Another craigslist project.. A sears console with no raster.
 

The other day I got a call from an older man who needed a tv removed from his basement. He said it was a Sears console and that it worked, or at least he thought it worked.

When I arrived I scooted the set away from the wall and saw screws missing and sticking out of the back, so yeah something wasn't right. We fired it up and it had no raster. It appears you can see some static but the screen is too dark to tell. I loaded this set into my station wagon and took it home since there is no reason to refuse a free set. For the last few hours it has been sitting running. The condition hasn't changed since letting it sit so I don't think the CRT is bad in it. Out of 4 CRT testers only one I have can fit the picture tube, but it is missing the attachment, so the condition of the tube is unknown.

Mostly I am wondering if I should mess with it without knowing the condition of the tube. The CRT does give off a good flash when powering the set off which is not something I've seen in a bad tube.

I'd like to see photos of this set. I got two Sears consoles recently, I just haven't gotten around to a photoshoot for either. One is a JVC-made unit from 1984, the other was made by RCA in 1986 I believe and probably uses a CTC136 chassis, I haven't checked. That being said the pros here would appreciate having a chassis number to help you get started on this rig.

Here are some pictures of this set. I am not sure which number is the chassis number on this one. There is what appears to be the right number on the neck board but the lettering is faded out.

Overall it is a very nice set. Usually Sears sets are labled with the actual maker inside, but this one has everything labled as Sears. The last two Sears sets that came in for repair were made by Toshiba, but this one looks a bit different.

Looks like a Sanyo.

564 is the Sears source number for Sanyo.

That's pretty cool. I haven't had a Sanyo before.

How good is Sanyo compared to other well known brands?


I have a big book of case histories on TVs that I have been looking at. It seems that all similar problems differ in the fact that messing with the controls changed the screen. One of those cases had a bad resistor on the neck board. Anyways Friday I'm going to drive an hour and a half to borrow the adapter for the CRT tester. That'll get rid of a lot of guessing.

Yup a Sanyo. These usually had Sylvania CRT's EIA 312
VERY good sets as a rule.
If it uses any IC sockets watch for very int problems.
Sounds like you have HV but no raster. Look first
at the G-2 on the FBT then resistors on the CRT brd in the G-2
if any.
BTW the big white tag with the long number starting
564. ####### is the real model. 4 digit sears numbers
are near useless.

73 Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

Nice, clean cabinet design on that one. Assuming that Sears stopped carrying Sanyo-built sets as soon as they started with RCA, yours may be one of the last Sanyo-supplied units. The back cover of my RCA/Sears is stamped 9-86 in a couple of places; I assume that's the manufacturing date.

The last RCA supplied Sears set I worked on had the CTC177?, the one with the on-board tuner problem.
A Sears set, slated for the scrap-heap is a rebadged Gold Star, source 580. Also, Funai supplied the small TV/VCR combos. :thumbsdn:

This set was built in May 1986, so it really does seem to be right at the end of Sears' usage of Sanyo.

I checked and resoldered all of the components on the CRT board with no luck. I can still see some very dark raster but it looks like the lum section has a cold joint. Next step is to discharge the set and fix all the joints in that particular section. There is an IC in that area so the hope is that the joints for it are cold. Every now and then a Zenith system 3 or CCII comes in with no raster and resoldering that white resistor pack always fixes it, so maybe the IC chip in this set will have the same issue.

Hopefully this set will live. It'll make a nice addition to the ever growing stack of working sets in my basement (no one wants TVs around here so we make walls out of them for fun).

Sears started labeling Sanyo's as LXI about the time of the
switch to "Brand Central" when they started selling brand named
sets. Sears bought most sets without a factory warranty so
only they could do the warranty. This was never told & pissed a
lot of people off when something broke a few days out & would do zero
for you. Mom & Pops would stretch things & so would the factory
if it were from an independent.

73 Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

So Sears stopped selling "Sears" TVs and just sold name brands without any rebadging? Actually growing up I don't recall ever seeing store brand TVs like JCP or Sears unless they were pretty old, but by the time I came around CRT TVs were on the way out. When did stores in general stop selling sets with their name on them?

