Deoxit Convergence Pots?

[TinCanAlley]

I'm about to change the capacitors on the remote control board noted in the troubleshooting PDF. If this works, and the set starts turning on and off via remote and/or power button, I want to redo the all the purity, gray scale and convergence over as I was never fully satisfied the last time I did it.

I know the convergence pots don't get much rotating, but after 51 years, would you say it might be advantageous to clean them with deoxit? I know that's a no no on the 3 ferrite core (inductors?), but the other 9 are standard pots.

Also, since I'll be starting from scratch, I'm going to deoxit the setup switch in hopes it fixes the issue of no lines showing when in setup mode.

What about the other controls (Focus, G2s, Horizontal Hold etc.)?

I'm attaching a pic of the convergence board. It looks as though the inductor core for the blue convergence has been damaged. The other 2 have a nice hex socket and the blue looks mangled. Since it has converged the blue lines, I'm assuming it is still working, but might not accept a tool to adjust.

[Alex KL-1]

I believe that will don't harm. I have one delta gun TV with some scratchy convergence, making a annoying vertical jittery at times, and was solved with Deoxit (after applying a lot and rotating pots a lot). In your case, the pots are shinning, so only a dab and somegentle rotation (taking a careful note of original positions) can be needed...

[vol.2]

General rule of thumb on something that old is to use regular deoxit or other contact cleaner on metal/metal pots, and something with a lubricant in it like deoxit fader lube on anything that has a carbon trace inside of it.

Really old carbon traces can be brittle and spraying them with harsh solvents can cause them to crack off. Fader lube type products are designed to help restore some of the durability to carbon tracks. It doesn't always work if the tracks are too far gone, but it can prevent catastrophic failure of a carbon track that is starting to get crunchy

I don't know what's inside your pots though.

[Electronic M]

Convergence pots are wire wound types. Some contact cleaner won't hurt. I haven't seen this in the pots Zenith used, but on the convergence pots RCA and the rest of the industry favored sometimes either the form the wire if wrapped on burns up or the wire gets loose and starts getting hooked on the wiper and sometimes that destroys the pot. Take care while adjusting.

Also only use all plastic construction alignment tools on the slugs in the inductors on the board. Metal hex tools will not only crack the slugs, but also the metal changes the tuning of the slug while near the inductor so after dialing in an adjuster merely removing the adjustment tool will throw it off if the tool is metal.

BTW, it's generally frowned upon to create multiple topics for the same TV. You've been creating a lot of topics to ask about various aspects of your Avanti that could all be done in one place.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by vol.2

General rule of thumb on something that old is to use regular deoxit or other contact cleaner on metal/metal pots, and something with a lubricant in it like deoxit fader lube on anything that has a carbon trace inside of it.

Really old carbon traces can be brittle and spraying them with harsh solvents can cause them to crack off. Fader lube type products are designed to help restore some of the durability to carbon tracks. It doesn't always work if the tracks are too far gone, but it can prevent catastrophic failure of a carbon track that is starting to get crunchy

I don't know what's inside your pots though.

I usually use D5, and when I am satisfied with the results, I follow up with a short blast of Fader F5 to leave behind a bit of lubrication.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by Alex KL-1

I believe that will don't harm. I have one delta gun TV with some scratchy convergence, making a annoying vertical jittery at times, and was solved with Deoxit (after applying a lot and rotating pots a lot). In your case, the pots are shinning, so only a dab and somegentle rotation (taking a careful note of original positions) can be needed...

I don't recall noticing any issues when I use the controls years back, but I was noting some issues on how the blue horizontal lines bend at the ends where the red and green didn't. I was hoping this time to correct that and thought it might be a dirty pot.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

Convergence pots are wire wound types. Some contact cleaner won't hurt. I haven't seen this in the pots Zenith used, but on the convergence pots RCA and the rest of the industry favored sometimes either the form the wire if wrapped on burns up or the wire gets loose and starts getting hooked on the wiper and sometimes that destroys the pot. Take care while adjusting.

Also only use all plastic construction alignment tools on the slugs in the inductors on the board. Metal hex tools will not only crack the slugs, but also the metal changes the tuning of the slug while near the inductor so after dialing in an adjuster merely removing the adjustment tool will throw it off if the tool is metal.

