Hey thanks again, it was indeed the variable cap in the crystal circuit. I changed it for a 22pf ceramic disk and we have color!

Well done Max !!
Super rare for piston caps to go. They must short, as an open one will still have some PF's Usually see them in tuners & IF. High freq stuff.
Now lets find another set to put on the bench:banana:

Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

This one is probably not a piston, it's a small flat trimmer. I'd say mica but I'd probably be wrong, it looks like the sort of thing you'd find at the input of an FM tuner. Really tiny, the size of an ant. It also didn't short, because it measured open, but replacing it was the acid test. This little set has really nice color and good geometry, I need to find a spot for it where I'm not too close and not too far. I've always thought 13" sets have the best NTSC picture, because they are big enough to see but small enough to always look so sharp.

And thank you! It will probably be a while before i acquire another set, but I'm quite happy with this one. Your well timed advice really cut down on the troubleshooting time, and I really appreciate this!

Update - been watching 80s movies on this little TV, am really enjoying the nostalgia of TV looking exactly as it did while I was growing up. The colors are very vivid, and the picture is crisp, without any noise. It's also nice to have a TV without any buzz in the audio. If I ever see the 19" version of this set for sale, I'm going to buy first, and think later. I wasn't able to find a code on my universal remote, but it might just be too new.

Found a new old stock RCA universal remote from 2000... code 095 operates this TV perfectly.

Cool. You should post a couple pics of this thing in action.

Right now I'm away from home for a while, but here's a photo I took of the board while I was troubleshooting, showing the bad trimmer capacitor.