Well yesterday afternoon something happened that I would never have expected. I found a set, that I would actually consider adding to my collection, on the road side! All winter a few BPC sets and a moldering couch have sat on the roadside near a place where three driveways converge at the side of the main road a couple of blocks from my home. I've considered taking everything but the CRTs and cabinets from these sets for spare parts but didn't feel the need. Then yesterday while out for lunch I spotted some new additions a couple of consoles that looked to be late 70's-80's solid state models. These piqued my interest as the possible chance to get a new delta gun CRT to replace the dying one in my '67 Admiral remote console for free proved irresistible. I figured they were probably inline(and was right) but biked over later to check it out. After observing the carnage of the several BPC sets that had already been plundered in the way I was contemplating and the beat up SS Sylvania inline consoles I noticed a metal cabinet Sylvania table set laying on it's back that I almost instantly knew was a delta gun set.
From it's cosmetics I figured it was might be a SS set, and I further figured the CRT was toast seeing as it was on it's back and there was an ugly chip/crack on it's face...either of which could have broken the vacuum.
Well I was curious so I put it on it's feet and looked at the warped scrunched in back and figured it was necked for sure, But to my surprise after peeling the back off I discovered the CRT neck was intact and whats more it had tubes!....Five of them.
Upon seeing this I called in for backup and when my Dad arrived I loaded it into the C-RV and raced on my bike back home to unload it and give it a more detailed examination/damage report. The wood grain vinyl is toast, the UHF dial string is snapped, some knobs are stiff,the back severely warped, the speaker grill damaged, the set was full of leaves/mouse nest , the degauss coil and HOT plate lead were unplugged(prompting me to hazard a guess that this set was dead before it's days outside). I also observed that this set is a five tube hybrid with a trippler for HV and focus which I've never seen on a set with a tube horizontal section before.
The chassis was a cinch to pull just two screws holding it, two more holding the hardwired pencil box control board, and a bunch of things to unplug. Service techs must have loved this back in the day. I then checked the CRT which read bad on all guns. Unbothered by this I cranked the heater up to 8 volts and let the CRT cook for a few minutes as I tried to get some of the yard waste off the PCBs. In that time it went from the middle of bad to the middle of good on all guns so it seems the CRT lives.
The chassis looks like it can be saved. There about 6 cracked to hell ceramic caps, half as many similarly ruined orange drops, a couple of scary power resistors, and some questionable ceramic peaking coils, but it still looks like I may be able restore it. If I can make it work I'll be left with the choice of whether to get new wood grain vinyl, sand and paint, or leave it as is to shock visitors that such an obviously ruined looking thing actually works.
If anyone knows what model this is it would be appreciated as I doubt a readable ID number can be found. I've never in all my 21+ years in this world found a vintage tube set at the curb that genuinly might be restorable before or came upon a Sylvania in the wild before so it must have been a real cold day in hell yesterday.
I'm curious how these sets compared to others at the time(I have several 70's Zeniths as a yard stick for that brand) performance wise. I wonder how did the picture detail and color compare to other makes, and what service issues were common?