GE 810 restoration
 

I think I'll begin restoring my GE 810 10" tv. I like the looks of this set and I like how Bandersens turned out. Here we go....

Well the picture tube didn't test well and cooking it for 45 minutes didn't help much. Hopefully it will be viewable. Good news is that it looks like the flyback has been replaced. I've heard the originals are highly failure prone.

Flyback replacement is s GE 77J1

What makes you think it's been replaced? I'm pretty sure GE 77J1 is the OEM number.

The one pictured in the sams looks totally different.

The SAMs list GE part rto-054 as the original.

Well for what it's worth, 77J1 and RTO-054 both cross to a Thordarson Fly 3. However, I think the 77J1 is original to your set. I have that exact same flyback in an 830 chassis.

I think it's original too as it looks the same as the one in my 810.

That sucks. That got a 10BP4?

I wonder if that set is related to my 806, electronically? Same era set. I wonder if it uses the same flyback as mine....I think mine's original, but after warming up, mine really likes to sizzle:grumpy: I'll probably have to replace it, but that set won't ever really be a watcher for me so....

I brought it up slowly on a variac and the speaker buzzed really loud. I did get a dim raster and and a few thousand volts on the second anode. I've got a b-k CRT tester, which I've tested crts on them before that tested bad, but we're viewable.

I think they came with a 10FP4 originally. 806 is a series strung set and very different design. Flyback might be compatible though.

Loud hum from the speaker is a classic sign of bad electrolytic filter capacitors in the power supply. I wouldn't run it for any length of time without replacing those.

Phil Nelson
Phil's Old Radios
http://antiqueradio.org/index.html

Is a 10FP4 a direct replacement for a 10BP4, except it is aluminized? The RCA manual
implies that it is.

Yes. It's a straight gun, so no ion trap is needed.

My set doesn't have the 2000uf cap on top like the sans shows, but is mounted underneath. It has the cage over the flyback, but it has screw holes for a door on the back. Does anyone have one do I could get dimensions to make one? I have the cage in an earlier picture above.

There is no back to that cage, it's just a "canopy" :)

The screw holes that you see actually attach the fiberboard back to the set.

Ok gotcha, thanks!

BTW, I have a nearly complete parts chassis for this set if there's anything you need. I just got done restoring one myself a couple months ago. One of the nicest 40s sets to work on.

After that, I knocked off an 835, and I have an 830 and an 801 here waiting for me to get an Admiral 20X11 off the bench :)

Oh great! It's actually got the wrong speaker with it. When I got it, it had a rectangular speaker instead of the 4" square one it's supposed to have.

Unfortunately I just have the chassis. Send a PM to Ray Sieracki, he got the cabinet which has the speaker. I know he'll end up having one extra :)

I didn't see his name in the members list...

Ok, I checked all of the tubes and they were actually all good. Next I replaced about 6-8 paper caps that I had replacements on hand and a few electrolytics. I slowly brought it up on a variac and was rewarded with a raster. It lacks in vertical, but I've still got 6 more electrolytics and 25 or so paper caps to replace.

Got the brass all polished up and lacquered. Now it's time to make a cap list.

Gotta admit, I'm a little lost on why you guys power up sets of the '40s at all without replacing caps first. A lot of damage can be done by shorted caps.

I was curious if the flyback was functional. It wasn't on more than 30 seconds.

That is all our fears. Recapping a set only to find a bad flyback.

I've yet to find a bad flyback and I've worked on a lot of sets. I have a spare for this 810 if you end up needing one.

I always try to do a slow power up before starting on a set, it can help a lot to know where you are before you start, then when (not if) things go wrong you have some idea if you caused the problem or if it existed before.

Well since you asked. :) I think it's probably an instinctive desire, that some of us prefer to trouble shoot the circuitry, vs taking a shotgun approach to the finish line. I know for myself, I've often lost interest soon after the set becomes reliable in operational, and there goes any hope of completing the cosmetic aspect of a restoration. Dare I suggest that I've parted out sets that I repaired only a few years earlier. :screwy:(nothing historically valuable of course) And I'm not implying any of the above in a derogatory way, I'm simply suggesting that we're not all wired to our hobby by the same intentions. Might I add that this is why so many find it sad that our nation is moving more and more away from a service economy. There just aren't too many creative employment opportunities left for those who enjoy troubleshooting electronic and mechanical devices.

Might I add that this is why so many find it sad that our nation is moving more and more away from a service economy. There just aren't too many creative employment opportunities left for those who enjoy troubleshooting electronic and mechanical devices.
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Tell me about it.... All tv shops are gone here, and im pushing a broom these days...

SR

[QUOTE=Kevin Kuehn;3150337], I've often lost interest soon after the set becomes reliable in operational, and there goes any hope of completing the cosmetic aspect of a restoration. /QUOTE]

LOL...I always do my cosmetic restoration first these days so I don't fall into the same trap.

GE Restoration
 

It will be great to see your progress on it.

GE 800 parts
 

There is an eBay seller posting in Vintage Television to sell his GE console for $50. It has a fried power transformer. Maybe it has useable parts.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Vintage-Tele...8AAOSwu-BWO3u7

That's an early 1947 GE 801 and I think uses a different flyback. Also a very collectable TV in it's own right and I hope someone can restore it.

That's a nice early GE, hope someone grabs it!

To each their own, I guess. I usually end up working on 3 or 4 sets at a time, simultaneously recapping chassis and ordering odd bits for all of them at the same time.

If there's any cabinet work that needs to be done, I send the cabinets over to a friend of mine who does them up in exchange for radio repair.

Then, I end up with at least one out of the lot that has some funky issue, and those are the ones I post about here :) . Most of those get sorted out, but there are a couple (such as my 730TV2) that I've been wrestling with forever and intend to get back on once the restoration backlog is a little more clear. Yep, this place is most of the time like a production shop.

Once the sets are done, I end up watching the snot out of them. There are some that I end up selling to a few local guys that are really into vintage TVs but don't have the experience to restore them, and that pays for my parts and puts a little change in my pocket. Which is good, because once I bring something back to life, I want it to *live*. I think we all do :)

I've replaced all wax caps and electrolytics. My picture is clear and sharp, but has to be viewed in dim light. I expected that from a pretty weak CRT. Now I only have s buzz for sound. Trying to troubleshoot this now...

None of the resistors under the audio output tube are out of tolerance. I can hear the audio faintly, but I have to listen close.

Does the audio get any clearer if you offset the picture with tuning, in other words tune for best sound?