15GP22 Latest News!!!!!
 

I just got word that Scotty has John Folsom's 15GP22 in process in the evacuation oven as I write this post.

John's tube was originally under vacuum. This one is NOT a leaker and is a standard rebuild.

I will update as soon as I hear anything from Scotty!



UPDATE 1: I just spoke to Scotty. The tube will be in process until about 4PM which is when "pinch off" will occur. The oven will not be cool enough to open until several hours later. Being a Friday, Scott doesn't plan to be at the plant over the weekend, so we will not know the results until probably Monday. Scott has my cell phone number, and in the outside chance he does go down to the plant over the weekend and has anything to report to me, I will update again.

Scott said that the new stems we had made are working GREAT! We seem to have resolved the cracking glass problem that plagued us for almost 2 full years.

On another note: Scott got a call from Erv at the crt rebuilding division of Video Display Corp. Scott went out there to see if there was anything that he could use. Scott bought some glass for re-necking tubes, but ther rest of the plant was geared to high volume production and was not suited to Scott's rebuilding business. VDC is no longer rebuilding any tubes.




Bob

Excellent! I eagerly wait to see what happens........

Wishing Scotty & John best of luck with this.

Curious... once the 15G is finished, what will be its new home? A CT-100?

I don't know Charlie. So far as I know this tube was one of John's dead spares. Come to think of it I believe he purchased it from another collector in hopes that we could some day rebuild it.


Bob

Buy it from John for your set if he'll let you Bob. Just a thought. That functional CTC2 chassis of yours is lonely I bet :D Good luck guys! I really hope this can happen after all that is invested.

It DOES seem like in 2009 we could easily replicate 1954's punk-ass technology...A KID oughta be able to do it...Yeah, right.....(grin)

Man, ain't that the freakin truth!!! And to think of all it's taken for those guys to get to this point... you'd think there'd be an easier way! :yes:

Regardless of what the tube goes in... just having a recently rebuilt 15G will carry LOTS of weight!

Big balls in Cowtown, boys!

:banana: :thmbsp: Man, that is great news. ladies and gentlemen, LINE UP YOUR DUDS!!
Hey, is Scotty still doing 21AX's? My best one has a slight crack in the neck and could go to air anytime.
Kevin

Yes, Scotty is still doing 21AXP22's It is not cheap, but well worth it. I had one rebuilt and it now lives in my 21ct55. The picture is just georgeous.

Call Scotty for a quote. I am sure he will do a super job for you.

Bob

I wish there had been an easier road to get where we are now Charlie.

Out biggest obsticle has been that we are now at the end of the crt era. There is almost no one left in the CRT industry. We have one company that can rebuild the guns, and they are getting near the end of doing business. There is one company that can make stems for us in the US. And we are down to one crt rebuilder, Scotty.

Scotty has worked with us every step of the way, and I can't tell you how dedicated he is to winning the fight to be able to restore these crt's. Without Scotty, we would be SOL. We are also fortunate that Scotty is not to far from Milwaukee, and I can drive there in only 8 hours. When we get to the stage where we are actually attempting to seal and rebuild the leakers, it will be necessary to work hand in hand with Scotty at his plant. We will be performing the sealing protocall experiments and Scotty will be doing the usual crt rebuilding things.

I know that it has been an agonizingly slow road getting to where we are today. But most of the difficult work is done now. We have special tooling and equipment to remove the old cathode assemblies. We have a company to make stems that work. We have a gun rebuilder to install new cathodes and mount the guns on the stems. We have Scotty on board to do the rebuilding and we have even machined some special parts for Scotties equipment to accomodate the unique parts of the 15GP22. We have special equipment built for our experiments in sealing the leakers, and we have developed special techniques for preping the tube for the sealing process.

It seems like it should have been a lot easier than it actually was, but you have to understand we are not working with a tube that anyone has ever tooled up to rebuild. So everything had to be custom made. Every step in the process had to be painstakenly researched and developed.

It has however been a labor of love, on a quest to do something of spectaular importance for all tv collectors interested in this very historic color tv artifact.

Please...everyone think good thoughts and say your prayers, and perhaps we will finally be rewarded with success.

Thanks for the info Bob. I'll start selling some vintage hifi gear and plan to get that tube rebuilt. It is an early version with a gamut much like the 15G, it seems. The blues are electric, and the reds deep and beautiful. If I ever figure out how to post pics I will send a few.
Kevin

I'm going to try to load some screen shots of my CTC-4. I re-sized the pics, and hope they make it to this post. Here goes!
Kevin

Made it! BTW this is the tube with the small crack in the neck. I guess you can see why I want to have it re-gunned!
Kevin

Hi Guys,

Boy is this exciting! i wish you All the Luck in the World and hope to read a historic announcement right here on monday.

Bob, did you or someone else photo/video document this historical attempt?

Best Regards

jhalphen
Paris/France

Don't ya know that those folks back in the 50's would have never imagined anyone would be attempting to rebuild such a tube... especially so many years down the road!

The 19VP22 tube that followed... is it a closer sibling to the 15G, or to the 21AXP?

Hi Jerome,

No, Scotty was on his own this time. Nobody filmed it. However when we go back next time we will document on video and stills, the procedure as a re-enactmant of the actual event, when we rebuild the next tube.

I know it won't be authentic, and it loses some of the excitement, and that it will not be the genuine article, but it's the best we can offer. We have been down this road before, and there have been several filmed attempts that failed. So I guess our attitude became, that we would wait for success before making another trip to document another failure.

But fear not, we WILL have documentation to show the world how it was done, if and when we are successrul.

Perhaps NOT being there this time, will add a extra measure of success. Perhaps our constant pressence, pushing for success in the past, may have been a jinx. :-)

The 19V is closer to the 21AX. The 19V was the first tube to use photo deposition of phosphor dots directly to the inside face of the tube.


Kevin, Georgeous screen shot of your 21AX. I would want to save that tube too. The color saturation is fantastic. I hope my CTC4 looks that good when I get around to restoring it.

Bob

Kevin: The color in those screen shots is absolutely stunning!!

Thank You, gentlemen, for the kind words. It was a labor of love to restore that chassis, and I took my time and documented the whole process. I have a restored 5N chassis waiting to be reunited with its cabinet, and a blonde 7 that I am digging out right now. Two good spare 21CY's too. Much to keep me out of trouble this fall and winter!
Kevin

Thread continued at the following post
 

You guys should see the rebuilt 19" color tube Scotty did for John Folsom.
Scotty is truly a genious!
Bill Cahill