About to start on something rather unique and interesting...

[Glenz75]

Thanks for the comment Chris Those Solar caps could very well be...Alan would have imported them from the US.. I've seen quite a few of those solar caps in radios built here. Cheers Glen

Originally Posted by ChrisW6ATV

Nice progress, Glen.

I wonder if those Solar capacitors are among the few that ever traveled to NZ and are still there?

[Glenz75]

Here is a rather belated update on this restoration, have been busy with other things of late

The vertical section has now been totally recapped and all resistors replaced, most of them were way out of spec and the result is now a nice even picture that fills the screen. I can adjust linearity and height now without any problems.

I also tidied up the smoothing cap arrangement in the voltage doubler circuit for main B+ that runs the whole set. I actually had some identical new old stock filter caps which surprisingly reformed to near perfect so I installed those, they should be ok, generally I'd just put new ones in, but in this case I thought I'd try them and see how things go. I will replace rectifier diodes but for now they can stay there.

I think my next move is to replace all the electrolytic caps that are still in place and there are about 1/2 a dozen or so.

Since the original speaker and output transformer were missing I connected another speaker that had an output transformer with it and tested the audio side and thats working fine too, there's no video buzz or off tune noise and sounds good, so the alignment has held up pretty well. At least thats something I don't have redo! That's all for now.

[kvflyer]

Certainly looks great. And now that you have had a few moments to work on it, most likely you will be even more encouraged to go on. Great success story and I am sure that this set is unique and may ultimately deserve a place in a museum...

[Glenz75]

Thank you for the nice comments kvflyer Yes this set it pretty unique and its already in a museum...my own personal one! This is going to be one of those TV's that must be passed on and end up in the right hands when I leave this earth, which will not be for a long time.

Originally Posted by kvflyer

Certainly looks great. And now that you have had a few moments to work on it, most likely you will be even more encouraged to go on. Great success story and I am sure that this set is unique and may ultimately deserve a place in a museum...

[Kevin Kuehn]

Looks really nice. Do some stations actually still broadcast a test pattern over there?

[Glenz75]

Hi Kevin, thanks for the compliment. There are no TV stations here producing test patterns anymore. Our analogue gets turned off next year. That test pattern was recorded on VHS some years ago when a small local TV station started up. I then transferred it to DVD and its perfect for when working on TV sets.

Originally Posted by Kevin Kuehn

Looks really nice. Do some stations actually still broadcast a test pattern over there?

[Glenz75]

Hi all, Good news, this project is coming to an end....It's nearly done.

Over the past few months I've been slowly picking away at it, replacing components here and there, haven't had much time to really spend on it only in the past few weeks has some real progress been made.

Every single paper and electrolytic capacitor has been replaced along with several resistors in which some were way out of tolerance, others were ok but decided to replace anyway for peace of mind. Replaced the rectifier diodes and the screened cable going from the tuner to the 1st IF as the orignal was all stiff and no doubt its dielectric properties would have gone a long time ago.

Fitting some of the new electroytics, I had to compromise as to where to put them as the originals were buried in places and restuffing the original cans, I wasn't even going to go there but managed to put the new ones in various places so it still looks tidy. I had to mount some on a tag strip as the area would not allow me to put the new ones in place as they would have been right above the B+ droppers and in amongst other components.

I did though encounter a couple of faults which had to be sorted, the first one was width related. From cold the width was fine and the control could be adjusted to suit, after about 5-10 minutes the width would increase in size and get to a point where it was too much and it was affecting the boost voltage and the control had to be turned hard to one end which I didn't like so I set out find out what was causing the issue.
In the end it was width control pot, obviously heat and voltage was causing the resistance to change after time. Luckily the pot on the donor chassis was ok, so I put it in and now the width and boost voltage are stable - phew!

The other problem kind of led me on a wild goose chase in a way, again it was a resistor causing the problem, after about 1/2 hour I noticed the contrast would reduce and picture would get a bit washed out and I had to adjust the AGC control to compensate as it warmed but even hard at one end it wasn't good enough.
I started with the tuner and did find a 5.6k inside which has risen to about 20K, but that didn't fix it so started poking around with the scope and confirmed that it wasn't the front end causing the problem. Next I moved to looking around the AGC gate/sync area and eventually found a 22k resistor that was heat sensitive, spraying it with freeze would restore the contrast to normal but something interesting is that while it was faulting, touching anything around there with meter probes would boost the contrast level, but after the new resistor was put in, this had very little or no effect, must have the capacitance of the meter probes compensating for the fault!
This one did take a while to find in between getting constantly interupted while in the middle of it all, but got there in the end!

So there we have it, too queer faults both caused by resistors this time, not capactiors for a change!

At this point in time all I have to do now is make up a lead/plug for the speaker and output transformer and put that and chassis back in the cabinet.

