reinforced surfaces. And of course they had to open a ventilation grille between the headlights and run the transmission shaft to the rear axle.
All said, they don´t look half as bad as it sounds... except that I LOVE to see older cars running as they were made.
I have a 1953 Chevrolet Belair (it needs a new front grille because the original one rusted apart), but with the original engine and transmission. Only change is an alternator instead of a DC generator.
The Corvair is a beautiful, unique American car. I think it is the ONLY 6-cyl H-engine ever made. Maybe they made it after the Volkswagen, air-cooled, rear-engine, but being American it had to have 6-cyl power!
A friend of mine here had a Corvair with automatic transmission, but after so many years it was worn, and after 30-40 mins of driving, it wouldn´t shift to high!

[fsjonsey]

Originally Posted by RJMiranda

Hi fsjonsey! Great looking TV, good job!
I am very sorry about what happened to your Corvair.
There are some Corvairs in Havana (I can´t tell you much about other provinces) but MOST of them have replaced the original engine with a Russian Lada 4-cyl mounted at the front. Don´t ask me what they did to the steering system, nor how they mounted the engine without proper reinforced surfaces. And of course they had to open a ventilation grille between the headlights and run the transmission shaft to the rear axle.
All said, they don´t look half as bad as it sounds... except that I LOVE to see older cars running as they were made.
I have a 1953 Chevrolet Belair (it needs a new front grille because the original one rusted apart), but with the original engine and transmission. Only change is an alternator instead of a DC generator.
The Corvair is a beautiful, unique American car. I think it is the ONLY 6-cyl H-engine ever made. Maybe they made it after the Volkswagen, air-cooled, rear-engine, but being American it had to have 6-cyl power!
A friend of mine here had a Corvair with automatic transmission, but after so many years it was worn, and after 30-40 mins of driving, it wouldn´t shift to high!

RJMiranda, I had a feeling that most of the Corvairs left in Cuba had been converted to Lada or Moskvich power. I would love to see how they made that work, haha.
The Corvair engine has sort of a unique back story. Ed Cole, the head of Chevrolet, and father/champion of the Corvair, was an accomplished Civil Aviator. He was quite familiar with the flat-six Franklin and Lycoming engines in the aircraft he flew, and knew that American car buyers wouldn't accept the roughness of Volkswagen's flat four in an American car. The Corvair engine shares more with small aircraft engines of the era than anything else. Chevy had an air cooled flat-six engine in mass production 6 years before Porsche debuted the first 911.

Originally Posted by RJMiranda

A friend of mine here had a Corvair with automatic transmission, but after so many years it was worn, and after 30-40 mins of driving, it wouldn´t shift to high!

Also, it's too bad about the Powerglide in your Friend's Corvair. It was probably something as simple an a broken E-Clip or at worst a $30USD Vacuum Modulator. The Corvair Powerglide is almost indestructible. They were so reliable, in fact, that GM never issued a full rebuilt kit for them. I've seen a few that outlasted being swapped into five or six cars.
http://corvairfleet.blogspot.com/201...es-e-clip.html

Oh, one last question. Did imports of American cars cut off in the 1960 or 1961 model year? I've seen some photos of Corvairs in Havana that look suspiciously like 1961 models.

[RJMiranda]

Hi, fsjonsey!

I haven´t seen how exactly they put a Lada engine into a Corvair. I am really curious, but haven´t had the chance of seeing one with the hood open.

Of course they put the Lada engine on the front (and have to open a grille, that´s how you can know they are converted Corvairs). They somehow modify the floor to run the transmission shaft to the rear axle, which is (of course) Lada.

I don´t remember the exact date of the US embargo. (1962, I think). Of course the day after that you couldn´t send a nail to Cuba! But I am told by older people that American cars were sold in Cuba even before than in the US, maybe so they could test them before the beginning of the actual model year. If that is true, the sellers could have some cars of the next model year at the time the embargo came into force.

[OvenMaster]

Originally Posted by fsjonsey

The drunk who hit me was found liable and his car insurance is going to pay to fix it, but it's still a shame. This was a spotless, rust free car from Arizona.

Ouch! As a lifelong Corvair lover, this makes me sick to my stomach.
Do you have Antique plates or similar on that car? In my state, if you have normal plates, the other guy's adjuster would go strictly by book value and total a car that old without a second thought and force you to scrap it, give you book value, or get a salvage title... and no more collision or comprehensive coverage. That's what happened to my mom's '91 mint Crown Vic wagon in 2010 (insurer paid us book value, let us keep the car; we used the money to fix it but are forbidden to buy any coverage except mandatory liability).