BTW, it's generally frowned upon to create multiple topics for the same TV. You've been creating a lot of topics to ask about various aspects of your Avanti that could all be done in one place.

My bad. While each post was about the same set, it was on different issues, questions and advice. Thought an original thread might get pretty convoluted with all the jumping around and some might not reenter the thread base on original topic, not knowing there was something new. Will keep one thread from now on.

When I first started working on the set, I got an entire set of alignment and other plastic tools meant for TV. It has just about everything I needed. The center of the inductor was like that when I got the set and it seemed to work, albeit a bit harder to turn than the others. I do have a new inductor that I was going to install before the redo of convergence, etc.

Any thought on G2 pots? Would they benefit from a cleaning?

[mrjukebox160]

Do not spray anything in to the G2 pots. They have 800 to 1000 volts on them sprays can cause arcing.

[Electronic M]

If the donor coil is the same and the only damage to the original is the adjustment slug and it's not stuck you can just spin the slugs out of both, blow any debris out of the one in the set, and spin the new slug into the new coil... I've done this more than once.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by mrjukebox160

Do not spray anything in to the G2 pots. They have 800 to 1000 volts on them sprays can cause arcing.

Noted. I'll leave them be.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

If the donor coil is the same and the only damage to the original is the adjustment slug and it's not stuck you can just spin the slugs out of both, blow any debris out of the one in the set, and spin the new slug into the new coil... I've done this more than once.

It's an NOS replacement. I got just about every pot and inductor on the board, but never got around to replacing any. So if the replacement is factory, and NOS, should I use it or just the slug?

[Electronic M]

Originally Posted by TinCanAlley

It's an NOS replacement. I got just about every pot and inductor on the board, but never got around to replacing any. So if the replacement is factory, and NOS, should I use it or just the slug?

Either approach should be workable. I'd use just the slug. Changing just the slug is easier, minimizes the chance of wiring errors or damaging the original or replacement coil and if you ever accidentally damage the coil form of the original (or the plastic degrades and fails... which happens sometimes on 60s Zeniths with that style coil form) you still have the replacement coil to fall back on.

It's your set so the approach you take is your call.

[TinCanAlley]

Originally Posted by Electronic M

Either approach should be workable. I'd use just the slug. Changing just the slug is easier, minimizes the chance of wiring errors or damaging the original or replacement coil and if you ever accidentally damage the coil form of the original (or the plastic degrades and fails... which happens sometimes on 60s Zeniths with that style coil form) you still have the replacement coil to fall back on.

It's your set so the approach you take is your call.

Slug change it is!

[TinCanAlley]

Since I just learned that multiple posts on same TV isn't the best approach, I'm going to post this here because it's the closest thread to my next question.

I was searching the internet for all the info I could find on my model (Avante SE2564X) and came across something from another forum (Zeno was helping them). In one of the pics posted, I noticed the routing of the convergence board wiring was routed much differently than mine. It got me thinking that maybe mine is wrong? I'll post the images and maybe someone will be able to chime in. Mine is tied together with a yellow tie. Not sure what it's called, but it seems to be a version before our standard zip ties. Maybe it was changed from factory routing.

Anyway, let me know what you think.

[TinCanAlley]

Well I feel like a complete idiot. Ignore everything I asked in this thread. I really should have gone over old threads before starting this and also looked over the convergence board. It's been almost 13 years since my initial work on the set and I completely forgot I had tackled most of these already. I replaced all three inductors and cleaned all other pots.

They only thing I didn't do is replace the pots that might be causing the right side red and green not adjusting to match the blue. I know have those pots and will replace Monday. The only thing I needs is some tips on how to unsolder them. The leads are down into little metal "buckets" and then filled with solder. It's the same inside the set on all the underside components. I tried holding my iron on the metal "bucket", but it never got hot enough to melt the large blob of solder. If I could find a long, thin tip I might be able to get down into it. I don't know what they used at the factory, but I'm assuming it was something that surrounded the little "bucket."

Attaching a small pic of what I'm referring to. In it you can see how the leads are set into solder inside the inserts. You can also see one filled, but nothing in it.