Also If all goes well I will hopefully have the CRT tester attatchment for this set Friday, or if my buddy lets me I'll just bring the whole set to his house and test it in my station wagon. If the CRT is bad I don't know what to do with this set. I don't want to take it to the scrap yard but my family hates all the old sets hidden around the house.. Also why I bug so many people on here with repair questions :lmao:

I had a Funai sourced Zenith 13" TV-VCR combo. The Zenith model number was pre-fixed by the letters SR.
They were always intent on selling the customer a maintenance agreement.

The forum members and myself never thought that you were that young.
I started very young as well. 60+ years ago.
If the CRT is good, maybe your buddy will take it in.

House brands like Insignia still exist. Sears from the daays of crank gramophones to some time in the 60's or 70's used the Silvertone badge for gear made by a wide variety of makers. The Sears badging appeared later.

The Silvertone name remained until about 1974 when Sanyo bought out Warwick. The Silvertone name was on the higher line products. In the early 60's they started using the Sears brand name on some of the imported sets.
Before that, the real cheapie line was badged "Meteor". That name probably went back to the 30's.

What was the deal with Sanyo and buying companies back then? I believe Sanyo bought Fisher around the same time, and then bought Marantz later. I have worked on Marantz gear that was built the exact same as later Sanyo era fisher stuff. It's been a few years though.

I tested the tube today in this Sears set after finding a #23 adapter. The CRT tests very good and I made sure to test it following the manual, then found a video online to follow just in case there was a mistake. Now it seems time for the LUM section to get resoldered and checked. It really is nice to know the CRT is good rather than just dig into a tv that could be a lost cause.

Also the way this set is built is super cool. The two board chassis design is something I haven't seen yet. Most sets here either have one single board, or they're a Zenith set with boards all over the place.

Resoldering did nothing, so I will have to pull the board.

When the set is powered on, there is an extremely bright blue and green dot on the screen. What is this?

Before you go further make 2 DC measurements.
1) measure the collector of one of the 3 video outputs on
the CRT socket.
2) the G-2 ( screen ) voltage at the CRT socket.

This narrows things down.
The colored blobs are normally seen at turn off & is usually normal.
BTW try the G-2 control on the FBT. Just turn it up a tad.

73 Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

I have a lot of stupid questions since i have never really taken a voltage measurement on the CRT out of fear of damaging tools.

What is the collector and where do I find it? I'm also not sure how to measure the G2 voltage. I know of the G2 controls but not where to check the voltages.

Which G2 control and what is the "FBT"? Sorry about the stupid questions.

FBT is flyback transformer! Can't help you with the rest though...

Look at CRT socket. The 3 color outputs have white paint on
the PCB. They are marked E B & C measure the C in DC volts.
The G-2 should be marked too. Use a meter rated at 800-1000
volts as it can be adjusted that high. Normal voltage is apx 400-500.

Almost all in line tubes will have the same set up & its common
to make tests here.

73 Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

If your meter does not go beyond 600V you can get more range by finding a 200-400V B+ rail. Measure the B+ rail with respect to ground, then measure the G2 with respect to the B+ rail then add the two measurements to get the real G2 voltage.

The three color controls had no markings for what was what, and the only things with the E C & B markings are transistors on the neck board.

I tested the voltages on the controls and got nothing on DC, then figured I misread something and tried AC. Still no voltage. I grabbed another meter and still got nothing. So the issue is the neck board?

Have to admit it, but the high voltages can be a bit scary sometimes.

Measure at the C of one of the transistors. Not the
controls.

My bad. I should have realized that.

The voltages I got were 121, 123, and 127 volts DC.

They are normal.
Try turning the G-2 control up a little.
Also check the CRT socket for cold joints.

73 Zeno:smoke:
LFOD !

Sanyo never owned Marantz. They owned Fisher. The cheapie Marantz gear you refer to was when Marantz was owned by B&K/Dynascan and common rent to own store fare, and I bet outsourced to Sanyo to build, when Marantz hit rock bottom. In between the SuperScope and Philips era. During the B&K/DynaScan era, there was Marantz Japan which was not available here except for a few items. Who made much better equipment than was then offered here in the same time frame (and some of it was sold here as top of the line Marantz offerings by B&K)

Silvertone was indeed bought by Sanyo, as it was part of the Warwick Electronics purchase by Sanyo. The Arkansas Plant became the Sanyo TV plant, and under Sanyo ownership went from bottom of the barrel, to one of the most reliable TV plants in the industry, by cleaning up the plant, and by vastly improved quality control practices and better management.