I have decided to leave the chassis surface alone as it had originally been sprayed with silver paint and don't want to disturb it by cleaning. You can see it starting to flake off in places but it isn't not going to rust away. I might just give the chassis top a light spray with some silicone anyway.

So all going well the next update should be of the set all back together and playing.

Attached are recent photos and the final pile of dead bits.

Stay tuned...

Cheers

Glen

[Phil Nelson]

Beautiful job on this one-of-a-kind television. I can't wait to see a photo of the whole thing put together.

One caution about using silicone (in any form) around furniture: It can create serious problems with "fisheye" that might defeat any future attempts to refurb the lacquer finish on your television cabinet. Pledge and similar furniture polishes have been permanently banned from our house!

I understand that you mentioned using it on the chassis, not the cabinet, but silicone oil is invasive and pervasive. It can be transferred on fingers or a rag, as well as through the air.

Perhaps there's some other product that would work just as well on your chassis. Or, if you use it, at least keep that spray far away from your cabinet and wash hands thoroughly before touching the cabinet again.

Regards,

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

[Glenz75]

Hi Phil, thanks! Its now very close to going back in its cabinet, I am hoping to get some photos up over the weekend

Silicone - Yes it can be a pain, I know what its like as that stuff does go everywhere, I may decide not to use it just in case I have to pull the chassis again in the future should anything else go wrong and then have that stuff on my fingers and tools etc.... I think I'll just leave it as is.

Cheers
Glen

[Glenz75]

Hi guys - Its done, the Telerad is finally all back together in its cabinet and is complete! Phil - My avatar has been a kind of a teaser..

I have to say though its been an interesting project to say the least and it took me a lot longer than I'd expected to finish it and I learned a few things along way as you do with anything like this. The bit I didn't like was not working without a circuit, there's always a degree of uneasiness with something as rare and odd as this, but thank goodness I did have that spare junk chassis and the heap of photos I took to fall back on especially if I'd undone a part of the circuit to replace some components and then left it like that for a week or two!

I also reckon that this Telerad was set number ten that he made as there is a code on the back of both chassis, this one is '1510' and the donor is '1503'.
Thinking back I do recall Alan saying he used a prototype set in his living room for years and that one is the junk chassis as I saw where it came from after it had already been thrown in the skip complete with CRT etc and smashed by someone helping with the clean out at the time before I could stop him!

Now I can sit back and enjoy watching it. There are a few DVDs I've been putting aside just so I can see them on this, so looking forward to doing that with a

Hopefully the set will behave itself, now its back together. The cabinet is really well built and does look nice.

I'm sure if Alan were still alive he'd be tickled pink to see his only remaining set in existence going again.

Thanks for following this thread and should anything else come up in regards to the Telerad I'll post an update. Some final photos for your enjoyment.

Cheers!
Glen

[Glenz75]

More photos, the camera doesn't do it justice, BTW The screen shots are from Monty Python.

[hi_volt]

Wow. A very extraordinary set! Did you ever get an opportunity to trace out the circuitry? That would be quite interesting!

[kvflyer]

Hi Glen. I have followed this thread for the duration. It has been very interesting and I have enjoyed it immensely. It great to see a set that is from another country because we are so used to what we see daily.

My daughter lives in Melbourne, Vic. If you would like me to "stuff" your defective electrolytic capacitors, I would be delighted to do it for you. It would be your call and if you are interested, you could mail them to her and I could collect them next time I am in Australia. Just a thought Mate!

Cheers,
Don

[Glenz75]

Thanks! I might trace the circuit one day, I did think of doing it during the restoration but really wanted to get the set working. But tracing the circuit would reveal a few things about its design though! Cheers.

Originally Posted by hi_volt

Wow. A very extraordinary set! Did you ever get an opportunity to trace out the circuitry? That would be quite interesting!

[Glenz75]

Hi Don, and thanks for the compliments! This is exactly why I enjoy reading threads on here and ARF as your native television sets especially tube colour ones are something that here in New Zealand never existed, same thing really.
I'm glad that you did enjoy the story on this. I have plenty of other sets in the pipelines to feature here at some stage when I get around to working on them, they are all production sets, but nevertheless they maybe of interest being foreign.

Thanks for the offer to restuff the caps, if I get stuck at some stage I might just take you up on that offer. I'll have a go myself first but if I get stuck I may call on an expert

Thanks Don.

Originally Posted by kvflyer

Hi Glen. I have followed this thread for the duration. It has been very interesting and I have enjoyed it immensely. It great to see a set that is from another country because we are so used to what we see daily.

My daughter lives in Melbourne, Vic. If you would like me to "stuff" your defective electrolytic capacitors, I would be delighted to do it for you. It would be your call and if you are interested, you could mail them to her and I could collect them next time I am in Australia. Just a thought Mate!

Cheers,
Don