Estate Sale Finds In 2008!

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by drh4683

The picture blew me away too. THe picture is as good if not better than a zenith chromacolor II. It has 8 preset UHF channels. Opened up the control door, which is designed to be completely removable. Also to note, the long vertical control door is actually pot metal! None of the presets were tuned, the indicator bars were all the way to the end like it would have been after leaving the factory. The channel windows on the dial drum all had letters A-H for UHF too. No channel digits were ever installed.
I didnt know what to expect as far as the chassis was concerned. I bought it for half off, which was only 5 bucks. My kind of deal.
When I got home, I pulled the back off to dedust it. I was expecting some "modern" looking chassis layout, like a mediocre sized circuit board and nothing else. Well, I was pleasantly surprized with what i saw. A nice big chassis, like an XL-100 which plug in modules, but the chassis was a horizontal layout. The power supply and HV sections were still point to point wired. Even has a seperate remote control chassis, similar to that used in the 60's sets. So its not a cheaply made set. It must be one of last "good" ones though. Good meaning, circuit boards/modules mounted on a steel framed chassis, and individual pots mounted to the rear of the chassis. I really like this one, and would make a great everyday TV.

I agree with you, Doug. I also have an XL-100, very late 1990s vintage (CTC185, bought new in 1999) that has only had two repairs in eight years...and even survived a fall off the stand about two weeks ago, the only "damage" being slight color distortion that I was able to clear up with a few passes of an old speaker magnet. I don't know to this day whether the auto-degausser in my set has failed or just what happened (the shadow mask was bent slightly when the set hit the floor, or...?), but I do know I was very surprised and pleased to have gotten rid of the color splotches so easily. (I had visions of a smashed CRT and other horrendous damage to the chassis.) They haven't returned; in fact, the TV's picture is every bit as good as it was when the set was new. The only thing I've noticed is that the picture is slightly out of focus for a few seconds, until the TV warms up. Once it's warm, the picture is beautiful.

The picture quality of XL-100s, as you noted, is every bit as good as (if not better than) Zenith sets. I would put my XL-100 up against a Zenith Sentry 2 any day of the year.

RCA/Thomson finally got the bugs with the RF tuner out of their newer TVs, beginning with the CTC203 chassis (so I've read here), by mounting the tuner separately from the rest of the set. The on-board tuner in those late-'80s-'90s RCAs was a bad idea from the beginning; I can't help wondering why it took them so long to get the message and change the design.

[Carmine]

Originally Posted by drh4683

THe picture is as good if not better than a zenith chromacolor II.

Blasphemy.

Hate to be off-topic Doug, yet hardly worth a new thread...

Did you get the e-mail I sent from my work? I'd really like to see some of the cleaned-up & working pictures of that Zenith set I gave you, as I'm sure other AK'ers would too.

[radiotvnut]

Nice find! And, getting the original remote and cart makes it super nice! That set brings back a memory of one a lady gave me years ago. I put a CRT in it and sold it. That was back when I sold every TV I fixed to fuel my antique radio habit. I'd almost forgotten about it until I saw your set.

[zenithfan1]

Great find Doug! I've never seen one of those before either. Very nice, well made design. That thing will last for many years to come. And the ultrasonic remote, makes it an unbelievable deal. You are having a streak of good luck!

[Chad Hauris]

Very nice set! I have noticed too that on almost every TV/VCR with a varactor tuner I have seen, the UHF presets/numbers are not set up. Either people were using cable boxes or just did not watch UHF. Very rarely, some of the presets are set to local UHF channels but often the numbers are still not installed.

[radiotvnut]

Way to go, Doug! You done good this weekend! I'm anxious to see those sets up and running!

[Adam]

I like those Zenith b/w sets with the three pointed tuning dial, have 2 of them. This is the first 60s Zenith b.w set I ever heard of with no HV, one of mine had been sitting out in a barn for decade, the cabinet was all dirty and beat up, but it still worked when I got it.

[Chad Hauris]

Yesterday I found a 1971 Curtis Mathes tube type color set at an estate sale for $10.00. This house looked like very little in it had changed since the 1960's...there was lots of interesting vintage lamps and decorative items I got too.
The set had a hack repair job done on it...the back was put on with one screw and the chassis was not mounted to the cabinet very well...maybe only with one screw. I used the ratchet strap and dolly to move it on end.

