This is the CTC-5 westcott that I bought off ebay from John Marinello back in March. This is an original chicagoland TV set, originally from Park Ridge, IL. Ive had it sitting down in the basement since then and have had the chassis pulled and sitting on another bench out of the way since April.
I actually attempted to sell the set on ebay a few months back, but am glad the reserve was not met. I finally made it important to restore this set and will now be keeping it for the collection. Its too nice.

It only took the replacement of 49 paper wax caps to do most of the job. I used all exact value sprague orange drops were ever I could. Some of the odd values such as .0018uF and .0039uF, I used off brands as they were not available from sprague. Having the weller desoldering station made this job much more efficient and clean.

ESR was bad on only one of the filter caps and was replaced. The others were excellent still and left them alone.

This set was used up until atleast 1971 as there is a repair tag from then. However, the set does not appear to have daily use from new untill that date or else the PC boards would have been toast.

The CRT was changed out in 1959 with a correct RCA 21AXP22. CRT tests very good. I have not raised the heater or rejuvenated the tube. A few tubes got changed out, still a number of original RCA tubes on the chassis, all dated middle year of 1956.

The set was in a very clean home and probably never in a basement as there is no mold/mildue presence or chassis rust.

These sets are quite different when it comes to convergence. I had the service manual to guide me along luckily. After the recap, the set was slowly powered up and had a nice color picture and great sound. It is not even neccessary to align the IF or chroma circuits. The picture is great on this set and should be a reliable set for years to come. Another early roundie is up and running!

Excellent Job Doug. Its god to see yet more early color sets being restored and enjoyed!

I've heard that the roundies have a really nice red phosphor, but in looking at these pics, and of other roundie sets. i have noticed the Blue really stands out as a almost electric blue. I loved the pictures someone else took of a set with a DVD of the film State Fair playing on it. Doug, thats beautiful work on the RCA!:thmbsp:

Has anyone actually gone through the effort to etch new PC boards for early RCA roundies? In this day of digital imaging it would be as easy as removing all of the components from the boards of a junker chassis and then simply scanning the trace sides of each board with a flatbed scanner, using photoshop to convert the images to grayscale, inverting the images, and then printing them on transparency film with a laser printer. A clothes iron could be used to transfer the pattern onto blank PC boards, which could be etched and drilled.

http://www.headwize.com/projects/garbz2_prj.php

"Super" nice, Doug... Let me know when you're through "borrowing" it! (Ha ha)

It's a classic answe, but man, you got yoursfel an owsome colour tv! Shees, I want too to know how to restore tvs!

Beautiful Doug, of course it's a little out of place among your Zeniths.
I on the other hand have lots of RCA's, it'd be tough but I could find room for one more... :yes:

Congratulations Doug! I have heard that "you can't get a good picture on a Special". BS! Your 5 looks great!
I have only done one 5 so far, and it's waiting to be reunited with the cabinet. I found the chassis very easy, and enjoyable to work on.
Kevin

Yeah,, that sure looks like a keeper to me. Very very nice!
Dan

Great job Doug! That set really looks sharp! Dont mean to sound all duh, but I thought those big color bars on those components were resistors! I gotta whole bunch of those in my 16 chassis that could be shot...

Wow! Doug, your photos really show the meticulous and fantastic work you perform in the restoration of your televisions! I am most impressed by the thoroughness of the work you do and the "pride in craftmanship" that obviously comes through in the final product. You see this less and less these days...

Makes me wish you were closer to NJ, as I have a RCA CTC16XL set I would love to have you go through and work your magic on! Nice work!

Beautyiful Job Doug. It gives me hope that when I get around to restoring my ctc5 that it will produce as nice a picture as yours. Mine is a Super too, but it has the el-cheepo cabinet on 4 legs.

BTW, before you bought this set from John, on the e-bay auction, I was begging him to sell it to me for almost the exact price you paid for the set. I went out of town on a trip to get my ctc4 and the ctc5 and when I got back he had the ELVIS set on ebay.

I am not going to let John forget that either, even though he is my good friend.:D

Fantastic job, Doug. It is nice to see that "Super" chassis looking so good.

These sets are quite different when it comes to convergence. I had the service manual to guide me along luckily.
I am working on the CTC-5 Super that I got from another AK member, and I am having trouble with its convergence. In particular, I cannot make the "red horizontal" and "green horizontal" adjustments work as described in the RCA Field Service guide. Did you have to go through convergence several times or do other odd actions to be successful? My set has been fully recapped. I have not actually traced for possible circuit problems yet, but all other convergence adjustments seem to work as they should.

