I'm going to try to restore my RCA 630TS to perfect working and cosmetic condition. It all starts with this (http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a228/emuman100/PA310009.jpg) and this (http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a228/emuman100/PA310008.jpg). The underside of this chassis looks nice actually, and I cannot wait to dive in. I'm going to replace every paper capacitor with metalized polys and every electrolytic with moden axial leaded ones underneath. I'm going to remove the old cans, but save them. I know it won't look authentic, but I'll still have them to possibly restuff in the future. Removing them reduces a few pounds of weight too. The "micamold" capacitors are being replaced with silver mica capacitors. The drifted and bad resistors will be changed. I'm going to organize things a bit more with this chassis than I did the previous 630TS clone chassis (Air King A1000). The two electrolytics on the plate on the underside will of couse go and so will the plate, and a terminal strip put in it's place. Again, mainly for weight reduction. I'll keep you guys updated with my progress on this thread.

Thanks.

Jonathan

P.S. If anyone has the RCA servicing information this set (not the Sams), please let me know. I'll gladly pay to have you photocopy it and mail it to me. Thanks

Here's an owner's manual you might find interesting (http://www.njarc.org/images/RCA_621TS_and_630TS_Instructions.pdf). I'll try to find a copy of a service manual for you.
--Dave

Hi Dave, thanks for the link to the Manual.
You might oughta warned us that it's 60MB tho! :D :yikes:

Eric

Thanks so much! I love this manual! :) It's such a great scan too. Thanks! :)

Jonathan

This set is a little intimidating to me. Also, mica molds were not mica capacitors. They were cheap paper caps in a mica like body. Just use high quality 600v mylar there, and it will be happy. In fact, on ac line, I just leave them out, and it makes chassis slightly safer. :)

Hello Bill,

I worked on an Air King A1000 and completely recapped it, and got it partially working. After working on this guy, the RCA 630TS is familiar territory for me. Yeah, the "micamold" are just cheap paper caps. Replacing them with mica caps is what I did on the set previous with the horizontal and vertical, as well as the video IF section. I actually ordered mica replacements and got everything today, so I'll just use those. I also ordered AC rated safety caps to replace the AC line filter "micamold" caps. If they do fail, they'll open, and not short. So it's just as safe as leaving them out and filtering HF noise. I have great ambition to get this set displaying a sweet picture and sounding good.

Thanks again.

Jonathan

Well, I'll tell you, RCA bw tv's then had a very nice picture. Their weakest point was always that miserable, microphonic, trouble making tuner, but, sets performed very well, otherwise. Nice sets, and I like them. I grew up with a 1950 RCA 6T74 16" tv. :) :thmbsp:

Ahh, I heard these sets have a great picture. I'm only going to use channel 3 on the tuner, so once fine tuned, I think it'll work pretty well. Now I just need the time to work on it. :)

Jonathan

I have the original red bound factory service manual for the 630 if you want a scan or borrow it for a while. I may have 2 copies but I doubt I can find both at the same time :-)
-Barry

Are you talking about the 1946 hard bound one that covers everything? If so, would you consider trading, or, selling the extra copy? I don't have that year, and desperately need it, especially for my 630, and my 641 TV......

No,
This is a soft cover book just for the 630TS and 8TS30.
-Barry

bkasindorf,

Thanks for the offer, but I already have a copy. :)

I have started recapping this bad boy, finally. I had lots of confusions when rewireing the electrolytics, but I believe everything is good to go. I replaced most of the paper caps and two of the micamold caps. There was also a black beauty that I changed too. I also have damaged one of the inductors wound around a resistor in the video amplifier section. My soldering Melted the wax and I went to move it out of the way and the inductor broke from the resistor lead. Could I get a new inductor and resistor and connect them in parallel in place of the broken inductor/resistor or is the inductance and lead dress really critical?

Also, where can I get it's 10BP4 rebuilt? It has no raster, but doesn't appear to have lost it's vacuum. I tested it on a working chassis to see. I still have two good 10BP4's from the two 630TS clone sets I have, but I wanted to keep everything as original as possible. Any suggestions?

Thanks.

Jonathan

You GO! Glad to hear that your restoration is progressing. (mine sure aren't :no:)

Good 10BP4s are still fairly plentiful and it should be a lot less expensive to buy one than to rebuild. Hold onto the one you have in case that changes in the future, but I can't imagine how a replacement CRT would make your set any less "original".

