Does this description make sense?

[venivdvici]

Got it! I'll put that in my notes.

Originally Posted by Accumulator

No. Burned wiring or burned resistors. A "burnt tube" isn't likely. a "burned out" tube is, but that would be odorless. Like a burned out light bulb.

[venivdvici]

Thanks for clarifying. I'm gonna have my own glossary to make sure I get the details correct.

Originally Posted by Steve D.

Exactly. I never said burnt tube produces an acrid scent. As Accumulator said the acrid scent or smell is from an electrical short or rubber insulation or a resistor or any number of other toxic components in a television chassis. A "bench job" means that the chassis is taken back to the shop and put on the work bench to be repaired.

-Steve D.

[venivdvici]

Thanks, but I'm not having much luck finding the correct link.

Originally Posted by maxhifi

i think one potential goldmine of info is old 1950s issues of Radio and TV News. The Mac's service column had tons of stories about specific repairs.

[maxhifi]

Originally Posted by venivdvici

Thanks, but I'm not having much luck finding the correct link.

Oh sorry i should have explained
Radio news, later radio and television news, then radio and tv news, then electronics world, was a ziff-davis magazine the 20th century. It was targeted at tv and radio service people, as well as people with a general interest in electronics. Any major city university technical library will likely have back issues.. Or maybe a public library can get it on microfiche.

[maxhifi]

I'll add to the above point. The reason I made the suggestion above, is if you spend about a month or two making Radio & TV news bed time reading, you will essentially get into the head of a mid 20th century TV service man. They had articles on running a business, articles on new products, articles on how to test things, "tough dog" repairs. It's basically a slice of the whole industry. The Mac's column was a narative about a fictional repair shop where "Mac" would solve a couple tough repairs, with the help of his teenage assistant "Barney", and they would banter about current issues in TV/Radio repair, along with some corny material about Barney's girlfriend, or some sexist comments about female customers. It filled about a page to a page and a half, in every issue of Radio&TV news through the 50s. And the advertisements are a huge source of info too, giving more insight into what was going on at the time.

Technical books may be more to the point, but they are usually more dry, and don't contain the "human" element like magazines do. I think considering what you are trying to do, knowing a bit more about the "human" element would work well for you. Particularly things like how business was conducted, what customers expected, what a service call consisted of - the layout of a shop, the general demographic and social status of a repair man, etc. A bit of research will bring all this stuff into clear focus.

[venivdvici]

Excellent suggestion. I found some on ebay. 1959 issues. That should work for my 1961 story. Looking forward to reading them!!!

Thanks.

Originally Posted by maxhifi

I'll add to the above point. The reason I made the suggestion above, is if you spend about a month or two making Radio & TV news bed time reading, you will essentially get into the head of a mid 20th century TV service man. They had articles on running a business, articles on new products, articles on how to test things, "tough dog" repairs. It's basically a slice of the whole industry. The Mac's column was a narative about a fictional repair shop where "Mac" would solve a couple tough repairs, with the help of his teenage assistant "Barney", and they would banter about current issues in TV/Radio repair, along with some corny material about Barney's girlfriend, or some sexist comments about female customers. It filled about a page to a page and a half, in every issue of Radio&TV news through the 50s. And the advertisements are a huge source of info too, giving more insight into what was going on at the time.

Technical books may be more to the point, but they are usually more dry, and don't contain the "human" element like magazines do. I think considering what you are trying to do, knowing a bit more about the "human" element would work well for you. Particularly things like how business was conducted, what customers expected, what a service call consisted of - the layout of a shop, the general demographic and social status of a repair man, etc. A bit of research will bring all this stuff into clear focus.

[Pete Deksnis]

Originally Posted by venivdvici

Hmm, I wonder if this "fix" would work.
'--the main filter capacitor had gone bad. That was strange on a new set, until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with cheap caps from the Philippines. Fine with him. The more corners electronics companies cut, the better his repair business.'
=================================
A few years earlier, Mrs. Amato blew almost eight hundred bucks of her late husband's insurance on the '58 RCA Anderson with the CTC-7C chassis and complained when all her shows weren't in color. Hunny explained most shows weren't broadcast in color and she should save her money and return it for a nice black and white set. Nope. She wanted to be ready for the color revolution. She'd read in Life it was coming.

Her problem was, "The picture's messed up. It looks smaller and it's got this dark area across it that keeps creeping up through the picture and the sides are bending in and out." A shrunken raster with a hum bar and accompanying hourglass bending. At her house, he tried replacing the two 5U4 power rectifier tubes, but that didn't fix the problem, so he brought the set to the shop.

