Last weekend I visited Nick to get a Zenith poster he advertised on VK, and he mentioned that he had a CTC4 he wanted to sell.

To make a long story short I ended up buying it for slightly more than 400$.
This I believe is the Seville model minus the legs.

Whom ever owned it before Nick did not take good care of it.
All the tubes (aside from the CRT), the speaker, the back, the legs, the channel selector knob, and possibly other stuff are all missing.

The 21AXP22 has the PNGOD (Purple Neck Glow Of Death) so it seems that I'm going to have to use a 21FJP until I come upon sufficient luck and or resources to bring a good 21AXP22 into my possession.



A nice 21FJP22 with the strongest emission of any of my roundys came with the set so I have a strong jug to put in for the time being.

One of the IF cans got knocked off the board, but miraculously the board appears to be just fine.

I'm going to go down in a few minutes and start examining the set in day light (read pulling the chassis and examining it).

Here is a link to some pictures of it...
http://s1095.photobucket.com/albums/i469/ElectronicMemory/RCA%20CTC4%20Seville%20%20blond%20finish/

I've clearly got my work cut out for me, but still I can't suppress that "Woo Hoo! I finally have got a CTC4! " feeling.

Congratulations. That looks like a fun project. First thing I'd do is put some legs under that poor cabinet.

Thanks!

I don't even know where to begin looking for original legs, and it appears that there are factory feet for it to sit on a table.

I pulled the chassis about an hour ago and brought it upstairs for examination and some work. here are the chassis shots...



The fly looks good with only a pinch of wax dripped.



A fuse was blown and a replacement was slapped in at some point in the past.


And this just looks like a hack job.


The set uses a metal color crystal.


There is minor damage to the IF board where the transformer got busted off.


One of the CRT socket wires is snapped off.


Tom C.

Very cool!

I love seeing old sets like this being resurrected.

I agree that you do have some work to do. But certainly like all of us, you knew that and actually welcome the challenge, don't you? Sorry about the CRT. Interesting to see paper capacitors labeled "Philco". I guess you are referring to them as the hack job?

As I saw in the VK thread, what is the consensus about the colors in the older kinescopes? I remember that a Heathkit set that I built seemed to (appropriately!) have colors that were more what I will call earthy or similar to the colors in vogue in the 70s; browns, oranges, burnt umber etc. I also noticed that my sets of today (CRT type) just don't seem to have the bright blues and reds of those older set phosphors. I have a 21CYP22 in my CTC-9. What colors should I expect? Certainly, the colors in the CTC-4 in the thread over at VK seem to remind me of the early colors.

Hope I have not wandered your thread OT. If so, I apologize...

The older CRTs have a red phosphor that is really red. Unfortunately it is not very bright. The newer CRTs have a red phosphor
that is slightly orange. That makes it impossible to get the colors between green and red quite right. But the new rare earth
red phosphor is very much brighter, so you do not have to watch the set in a dark room.

Thanks Tom. I was an audio salesman at EJ Korvette when I was a teenager. The TV department was right next to ours and it was in a room with double doors, like the ones at the entrance to the store. It was very dim in there for the obvious reason.

Reason for my question is that I am hoping to eventually get this CTC-9 of mine working and hopefully enjoy the real red colors. Yes, I will totally agree that the red was rather orange/brown, not a vivid red. I do remember a TV mom and dad had from the 80s that had good colors. It was a 25" RCA. Does the 21CYP22 have the old red phosphor or the new rare earth? Mine is not an "A".

Been way too long since I updated my thread here.

I decided to pull the CRT a few days back. Here are some pictures of it.









I've also slowly been cleaning 57 years worth of grime off the chassis.


I've been recaping too. Here is the completed IF board.

The ceramic cased ones I managed to restuff, but the rest had "bakelitized" paper tubes the ends of which my soldering iron could not melt or even soften! I had to double up to get one value of cap....I replaced a .056 with a .047 and a .01 in parallel ( I know this not wonderfully exact, but it is an improvement over the .068 maroon drop that was installed at some point in the sets past).

I finished replacing all the paper caps, and found that this set more closely matches the riders schematic than the Sam's folder from the ETF.
The only cardboard tubes left under chassis are either lytics or restuffed papers.

After doing all that it was very late and I decided to call it a night thinking I had reached my goal of ousting all the paper caps, then as my head hit the pillow I thought "Oh no! I forgot three! Oh well tomorrow then.", and the following morning I swapped them out. Now I can say all the papers are gone (though it is possible that some papers in mica-mold clothing may still be lurking).


I also remounted the IF shield after the recap.