Dave S,

Thanks. :) Original being originally came with the set. I'd bet rebuilding would cost around $500, so about double the cost of one that you can buy. I was just wondering though, but I have two RCA 10BP4s just in case. :)

Jonathan

The inductor I broke is the 93uH peaking coil on the video detector. Sams says it's DC resistance is 4 ohms. Can I substitute a 100uH inductor here?

Thanks.

I'd have to say no. That, I'm afraid, would give you a negative video. That would increase your delay time in viedo signal. :nono:

I have a junk 630 chassis sitting in my garage, if you can tell me which part it is (a picture showing location would be great!) I can see if it has one.

Would a difference of 7uH make that big of a difference? I found that digikey has one from JW Miller which is 100uH with 3.6 ohms of DC resistance. You sure that won't work?

Eric H

Here (http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a228/emuman100/needcoil.jpg) is a link to the picture. The coil circled in green is the one I need. It makes me wish I was more careful. A new 100uH axial leaded inductor with 3.6 ohms of dc resistance won't work?

Thanks.

Jonathan

OK, I have one, I'll have to get a soldering iron out to the garage to remove it, I don't want to clip the leads.

I don't know if the extra 7uH would matter or not but you can have the original thing if you want it, just P.M. me your address and I'll try to send it out Monday.

Eric

Man, that's a nice clean chassis! Mine is a rustbucket, I should post a pic just for laughs.

Eric H

Before I make you go through all that work, I want to figure out if a 100uH 3.6ohms dc resistance inductor will do the trick. I don't see why not, but Bill says otherwise.

Bill,

The video would be negative with the increase of 7uH? Most inductors back then had a 20% tolerance or greater, didn't they? DC does pass through it, and I guess it saturates at the video peak? I'm not really sure how it works.

Thanks.

Jonathan

Johathan,
Your L190, a 93uH peaking coil in the plate circuit of the 1st video amplifier is part of a series-shunt compensating filter netowrk used to optomize the bandwith perfromance of the amplifier. A 100uH inductor should be OK. I may cause a bit of a change in the resopnes of the amplifier, but you likely could not see the diferance.

John,

Thanks. I just remembered I had my Air King A1000 chassis. I took the replacement coil from there. When I work on it I'll use a 100uH coil.

Eric H,

Thanks for the offer, but my trusty Air King A1000 chassis came to the rescue. I even found quite a lot of mistakes with it using my 630TS chassis.

I'll keep you guys updated and will provide pictures.

Jonathan

Well, I go to plug it in, the lights dim, the plug vibrates, and the breaker is on the brink of popping. I've got a short somewhere. The primary winding on the power transformer has a DC resistance of .6 ohms on my meter, so it's ok. The problem, I believe, lies in the crappy rewiring job of the electrolytics. The short must be there. Either it's connected the wrong way or connected to the wrong point. Once my head clears I'll go back to it.

Jonathan

The power switch seems to operate backwards. When I turn it off, the switch is closed according to my meter, and I get .02 ohms, basically a short. When I turn it on, the switch is open according to my meter. I know this sounds like I'm doing somethong wrong. I got it once ot twice to show an open when the switch actually was open and when it was closed it read 40 ohms. I'll give it a spray with some contact cleaner, maybe that might help things.

Secondly, the excessive current draw. The primary winding reads .6 ohms on my meter, which is the DC resistance it should be according to the service data. When I plugged it into a surge protector, the plug vibrated and the lights dimmed. There is a short somewhere on the secondary side of the transformer. I think I wired the electrolytics wrong, infact I'm almost sure of it. What I'm curious about is why didn't it draw that much current as to pop the breaker? I'm not sure if the surge protector limited the current or it was the limitation of the transformer. It was odd and something I never experienced before, so that's why I'm asking about it.

Thanks.

Jonathan

The power switch seems to operate backwards. When I turn it off, the switch is closed according to my meter, and I get .02 ohms, basically a short. When I turn it on, the switch is open according to my meter. I know this sounds like I'm doing somethong wrong. I got it once ot twice to show an open when the switch actually was open and when it was closed it read 40 ohms. I'll give it a spray with some contact cleaner, maybe that might help things.

Sounds like you have a special application control for a hi-fi system tone control or such.