With Yoyo out of his hair, he pulled out the heavy beast's chassis. It had twenty-eight tubes, drew three hundred eighty watts, and had over twenty-two kilovolts of zapping power. Once he was familiar with its layout, he found the problem--the main filter capacitor had gone bad. That was strange on a new set, until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with cheap caps from the Philippines. Fine with him. The more corners electronics companies cut, the better his repair business.

He replaced the cap, a major job in itself, checked the rest of the tubes, cleaned the tuner and controls, reinstalled the chassis, and did a thorough degaussing and complete convergence and purity set-up. It ran good as new.

Nicely done. May I suggest just three 'edits' from an old editor.

[1] First, I'm still a stickler for bring and take. The second paragraph ends, "...so he brought the set to the shop." I know nobody cares anymore, but "...he took the set to the shop." would be my preference.

[2] "...and had over twenty-two kilovolts of zapping power." A TV set is not a taser. It produces a picture. Thus: "...and had over twenty-two kilovolts of picture power."

[3] This is less objective. I could find no earlier reference in this thread to a Philippines-sourced electrolytic (filter) capacitor. I looked because I did not know that RCA used such foreign-made parts then and wondered from where the reference originated. So, it is to me a bit of a slur on RCA, which was the largest manufacturer color television sets and for whom I worked in 1961. Thus, "...until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with cheap caps from the Philippines." might be revised to: "...until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with defective caps Incoming Inspection had missed.

Whatever.

Pete

[wa2ise]

Originally Posted by Accumulator

A "burnt tube" isn't likely. a "burned out" tube is, but that would be odorless.

Oh, if a tube radio or TV set hasn't been operated in a long while, dust accumulated on its tubes will produce a weak burnt smell, very similar to the smell you get when you turn the house heat on first time a cold snap happens in Autumn. The dust on the radiators making the smell. But the tubes for the most part don't care, they will operate just fine. Unless the dust is literally 1/8 inch or more thick...

As for the faulty filter caps, about ten years ago there was some industrial spying one cap company in Taiwan I think it was, had stolen what they thought was the competitor's secret recipe for the special sauce used to make capacitors. And they started using it to make their caps. Only problem was what they stole was a recipe for some research and development cap experiments that did not contain materials to extend cap lifetime, maybe so the lab scientists of the competitor company had intended to test various new such materials to add to the recipe that was stolen. The evil spying and stealing company made lots of faulty caps that ended up in things like computer motherboards and power supplies, causing a lot of early failures in several major computer companies' products... This could easily have happened in the USA back in the 50's, as people around the world are more similar in most respects than the small stuff like what they look like or like to have for dinner.

[old_coot88]

There was one filter cap problem endemic to the CTC-25 chassis (and possibly the CTC-17 also, though I never saw it in a '17) that tended to crop up when the sets were just out of warranty. A multi-section can had a 680 (possibly 560) ohm, half-watt resistor between two of its lugs. The sets would come in with that resistor smoked. Turns out that one section had gone bad, allowing a large ripple voltage to appear across the resistor that overwhelmed its wattage rating.

[kx250rider]

I worked on many CTC-7s, and I'd recommend for accuracy, to remove the part about testing all tubes. No TV repairman would have done that, as it would have wasted a lot of time. If I had been called out for a shrunken picture, I'd have first measured the household electrical outlet to see if the voltage was low (a common problem at that time). There is a switch on many early color TVs to compensate for a low line voltage, in fact. Next I'd have tried swapping the two 5U4 tubes, and if that didn't fix it, I'd put the originals back, and then troubleshoot the power supply and have then found the bad filter capacitor. This would have involved unbolting the chassis from the cabinet, and sliding it part way out to get at the bottom (or actually the side, as that TV had the chassis mounted upright inside the right-hand side of the cabinet; not on the bottom as most sets were then).

I hope this helps...

Charles

[venivdvici]

Oh, my goodness, I'm looking at the posts subsequent to yours and I feel like I've started a "poop"storm. Ha!

Thanks for the edit. I'll change it to 'took' (too be honest, I was unaware of the difference; I'll have to read up on it) and 'picture' (I was just trying to point out how dangerous the voltage could be). As for the Philippines, I have nothing against the place nor RCA. I just picked the Phillippines out of the blue to be the country to have made the fictional defective caps. I'll use your suggestion for that, too.

I have to admit, I'm really looking forward to reading the 1959 Radio & TV News magazines I just bought from ebay for some color material.

Thanks.

Originally Posted by Pete Deksnis

Nicely done. May I suggest just three 'edits' from an old editor.

[1] First, I'm still a stickler for bring and take. The second paragraph ends, "...so he brought the set to the shop." I know nobody cares anymore, but "...he took the set to the shop." would be my preference.

