Newbie's First Questions RCA TS 721 Restoration

[Chris K]

I have a chance to buy a Leader LCG 396 generator for a decent price. I've heard too many negative things about the Conar 682 I've been using, among them, that it overdrives the signal and it's not variable. I hope the Leader works on B&W old sets!!! Does anyone have any knowledge on the Leader they can share? Is it a worthwhile buy at $50? Working and in very good cosmetic condition.

[Notimetolooz]

Oh, you are trying to confuse us by rotating the scan!

The brighter bands are probably due to the scans not being uniform, the lines are crowded together at the top and bottom making it look brighter. That means the scan shapes are not straight ramps.

The scan frequencies could be far off. No video signal is making it to the CRT.
If you had a decent oscilloscope you would be able to figure the approximate frequencies and the waveshapes of the sweep. If the frequencies of the sweep were not very far off and the video was making it to the screen a pattern generator would work instead.

That Leader would be fine (assuming that particular unit is working right).
If you get it one of the first things to do is try it on a working analog TV (a color set would be fine).
That will test it out and get you familiar with how it is used.

[Chris K]

Originally Posted by Notimetolooz

Oh, you are trying to confuse us by rotating the scan!

The brighter bands are probably due to the scans not being uniform, the lines are crowded together at the top and bottom making it look brighter. That means the scan shapes are not straight ramps.

The scan frequencies could be far off. No video signal is making it to the CRT.
If you had a decent oscilloscope you would be able to figure the approximate frequencies and the waveshapes of the sweep. If the frequencies of the sweep were not very far off and the video was making it to the screen a pattern generator would work instead.

That Leader would be fine (assuming that particular unit is working right).
If you get it one of the first things to do is try it on a working analog TV (a color set would be fine).
That will test it out and get you familiar with how it is used.

Leader came today and I hooked it up to a Zenith 12" I restored...a Sidekick. It works perfectly. The bright spots and other artifacts are reflections and issues with camera lighting. Hopefully, I now have a tool that's reliable and I can use to diagnose problems with the 721 and other TVs I work on. I guess you get what you pay for. The Conar 682 was $10! I've seen this Leader unit selling for as much as $200 used on ebay. I got this one for $50. It was supposedly owned by a retired Westinghouse engineer who knew how to use it and take care of it.