Secondly, the excessive current draw. The primary winding reads .6 ohms on my meter, which is the DC resistance it should be according to the service data. When I plugged it into a surge protector, the plug vibrated and the lights dimmed. There is a short somewhere on the secondary side of the transformer. I think I wired the electrolytics wrong, infact I'm almost sure of it. What I'm curious about is why didn't it draw that much current as to pop the breaker? I'm not sure if the surge protector limited the current or it was the limitation of the transformer.

Limitation of the transformer. But don't let it go like that for more than a few seconds, or the transformer will burn out. Remember all that Underwriter's Labs cares about is that such a fault inside the set doesn't cause a fire that burns your house down. I would highly recomend that you install on the primary side of the transformer an in-line fuse holder and a fuse of about twice the rated load current (wattage/powerline volts) so you don't ruin the transformer if you still have trouble correcting the problem.

The problem is in the B+ section. I removed the rectifiers and plugged it in and the tubes lit up. Something in the B+ is causing a short somehow. I don't think it's an electrolytic in the wrong way, but it could be. I'm being very cautious about the power transformer, as getting it rewound could probably cost up to $500 or more. But I know the short is in the B+, so just got to troubleshoot from there.

Jonathan

Check the electrolytics carefully, the can isn't always chassis ground, especially true if they are mounted in a fiber insulator.

Usually a cap wired backwards will blow the 5U4 or the Cap itself but it normally doesn't cause such a noticable overload.

After going through the capacitors again I can see no visible problems. With both rectifiers out, there is no excessive draw in current, but of course, there is no B+ either. The only caps connected to chassis ground around the transformer was a 20uF used for filtering B+ on the audio, and 80uF. The one on the bracket and the one closest to the outside of the chassis were all on insulators. All of their commons were connected to -100V. All of the negative ends are connected to the transformer lead with is the center tap of the B+ winding. The smaller 1000uF/250uF commons are connected to +275.

I'm going to recheck the electrolytics again and do a resistance check on the rectifiers and see if that fixes anything.

Thanks again.

Jonathan

I just bought a 630TS (with stand), so I am reading this thread with keen interest. The user's manual is a real treat!

The service manual sounds like a must-have. Any chance I could get a copy? I'd be happy to pay for photocopying, or good scans.

Thanks!

Meant to put this up before. Here's a PDF copy of my RCA 630 Service Manual (http://njarc.org/images/RCA_630TS_Service_Data.pdf). (Right-click to download.)

Be warned: it's a big file and gonna be a killer if you're on dialup. :sigh:

Hope this helps with some restorations!

--Dave

Awesome! Put me down on your owes-a-big-favor list.

I'll check back in after the 630TS arrives. Still negotiating with the seller over how many boxes it will ship in. The more the better, in my view, but if you're dealing with a non-electronics person on the other end, there's a limit to how much uninformed disassembly you want to risk.

Glancing at the user/installation manual, it appears that you remove the CRT from the front, after removing the safety glass and loosening things on the neck, etc. I'm not about to fly 1500 miles to do the packing myself, so I'll just have to find out how much this codger is willing to attempt.

Keep your fingers crossed!

I'm getting scared about the idea of shipping this heavy TV without pulling the CRT and chassis from the cabinet. The installation instructions indicate that it's more than simply removing a handful of few screws and sliding the chassis out the back.

I can mail those manual pages to my seller, but I'm not sure whether he's up for that sort of disassembly, or whether I could trust him to do it correctly.

Ideas? The TV is in St. Louis and I'm near Seattle, so picking it up myself is not an attractive option. If there are any TV friends in the St. Louis area, I'd be willing to pay someone to do the disassembly . . . .

Phil

Craters & Freighters does a good job shipping TV's.
They won't take it apart but they pack well and can ship it properly.
they shipped a set for me Air Freight, strapped to a pallet and upright all the way. Cost was about $250 though.

Maybe that's the way to go. Even if everything were to be double-boxed, I have visions of heavy fragile stuff in cardboard boxes tumbling off the end of a conveyor.

I would carefully box the tube, chassis, and cabinet in 3 separate boxes and send the whole mess on Greyhound. Best of luck however you do it.