[2] "...and had over twenty-two kilovolts of zapping power." A TV set is not a taser. It produces a picture. Thus: "...and had over twenty-two kilovolts of picture power."

[3] This is less objective. I could find no earlier reference in this thread to a Philippines-sourced electrolytic (filter) capacitor. I looked because I did not know that RCA used such foreign-made parts then and wondered from where the reference originated. So, it is to me a bit of a slur on RCA, which was the largest manufacturer color television sets and for whom I worked in 1961. Thus, "...until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with cheap caps from the Philippines." might be revised to: "...until he remembered reading a few years back some sets were built with defective caps Incoming Inspection had missed.

Whatever.

Pete

[venivdvici]

Ha! Industrial spy a la The Three Stooges!

Originally Posted by wa2ise

Oh, if a tube radio or TV set hasn't been operated in a long while, dust accumulated on its tubes will produce a weak burnt smell, very similar to the smell you get when you turn the house heat on first time a cold snap happens in Autumn. The dust on the radiators making the smell. But the tubes for the most part don't care, they will operate just fine. Unless the dust is literally 1/8 inch or more thick...

As for the faulty filter caps, about ten years ago there was some industrial spying one cap company in Taiwan I think it was, had stolen what they thought was the competitor's secret recipe for the special sauce used to make capacitors. And they started using it to make their caps. Only problem was what they stole was a recipe for some research and development cap experiments that did not contain materials to extend cap lifetime, maybe so the lab scientists of the competitor company had intended to test various new such materials to add to the recipe that was stolen. The evil spying and stealing company made lots of faulty caps that ended up in things like computer motherboards and power supplies, causing a lot of early failures in several major computer companies' products... This could easily have happened in the USA back in the 50's, as people around the world are more similar in most respects than the small stuff like what they look like or like to have for dinner.

[venivdvici]

That's interesting--measuring the household electrical outlet. Hmm, maybe he'll have to bring it back to the shop before troubleshooting the power supply, because Mrs. Amato had to leave the house for church bingo but didn't want to leave Hunny there alone and didn't want to reschedule to get her set fixed. So Hunny had to take the chassis with him! Church bingo. Does it every time.

Originally Posted by kx250rider

I worked on many CTC-7s, and I'd recommend for accuracy, to remove the part about testing all tubes. No TV repairman would have done that, as it would have wasted a lot of time. If I had been called out for a shrunken picture, I'd have first measured the household electrical outlet to see if the voltage was low (a common problem at that time). There is a switch on many early color TVs to compensate for a low line voltage, in fact. Next I'd have tried swapping the two 5U4 tubes, and if that didn't fix it, I'd put the originals back, and then troubleshoot the power supply and have then found the bad filter capacitor. This would have involved unbolting the chassis from the cabinet, and sliding it part way out to get at the bottom (or actually the side, as that TV had the chassis mounted upright inside the right-hand side of the cabinet; not on the bottom as most sets were then).

I hope this helps...

Charles

[old_coot88]

Originally Posted by kx250rider

I worked on many CTC-7s, and I'd recommend for accuracy, to remove the part about testing all tubes. No TV repairman would have done that, as it would have wasted a lot of time.

On house calls, that's absolutely correct. However, most road techies would routinely give all the tubes the 'tap test' to reveal any borderline intermittents and arcing damper tubes (a very common problem). Weak tubes could often be identified by turning the set off for about 10 seconds and then back on. A lag in horizontal lock-in would reveal the oscillator tube becoming weak, a lag in color sync lock-in showed a weak color osc. tube, slow width fill-out showed a borderline horiz output tube, etc. For house calls the old adage was that the set itself is the best "tube tester".

But in the shop, all the tubes were routinely tested on a tester unless the customer specifically requested a cut rate.

[venivdvici]

It seems late in the game for me to ask this, but what exactly is a road techie? Didn't repairmen go to the homes for those big consoles and if they couldn't fix it there, they brought it back to the shop? I'm sure some people could carry in their portables to the shop to probably save on a house call charge.

Originally Posted by old_coot88

On house calls, that's absolutely correct. However, most road techies would routinely give all the tubes the 'tap test' to reveal any borderline intermittents and arcing damper tubes (a very common problem). Weak tubes could often be identified by turning the set off for about 10 seconds and then back on. A lag in horizontal lock-in would reveal the oscillator tube becoming weak, a lag in color sync lock-in showed a weak color osc. tube, slow width fill-out showed a borderline horiz output tube, etc. For house calls the old adage was that the set itself is the best "tube tester".

But in the shop, all the tubes were routinely tested on a tester unless the customer specifically requested a cut rate.