Panasonic CT-26

[Dave A]

Cleaning storage today and found a 1971/72 Panasonic CT-26 Pana Color. 13" or so delta gun. 10 tube hybrid. No idea where I got it. Home and powered up minus Variac. It slowly got to to speed and was trying to work with massive dirty controls. CRT looked strong. Tubes seem to be original. Then I moved it and the not connected dipole antenna 300ohm wires brushed the cable balun. Big 110v spark and white smoke from inside below the CRT and breaker pop. Not sure what that was as the antennas are not grounded. Rats.

Looked inside and nothing burned and the line fuse was ok. My power strip saved it. Cleaned while open and powered again. It came back up with a minor AC hum line that was an odd few staggered lines of the scan. 4-5 lines at most. Played with the magnets and got perfect convergence. Grey scale great. Went behind to look for focus control and never found it. When I got back to the front the hum was gone. Did it reform itself? Still need to find the focus to finish. A bit soft. The AFC is wonky sometimes working fine and then garbage. Works fine with AFC off.

Anyone know where the focus is? Don't see any focus jumpers either. The web is no help with this set. Swamped with another CT-26xxxx flat panel.

[dieseljeep]

Originally Posted by Dave A

Cleaning storage today and found a 1971/72 Panasonic CT-26 Pana Color. 13" or so delta gun. 10 tube hybrid. No idea where I got it. Home and powered up minus Variac. It slowly got to to speed and was trying to work with massive dirty controls. CRT looked strong. Tubes seem to be original. Then I moved it and the not connected dipole antenna wires brushed the cable balun. Big 110v spark and white smoke from inside below the CRT and breaker pop. Hot chassis. Rats.

Looked inside and nothing burned and the line fuse was ok. My power strip saved it. Cleaned while open and powered again. It came back up with a minor AC hum line that was an odd few staggered lines of the scan. 4-5 lines at most. Played with the magnets and got perfect convergence. Grey scale great. Went behind to look for focus control and never found it. When I got back to the front the hum was gone. Did it reform itself? Still need to find the focus to finish. A bit soft. The AFC is wonky sometimes working fine and then garbage. Works fine with AFC off.

Anyone know where the focus is? Don't see any focus jumpers either. The web is no help with this set. Swamped with another CT-26xxxx flat panel.

I have one that's probably close. I think mine is an 11 inch. I picked it up at a thrift shop, I thought it was a solid state, until I plugged it in and I seen the tubes lighting up. I bought because it was a hybrid.
I think the CRT is a low focus voltage one. The picture looks good but I want to see the clearly defined scan lines. A fetish with me.

[mrjukebox160]

I worked on a 19" version of this a long time ago. Had no sound. Used weird tubes. Ordered a new sound output tube and it was good. I don't think it had a focus control as I recall.

[Electronic M]

I have it's big brother 10 tube hybrid and it's Sam's... can't spot the control on the layouts or photos, but if your 13" has the same high focus voltage gun as my 19" then follow the focus lead of the CRT... it goes straight to the wiper of the focus pot.

[dieseljeep]

Originally Posted by mrjukebox160

I worked on a 19" version of this a long time ago. Had no sound. Used weird tubes. Ordered a new sound output tube and it was good. I don't think it had a focus control as I recall.

Those are European type tubes, known as "P" series valves, odd heater voltages @300ma. All their sets seemed to use them.
Motorola used them in their B/W sets in the early 60's.

[CrtsRtubular]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lbe...ew?usp=sharing
Heres a sams pdf for a panasonic ct-26

[zeno]

Its a low focus tube. No control or taps. Even when the have them you can
barely tell the difference. Light rejuve usually brings them back. Jug
needs to be strong on any of them to look good.

73 Zeno
LFOD !

[Dave A]

Thanks for the interest and the Sams. Came to the same conclusion of a LF tube. Kinda fun to see a miniature delta tube. I did jumper the bulb to my Beltron and it showed great. Did a cleaning for fun. No real change to the focus. Still a bit soft. And the little AC hum jitter is back. That does not look like major filter problems. Maybe a minor sweep timing error on retrace. Later.

The Sams was interesting as my set has no HV adjust. The color killer is where the HV shows in the Sams. Design change or just nothing on the 13" version and not shown is the Sams? And I found duplicate Rxxx numbers. Oh well, it is what it is for going on 50 years old. Just like me. Wait, I am older. Thanks to all.

[dieseljeep]

Originally Posted by zeno

Its a low focus tube. No control or taps. Even when the have them you can
barely tell the difference. Light rejuve usually brings them back. Jug
needs to be strong on any of them to look good.

73 Zeno
LFOD !

I looked at my set. It is a CT21 as well. It seems to be a low hours set.
Talk about odd tubes, the set has that 25HX5 vertical output tube. I don't know about anyone else using one.

[zeno]

Originally Posted by dieseljeep

I looked at my set. It is a CT21 as well. It seems to be a low hours set.
Talk about odd tubes, the set has that 25HX5 vertical output tube. I don't know about anyone else using one.

I remember tracking down my first 25HX5. Only one distributor had it,
RM in Worcester Ma. BTW that is pronounced Wistah locally......
Pannys were the best tube based Jap sets by far. Always liked them

73 Zeno
LFOD !

[dieseljeep]

Originally Posted by zeno

I remember tracking down my first 25HX5. Only one distributor had it,
RM in Worcester Ma. BTW that is pronounced Wistah locally......
Pannys were the best tube based Jap sets by far. Always liked them

73 Zeno
LFOD !

Almost like the sauce, it was called Wistahshire sauce.
Many of the Panasonic sets were badged, Bradford, Penncrest and Singer. I think there was a few others. They were built well and heavy.