John

Since I am laid off from work for the time being, I want to start on my 630TS again. I never found the short yet. I did purchase an 80uF 450V to replace two 40uF 450V in parallel and a 120uF 450V to replace a 40uF 450V and a 80uF 450 electrolytic so I can have less parts and hopefully it'll be easier to find the incorrect wiring.

Phil,
So you were the one who got that. :) The stand is quite a bonus. Mine was shipped in a big box. with sponge and styrofoam packing and is shipped with the CRT installed. It did make it to me ok. The CRT cap was loose and I never got a raster in a good chassis. The yolk and focus coil bracket were bent.

Jonathan

I would carefully box the tube, chassis, and cabinet in 3 separate boxes and send the whole mess on Greyhound. Best of luck however you do it.

John

From personal experience of having been on the receiving end of a three-box-shipped 630TS arriving severely damaged (damage to Unobtainium tuner and speaker), I must say that a 630TS chassis must NEVER be shipped without the protection of its cabinet surrounding it. The ONLY exception to this rule is if the cabinet itself is not structurally sound. In such a case, a wooden crate must be built to surround and be bolted to the chassis to protect the very delicate structures which are mounted on the chassis.

With a structurally sound cabinet, packing the set exactly as shown in the Installation Manual is the ONLY safe way of shipping it. Never place loose packing material inside the cabinet, either, since fragments of packing material can become dislodged in transit and end up wrecking the speaker cone. Place small and fragile parts (knobs, etc.) in a well padded bag which is then tightly secured with rubber bands to the cabinet interior as shown in the Manual.

Regarding the rebuilding of electrolytics, here is a photo of how a restuffed C2 (C221 per RCA manual) should look.

Here is the latest photo of my Fada 799 after Sound IF, Video IF, and Oscillator alignment. Note here to always do a response check of each section before attempting alignment. If it's "way off" to start with, there is likely some other cause and realignment isn't likely to fix anything until that underlying trouble is corrected. One local channel's off-air picture, although reasonably good, is not as sharp as other local channels or as sharp as other 630-type sets have reproduced on that channel, so my next step is to look very closely at the RF and Converter response. My just-released "Angel Head Test Pattern" DVD produces an excellent picture on Ch 4, not quite excellent but adequate on Ch 3. The 5AXP4 test CRT is a real timesaver and worry-eliminator. I have a nice, strong 10BP4 safely stored in a custom-fitted carton for later use.

Regarding the B+ short in Jonathan's 630TS, have you ruled out pinched leads? I had one pesky 630-clone that kept blowing the B+ fuse I add during initial testing. It turned out that the last time it went to a repair shop (to be pronounced "dead due to CRT failure") the tech slapped it together sloppily and pinched the yellow lead from the speaker field coil between chassis and shielding. Of course, the B+ was a dead short to the chassis. In the third photo, note my use of a heatshrinked 5A fast-acting pigtail fuse (black tubing, lower left) and replacement of the old terminal strip with one having an "extra" lug. Also note the 1A fast-acting heatshrinked pigtail fuse (blue tubing, at 5U4 socket) and the 250mA PicoFuse (about the siz of a 1/4W resistor, under 5V4 socket). Probe with an ohmmeter and compare readings with the charts found in the service literature when tracking a short where applying power could endanger Unobtainium parts.

A recent UPS "incident" involving a Fada 930 which was dropped while en route to be restored has yielded a favorable outcome. After much paperwork on my part and correspondence between me, my client, and UPS, the damage claim has been paid and the recovered funds adequate to obtain used parts and cover extra labor required to repair the shipping damage so I can proceed with the restoration which was originally requested. In all, the resolution took nearly three months but was adequate to produce a viable restoration candidate after what had been an apparent tragic loss of a relatively rare 12" version of the 630 design.

Well! I have the Set plugged in, and I have Audio, and a Picture. Picture is having some Width and Synch issues, so I dropped it off at the Service Tech who gave me the set, and he will align it, etc. I'm very encouraged, and so is he.

I figure he'll have it back to me in a week or so, then, I'll throw a Party, like they did in the early days of Television.

I'll probably run some Honeymooners via a DVD Player, and maybe some Buster Keaton shorts.

Can't wait!

LJB:smoke:

The inductor I broke is the 93uH peaking coil on the video detector. Sams says it's DC resistance is 4 ohms. Can I substitute a 100uH inductor here?

Thanks.

I have good 10bp4 crts. Let me know if you need one.