I've disconnected the Doubler and B+ from the transformer and preformed a power up to confirm that the power xfmr is still good. The fillaments lit so it would seem that my power transformer is still good.

I variaced the set with only the doubler caps and seleniums connected to the B+ winding on the xfmr (I unsoldered the B+ lines) so I can reform 2-3 of the lytics and check the seleniums under power simultaneously. the seleniums ran cool to "warmer than the chassis, and cooler than my hand" so I may be able to keep them hooked up for awhile yet. The Doubler caps seemed to reform well.....I had a mA meeter hooked up between the B+ Xfmr winding ,and the two seleniums (this was the most convenient place to do so because all I had to do was pull out a fuse) The AC current varied with line input, but the DC seemed to vary with the reforming of the lytics. I reformed the doubler lytics by turning up my variac until the DC current was at ~1.5mA and then waiting until it dropped to ~.5mA I was able to continue this until I got to around 495V at the output of the doubler. At that point and above the current would stay around 1mA and not drop. The output voltage of the doubler is only supposed to be around 383V so I think the doubler is good enough for it's intended operating conditions.

I've been continuing to clean the chassis as well.
I thoroughly cleaned the inside HV cage including removing the HV rectifier cup for a cleaning.
The place where the HV rectifier cap connects to the fly was missing most of it's wax and kinda loose so I took some dripped wax and built up the wax around it for added support. I was concerned that the the connection on that lead was open so I checked the resistance between it and the HOT cap lead and got within 10% of what sam's lists that resistance value to be which is a good sign. I also for the briefest of moments touched the barrel of my soldering iron to the wax on the HV winding of the fly to melt the outer layer of wax in order to fill in some small cracks in the wax coating.
I replaced the HV cage lytics as well. I replaced the 20uF 25V caps with 22uF 250V replacements, and the 5uF 25V with two 2.2uF 63V Radio Shack "how the heck can new caps have some ESR???" specials connected in parallel (I'll likely change these turkeys later for a better part).

Here are some pictures.....More can be found in the link from the first post in this thread....

I visited Chester's electronics about 12 hours ago and got the last of the tubes I needed, and pretty much all the lytics I needed.
After hours of work installing the lytics I now can tune in good sound from my signal source, and I've confirmed the horizontal osc. is running more or less properly. I have not connected the top lead of the H out tube or the damper yet as the screen of the H out tube is at around half it's proper voltage (probably a bad resistor). Also the vertical osc. seems to be dead. I'll have to look into this tomorrow. Toooo tirrred!! Must sleep!

Tom C.

We have got a RASTER!!



About an hour ago I finished preparations and proceeded to do a full power up including the FULL horizontal stage. The best replacement for the bad 11K ohm 10W screen resistor for the HOT I could find was a 10K 7W, but I figured that it would last long enough for a full test, and I was right.
After putting the sub in with the top lead of the HOT still disconnected I read 110V. Sam's calls for 160V at the screen. I also decided not to sweat over not having the vertical osc. running the other day as I noticed that the plate of that tube gets it's voltage from the boost line, and thus would not work unless I went ahead and connected the flyback up to the HOT and damper.

The HV was only 15 KV (and falling) on the second test (I was too excited on the first brief power up to read the meeter). I figure that with low HOT screen grid voltage and all new tubes across the board that this is not too bad for a first power up.

I did not have sound during the test which I attribute to me messing with the tuner setting earlier in the day. This set may possibly have video for all I know.

This was the last task of the night. I'll see if I can do more tomorrow.

Looks good. All of the "stuff" that is expensive seems to be OK now. Congratulations...

With the HOT plate disconnected, the screen will likely draw excessive current. That would cause the screen voltage to
be low. You may well find the screen voltage to be closer to correct with the plate connected.

Just disconnecting the plate cap on hot will shorten the life of that tube.
It draws excessive screen current. Always pull hot tube to disable hv.
What is that test picture tube you have on it?
That set is meant to put out considerably more hv than I think that test tube can safely handle.
Is that a bw tube?
Or, is it from a modern projection color set?
In either case, alot of differences.
Looks like important parts are good.

Have you replaced the SELENIUM rectifiers, yet?
Bill Cahill

Thanks, I'll recheck the screen voltage with the HV going soon.

That is NOT a test CRT it is a 21FJP22, and it is the tube that I will use in the set until I can lay my hands on a good 21AXP22. Those are both color CRTs BTW.

There was no picture tuned in...just a blank (albeit impure and colorful) raster which my camera washed out.

I won't have much time to work on it today and much less for the next 7 weeks as my Christmas break from college is about to end.