It uses an RCA CTC-25 type chassis with some improvements such as connecting plugs and sockets on the wiring to the tuner cluster, 8" speakers, cooling fins on power transformer and a 6BQ5 audio output tube.
2 of the power supply diodes look very crudely soldered onto the circuit board. There was no indication of power when I plugged itin. It has a 25V" picture tube without a bonded faceplate.

Here is a video of the set. I don't have a still camera that works very well so I usually just do videos plus the video lets you show and tell more.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqsW7MwFcqI

Also does anyone know if there is a way to embed videos in AK posts?

[freakaftr8]

You lucky dogs! Sounds like a good weekend for finds!! Im in need of a 25AP22 CRT in that ctc-17 I picked up, but im going to use a variac and my 23egp22 CRT to test the chassis..

[zenithfan1]

Ya done good this time Doug!

[drh4683]

Thanks for the kind words everyone.
This evening (or should I say yesterday), I powered up the big 25" zenith for the first time. I pulled the HOT, and powered it up with the variac. The set was unplugged and appeared to have been untouched in years. From how the house was layed out, I believe this TV was the "basement" TV since day one. There was similar vintage furniture arrayed around the TV, and across from the seating area was the usual built in bar that everyone had. I don't think I've ever set foot in a 1950's/1960's home that didnt have a built in bar in the basement with wood paneling all around. Maybe thats a midwest thing, I don't know if its like that everywhere else in the US.

Back to the topic, after a slow power up, I had good sound. I plugged the 6LB6 back in and powered it up again. Had a picture with snow! Hooked up the antenna and as usual, a near perfect picture. I could'nt believe how crisp the picture was, and bright too. Its another lucky TV that survived, never had the back pulled off in 40 years until I came and saved it from its death at the end of the estate sale.

Its not 100% working perfect, the vertical is a bit short, not a tube either. So it will require some troubleshooting. A good chassis dedusting is also in order. My usual routine is to test ALL tubes in a recently aquired TV. Of the all original tubes, 3 were bad. Shorted 6U10 (rare), weak 6Z10 (the ususal), and a shorted 6GH8 (as expected).

I'll get into it tomorrow. Today was just the test out day to see what it was kind of shape its in. Its certianly a low hour set, for which I am pleased. The HV was running high at 28 KV when I first powered it up. Zenith with that ridculous "hollow shaft" HV pot makes it tricky to adjust the HV without the adjusting tool, which I never was able to find. A tapered flat head screwdriver always works though. The regulator is in good shape, brought it down to 25KV still within its adjustable range. The usual component drift. However, Im a bit concerned with the sweep transformer. That thing runs hotter than hell. I have an NOS one for this chassis should it be required. I've yet to check the cathode current. This is the same flyback used in the 20Y1C48/50 and 16Z7C50 chassis, and Ive had a couple of those crap out on me over the years.

Ha, as I sit here typing this, I'm monitoring the set. Now its intermittently flashing into a blank raster with the side pulled in. I know right off the bat thats an intermittent open vertical blanking transistor. Thats because one of my 16Z7C50 chassis sets had the same problem about 4 years ago. I went in circles trying to find it, little did I expect the vertical blanker to cause such a problem. Sure enough, replacment cured it for good. The original one had intermittent low gain which caused the problems. Im sure there will be more to come. A TV can't be flawless after almost 40 years of existance!

So that's where it stands for now. A few little things to work out, but thats where the fun is, in the repairs and getting it back up to par. Photos to come shortly....

[batterymaker]

Hey--how come you pulled the videos on troubleshooting the '61 Zenith? I enjoyed those. In fact, I watch both yours and Chad's videos on a regular basis.

Never had much courage with sticking my hands into TVs.
Portable radios, no problem--they only deal with 117v tops. Only TV I ever worked on was a 1948 Hallicrafters T54, and even then I was verrrry cautious.

Bill

[zenith2134]

Funny avatar, Batterymaker!

Good work on the Zenith; and I do agree that most things aren't perfect after 40 years .

About the bars....Seen that exact style around here a lot. My house had one but it was removed.

[andy]

...

[drh4683]

It is working much better now. I checked the HOT and it was running rather high at 210-220 mA. I adjusted the coil, this is the chassis where you shunt your meter over a 4.7 ohm resistor in series w/the control and just adjust for lowest voltage. I was able to bring it down a bit, and the fly is running much much cooler now.

This one was running hot to the point where you could smell the polyester from the HV cage if you were within a couple feet of the TV. That went away now as the fly is running cool. Just a slight adjustment to bring the current down makes the biggest difference. Just need to fix the vertical problem now, that will be this evening. Ive got some time now to fix it.