Beautiful! Now that it's working I'd like to find a time to come by and see it. I have been buried in work, so it probably can't happen for a while.

Green with envy over your good tube!

hmmm... care to do my 21-T639?

Yeah, im tempted to send you my ctc-16 chassis to see if yoiu could go over it!! (of course thats up to you)

WOW Doug!!!
That set is tremendous!

Hi Dough,

you did an excellent job. Thank you very much for your detailed report.

BTW: did the wax of the LOPT melted before? Did you adjust the horizontal output current? What is the temperature of the LOPT after one hour?

Kind regards.
Eckhard

let me know how much it is to restore my 21-T639 :d

i asked first

Thank you for the kind comments. I try do repair sets as though as if it left the factory that way. I always like neat and clean solder. Removing all old leads from the terminal lugs is a must when replacing a part. Many teks simply make repairs from above the chassis on pc boards, which I hate. I understand that they need to get the job done and move on, but in the case or restoration, you have the time to do it right.
This set was enjoyable to work on as I was the first one who attempted to restore it. I started the recap last sunday (10-14) and worked on it about 2-3 hours each night that week. Finished up the other details and reinstalled the chassis this past sunday.

Eckhard, the horizontal output transformer runs very cool after 1 hour. Using a infared thermometer, The hotest point of the transformer that I could get a good reading of (top of the secondary winding) is 54.4 degrees C (130 F) which is very cool. This temp is just slightly luke warm to the touch. The cathode current is a consistent 190 mA which is good. The efficiancy coil slug seized which is typical of an rca. I have not attempted to free it. The sweep section is operating excellent and dont want to risk damaging the coil just to lower it a possible few mA's. If the current were 210 mA +, then I would start to be concerned. I have it on as I write this and its been playing for nearly 2 hours this evening.

The sweep transformer has NO wax dripping or residue at all which surprizes me to say the least. Very clean and dry. Its even the orignal unit.

... the horizontal output transformer runs very cool after 1 hour. Using a infared thermometer, The hotest point of the transformer that I could get a good reading of (top of the secondary winding) is 54.4 degrees C (130 F) which is very cool. This temp is just slightly luke warm to the touch. The cathode current is a consistent 190 mA which is good. The efficiancy coil slug seized which is typical of an rca. I have not attempted to free it. The sweep section is operating excellent and dont want to risk damaging the coil just to lower it a possible few mA's. If the current were 210 mA +, then I would start to be concerned. I have it on as I write this and its been playing for nearly 2 hours this evening.

This is absolutely OK. You can even lower it by reducing the mains voltage a little bit with a variac.

The horizontal output current in my set was appr. 200 mA. I couldn't adjust the efficiancy coil slug. I have simply added another coil slug in the efficiancy coil and with it I could reduce the horizontal output current to 180 mA.

BTW: Does somebody knows what happened with the AK'ers in the Los Angeles and San Diego aerea? Are they in safety?

- Eckhard

This is absolutely OK. You can even lower it by reducing the mains voltage a little bit with a variac.

The horizontal output current in my set was appr. 200 mA. I couldn't adjust the efficiancy coil slug. I have simply added another coil slug in the efficiancy coil and with it I could reduce the horizontal output current to 180 mA.

BTW: Does somebody knows what happened with the AK'ers in the Los Angeles and San Diego aerea? Are they in safety?

- Eckhard

Hi Eckhard,

I can't speak for all AK'ers in So. Cal. but I have not heard of any forum members in major distress. Hopefully all are well. For those not directly in peril in the fire areas, the smokey air makes for sore throats and some breathing problems. The smoke here in Hollywood/Los Angeles was especially troublesome today as the winds die down, a good thing for firefighters, but allows the stagnant air to hang over the city.
Cooler, off shore air, and higher humidity should arrive by the weekend. Hats off to the firefighters. And prayers for the victims of this disaster.

-Steve D.

Hi Eckhard, I can't speak for all AK'ers in So. Cal. but I have not heard of any forum members in major distress. Hopefully all are well. For those not directly in peril in the fire areas, the smokey air makes for sore throats and some breathing problems. The smoke here in Hollywood/Los Angeles was especially troublesome today as the winds die down, a good thing for firefighters, but allows the stagnant air to hang over the city.
Cooler, off shore air, and higher humidity should arrive by the weekend. Hats off to the firefighters. And prayers for the victims of this disaster.

Hi Steve, thank you very much for your report. Tonight on television, we saw many interview with people from the San Diego aerea which have lost their home and houses, and still they all can not imagine what had happened. My father and his family have also lost their home, but this was due to the communist's expropriation in 1953. These are experiences which throw a shadow over people for decades.

- Eckhard