muntz tv/ceramic disc caps

[radio nut]

The Muntz tv I got running for a friend has been a pain. I put caps and electro's in it and got it going. Then a chassis mount resistor shorted to ground and killed the high voltage plus the rectifier tube really did not like that although the colors were neat!.

Ok, fixed that and moved the set from the workshop in the barn to the garage while the cabinet was being restored.
Turned the set on and it buzzed really loud through the speaker. Shorted tube.... alright then I just was not impressed with the picture itself....to gray and gray and not really very black and white.

Checked voltages and in the IF they were "off"
Well keep in mind that the resistors that were out of tolerance were changed.
I could think of nothing else beside ceramic disc caps. I want to make sure that I do not have to tear this out of the cabinet again so I just shot gun replaced those and then the picture was crisper and had the kind of black and white image I was used too.
Now as far as I have read here on this site it seems to me that most people believe that ceramics dont fail.

Are we getting to the age now where they might or is this probably cheap parts from the factory?

Oh, since then I have once again lost high voltage to the crt and traced the problem to (what are they called?) a hard flat square that has three tiny resistors and three caps in it.

So now I am making one of those on a terminal strip and will mount that this weekend.
One thing after another with this set!!!!