Show us your vintage B&W sets!

[jshorva65]

Originally Posted by ChrisW6ATV

I love the small CRT you have for the Fada project. And, "unobtanium electrodynamic speaker"... I have a 630TS that had been converted to a video monitor at some time, and a video-level control or something was mounted through the speaker grille cloth. I tried some kind of speaker as part of my repair attempts around 1980 but got no sound. Now I think I know the main reason why. I will have to look at the Photofact manual closely at some point and figure out how to make a PM speaker work in there. I do not remember if the audio-output transformer was even still there.

The original RCA service manual (as a 90 MB "pdf" file) is available for free download here http://www.antiqueradioshop.com/RCA630TSService.pdf, linked from this illustrated case history on a 630TS restoration http://www.antiqueradio.org/RCA630TSTelevision.htm.

The 5" CRT pictured is type 5AXP4, designed specifically for use in a repair shop environment. These can be found occasionally on eBay. Most 1950's vintage tube manuals having a "picture tubes" section include the 5AXP4 characteristics under "test" picture tubes.

Obviously-modified sets can be frightening. As long as the mod was added through the grille cloth, though, that should be a relatively simple fix to obtain some reproduction grille cloth of the proper style from AES, provided the IF wasn't gutted. Field coil is 62 ohms and voice coil is 3.2 ohms as I recall. The modification probably included a filter choke subbed for the field coil.

I just burned a DVD today of my new "Angel Head Test Pattern" which I drew on CAD software, superimposed a small photo of the family dog on one side, added a 400 Hz audio tone and transcoded to a video slide show. I may be offering that DVD on my web site soon.

The TV and HiFi sections of the Curtis Mathes "wall unit" slide out for easy servicing and all the "service" adjustments (height, linearity, AGC, etc.) are accessible from the cabinet front, concealed behind the large channel selector knob. The TV section itself isn't much larger than other 23" B/W consoles of early 1960's vintage. There are two sections to the TV chassis, forming an "L" shape as viewed from cabinet rear. Low-voltage power supply and horizontal sweep are on the horizontally-mounted subchassis, the entire signal path from IF to audio, video, and vertical sweep are on the vertically-mounted chassis behind the control panel. Terminal strips are thru-chassis "pin" type similar to those Zenith used in the 1960's. Tuner is a 12-channel turret type with silver contacts.