1985 RCA colortrak 2000
 

Found an 85 colortrak 2000 off of craigslist its in really good shape, has a very strong picture and the sound is really good, it also came with its big remote command center. I will probably use it as my daily viewer since its working so well, plus it has a lot of input/outputs.

I have two of these...both DID work to some degree. I think the tubes are ok in both. However--I think the cabinet on at least one got messed up some--from the old garage. Both were " shopping finds" and free. CTC 131 chassis. STILL want a "dimensia" version though.

Somewhere--I have at least one of those big remotes I think NIB.

That's a nice set. I would connect external speakers to one; I assume that side-firing speakers aren't very nice to listen to.

Wow nice find! That set looks like it's brand new.

We saw quite a few of these. Excellent sets with just
a few common problems. I remember a few yrs earlier
when the cube style came out we used to beat up on
the Zenith salesman for not having a comparable set.
You could get a Zenith just as good but not with the
kick-ass styling or jack pack RCA offered. Of course
Barney defended Zenith but also promised to drop a
suggestion at the next big sales meet in Chicago. They
even sang the Zenith song, wish I had that on a 45 !
A nice find right up with any 80's or 90's set. Only RCA
I liked better was the CTC167, an underrated set..........

73 Zeno:smoke:

That's one of the last real RCA's before GE took over.

Nice find crh... My Toshiba has lots of inputs/outputs like yours , mine has a flat CRT and love it ;).. recently I found a RCA entertainment serie 27' and had a poorly welded component and it did not work but I re-did the weld and it works fine now ... It was a small piece of metal near the flyback..

Nice set you got there crh4881! :) I have the '82 model. Interesting seems '85 was the year RCA redesigned the front control layout and rear connections. Maxm has the '84 model and is identical to mine. I really like that glass bezel and the option to hook up external speakers. I'm curious if RCA was still using the LDR on these that radiotvnut had mentioned.

RCA used the LDR on some of their sets until the early '90's. I had a 27" Colortrak 2000 from around '90-'91 that had it. I don't remember the exact chassis; but, it was something in the CTC157-67 series. It was not a CTC140 or a 169.

What's LDR?

It has a switch called DNR im not shure what that means.

DNR stands for : digital noise reduction.

ahhh ok thanks! I wish I had the manual for it.

I remember Video Stores using these sets back in the day. They usually had several of them playing different featured video tapes.

I have a 133-B that I like, although it has the "shiny whites" problem. Otherwise it's been a very good performer all these years. Picked it up at a scratch and dent department, and I only had to replace one of the output ICs. A 56K (?) resistor on the CRT board also went south. Other than that, OK. :yes:
Kevin

LDR is an abbreviation for Light Dependent Resistor. These were used in TVs of the '60s-'70s (Magnavox comes to mind, though other sets may have used them as well) to automatically adjust the brightness of the picture under various room lighting conditions. This feature was generally found in high-end Magnavox color sets, such as their fabulous 25" three-way entertainment center (TV, phono, AM-FM radio) of the mid-'60s, and a few standalone console TVs of the same vintage. It could be defeated by a switch if the user wanted to set brightness and/or contrast manually.

Thanks :) My first Zenith had this...it was a menu option I could turn on and off called Light Sentry.

The L.D.R. techonolgy is so old? I thought it was from the '90's.
Anyway, since I've seen the title I knew it was about an really wooooooooooow tv set!

The L.D.R. Technology. is recent Telecolor... you can say ' ...so old .. ' 70's and less lolll ... sure, the 90's compared to 2000's it's different.. ;)

I have two of these, which I purchased this year, one from a thrift and the other from Craigslist. They are both Colortrak 2000's, but different. One is a F27155AK June 1988 Thomson Electronics model with a SCART connector and the rest typically found on the Dimensias(?). It has a pincushion effect. Sound is great with external speakers added.

The other is a FLR2522T October 1985 RCA, which has a purity/convergence problem in the upper right corner(haven't tried to degauss, yet, not sure if that's the problem either). The sound on this unit is really nice, without adding any speakers. I may do that later.

I have read that the pincushion/convergence issue could be a pincushion circuit replacement need(maybe?). Since it rarely but occasionally turns off and comes on again - there are some solder joints that need resoldering, most likely(?).

I enjoy these alot, especially the one with SCART connector. They could both use repair and tune - finding someone in this Atlanta area might be in order, since I am NOT equipped with instruments or the tv repair know-how. Hope you enjoy the photos - everyone's contributions here add to the videokarma.org value. Thank you.

The tvs's are at : https://www.flickr.com/photos/41385747@N02/sets

That '85 is especially nice in my opinion.

The both sets use bonded yokes. The yokes are glued on the CRT
& the convergence / purity rings are often unadjustable.
Purity problems are from:
Unglued yoke.
Trim magnet fell off, they are usually V shaped on RCA.
Something magnetic near by.
If a big magnet got near the auto degauss may not fix it,
manual degauss it.
Degauss circuit not working.
Bad CRT, shadow mask moved.
Its best NOT to touch the neck rings. They wont need adjusting unless
it was messed with.

The most common pin problems with RCA of that vintage were
open caps or the pin diode. Also had a few pin out transistors fail.

BTW with RCA use the chassis number. Its on the tag and or
in the set. Starts CTC###.

73 Zeno:smoke:

Jon A. - I felt the same, as the sound and looks are cool looking. Thank you.

Zeno - I hope it was something magnetic nearby. The man who sold me this tv last month said his sons used it profusely for gaming. At the time I was buying it, I noticed the problem, but dismissed it as something that a degaussing ring would cure. But your list is a great reminder to me and others who are looking at tv repair solutions, that there are sometimes many reasons for problems. Thank you so much for taking time to list those. I can certainly do a degauss and will, once I get a degaussing ring. I would like to look inside this 1988 set to find the chassis number and I'll do the same with the other, and make notes. I know from reading videokarma.org that these RCA's are referred to by chassis numbers C140's, so I do need to find those numbers. Thank you for the list, again, and I can do some visual checking, of course, and if I have success with the degauss, I'll be shouting.."yay".