Admiral 14R12 Restoration

[Kevin Kuehn]

Yeah, that does look rather sun faded, but it's not to the point that the fillers are exposed. I suppose if a guy wanted a super glossy surface, one could wet sand the entire cabinet and have it clear coated with an automotive urethane. Maybe even lacquer would work, at least with lacquer you could dissolve that off if you didn't like the looks. Ive never tried it, but I'm guessing some toner lacquer would even darken the finish.

[Phil Nelson]

Remember that the glossy layer in Bakelite is thin. If you get too aggressive with abrasives, it's possible to polish all the way through it, and then you are down into the pulpy under-layer which no magic potion or process will polish to a shine.

Some Bakelite cabinets will polish up nicely, and others are just too weathered (or whatever-ed). This comes up all the time in the radio collecting world. You can spray on clear coat to make a weathered cabinet shiny. Some people also use wax, but I consider that a temporary solution.

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

[Crist Rigott]

Thanks guys on the comments on the Bakelite. To get a real good shine on this one, it looks like I'll have to spray some clear lacquer on it and go from there. I did this on a Zenith table radio and it turned out real nice.

[Crist Rigott]

I replaced the door knob cap tonight. Success! I now have about 10Kv at the 2nd anode with 1 HV tester and about 13Kv with the other.

I've hooked up my pattern generator to it and I am starting to straighten out the picture.

I adjusted the ION trap for max brightness and centered the focus coil. I do have a question on the adjustment lever for the focus coil labeled Centering. I'm guessing I move the lever around to "center" the picture on the CRT. My question is there are 2 screws on each side of the Focus Coil that allows it to move up and down and from side to side. Do I loosen them to move the centering lever around and once the picture is centered I tighten those screws along with the 1 screw on the Centering lever? This is the first time I've done an Admiral and this lever is new to me.

Next problem. It seems that the H width and H lineraty adjustments do very little. There is some adjustment but the picture is past full screen. I've read the Sams on adjusting the Horizontal sweep circuit adjustments but very little happens. Is this normal? Any clue as to where to look? Remember I just replaced all the caps and resistors. I ohmed out the coils too.

Thanks.

BTW, my 210 volt line going into the fuse is now measuring 238 volts.

[Crist Rigott]

It's playing a DVD now and it looks pretty good. I know it can be better. I'll let it play for an hour or so to "burn it in" some.