Tom C.

We have now got VIDEO and sound!







Well I got my signal issue sorted and did another power up. As suggested I meetered the screen of the horizontal with the plate lead of the HOT connected, and I got 150V. This is close enough to the 160V sam's calls for that I will not loose sleep over the resistor that is in there(at least for now). When I first powered it up with signal the video was so weak I almost missed it. I did see it though and synched up the horizontal and vertical. Even with the contrast maxed the video was really weak, and the deflection would not keep synch so my mind went straight to AGC. The control was near max already and maxing it did not yield enough improvement so I started jiggling tubes in their sockets and it was the second IF tube that fixed it. In fact after shifting that tube to a better position the signal was overloading the set. A quick readjust of the AGC and all was well (except for the dead color circuits and a some other bugs).

The HV stayed at about 20KV this time and adjusting the regulator would only reduce it. After about an hour of operation the fly was pretty warm.
I think it is about time for me to read and preform the Sam's horizontal adjustment procedure on this set....

The screen controls were sticky and the red is stuck. Between this and the dirty tube sockets I believe that it is time to get some DeOxit and start cleaning controls and contacts.

WOO HOO! Just a bit more and it will be working like new again!

Tom- Lookin' good!

I do have to say, when I say the screenshot of "Big Shot", I thought "Whaa? Cowboy Bebop? Naaaah." Until I saw the next picture. Never thought I'd see THAT used as a video source for a rebuild. I did enjoy the series, but as you know, it's not for everyone.

I hope to pick up a pait of TV's later this month, and might even get to do them late this year. I'll have to use my Bebop as my source, if nothing else, as a nod to your significant work here!

Keep it up!
John S.

Thanks John!
I'm almost as surprised that someone here recognized my program source.
I'm a big fan of Anime (it is comprises the bulk of what I watch, and what is played by my vintage sets), and Cowboy Bebop is a favorite of mine, and one of the few I have on DVD so I decided it was preferable to tape, cable, or OTA broadcast. I love the opening theme in Cowboy bebop it is much like the Swing music I listen to.

Good luck on those sets you are trying to get.

Tom C.

As of Wednesday I got the cabinet up stairs and dismantled the CRT mask/safety glass/trim assembly for cleaning.
On Thursday I cleaned the disintegrated rubber gasket from the Glass and mask. I used Goof Off to get the rubber off the glass, and started to use it on the mask. I then realized that it would be too harsh on the paint of the mask, and switched to rubbing alcohol, which is also not particularly good for the paint, but less harsh and yet still efficient at dissolving the rubber goo.




On Friday I started to polish the the the brass trim. It was not going fast at all on the lightly tarnished piece I started on. After that piece was good on Saturday, I grabbed the worst corroded piece I had and started experimenting with technique, and found that vigorously scrubbing the polish on with a tooth brush was VERY effective. Sadly even though it looks good from a distance it is clear up close that these pieces are brass plated copper, and that all pieces have spots of varying size where the plating was corroded through over the years.





Nick I found out why those corner pieces were loose....Their retainer clips are busted. On the left is a good one the two others are the bad ones.

I mounted the corner pieces with the bad retainers at the top, and reinstalled everything in this picture.

I did a quick green purity (at the time the red would not work) and neglected to take a picture. I was confounded by the red not working for some time, but then found that there was a lead touching the screen wire terminal that was shorting the screen to ground. It looked much better after that.

The color circuits work, and I did some minor convergence tweaks to improve the picture. I still need to spray deoxit into some of the convergence pots as they can get squirly and mess with the deflection circuits. Still tons of adjustments to do which I'm going to need to fabricate a yoke extension cable to preform, and then hope that either the convergence will reach where I need it or that the set will not mind having the convergence yoke unplugged.


And what Nick has been wanting to see.....Color bars.

My camera made the left side look worse than it is, but it is clear that the demods need adjusting.

There is a nasty imtermitant that kills the signal at the second IF tube. I'm begining to wonder if the socket is bad.....

I actually lifted that set (minus the top lid) on to the black roundy my self. If it was not for the sore mussels I'd have been pretty proud of doing that.

For the problem with the 2nd IF tube, If you have not already done so, spray come contact cleaner into the socket
and on the tube pins. If that does not fix it, the socket may have some loose contacts (not enough pressure on the
tube pins). Socket construction varies, but you can usually find a way to bend the contacts so as to tighten them.

I sprayed some Deoxit on the tube pins, but not in the socket as it is tough to reach unless the chassis is removed. When I have the chassis out next I'll try that and possibly the socket contact rebending trick.

Thanks.

Tom C.