I know it's been a while since I last posted... just been busy. I got a heated storage unit since I ran out of space. Just till I get my own place.

Anyhow, got a good truckload here:

An early 70s solid state Zenith Chromacolor
Early 80s Zenith System 3 with Space Zoom
1980 Sears console (I liked that it sat up on what looked like gold plated casters about 4" off the floor)
A 1975 Motorola Quasar 23" console.

2 of the consoles have their power cords cut. This weekend I only had time to just test the ones that had their cords (didn't do much else). The System 3 is dead.
The Quasar works perfectly actually. I was a bit worried about this one because it has an instant on switch in the back, and it was still set for on. But all it needed was refocused and vertical linearity readjusted. Perfect gray scale. Has dual speakers in front, and line level and speaker outputs in the back.

The rest I'm going to test this weekend when I go back out...

Hi Mike,

Thought you'd like to see my TV storage area.

Actually, before everybody goes crazy, this is a shot of my rented storage garage, back in 1990. Since I was running out of money to pay for the 20x40 space, and had just moved into my house, I built a garage for the TVs.

I put up a cement block garage, 36x30, and quickly filled it with furniture, TVs, and merch. Of couse, now it's 2007 and the televisions are more '60s and '70s...but I spotted this old picture, and it brought back pleasant memories!

Harry

I know it's been a while since I last posted... just been busy. I got a heated storage unit since I ran out of space. Just till I get my own place.

Anyhow, got a good truckload here:

An early 70s solid state Zenith Chromacolor
Early 80s Zenith System 3 with Space Zoom
1980 Sears console (I liked that it sat up on what looked like gold plated casters about 4" off the floor)
A 1975 Motorola Quasar 23" console.

2 of the consoles have their power cords cut. This weekend I only had time to just test the ones that had their cords (didn't do much else). The System 3 is dead.
The Quasar works perfectly actually. I was a bit worried about this one because it has an instant on switch in the back, and it was still set for on. But all it needed was refocused and vertical linearity readjusted. Perfect gray scale. Has dual speakers in front, and line level and speaker outputs in the back.

The rest I'm going to test this weekend when I go back out...

Many times, when a TV set (or anything with a cord) is found on a curb or elsewhere with the cord cut off, it could (and oftentimes does) mean that the unit has some kind of electrical problem and the former owner doesn't want anyone trying to plug it in, by accident or otherwise. Of course, there would be nothing to stop you from splicing a cord onto the stub of cord coming from the back of the unit and powering it up through a Variac (starting from zero and working up, slowly, to the line voltage--stopping, of course, if you should smell something burning or if you actually see smoke), or even with a 100-watt light bulb in series with the line cord, for testing purposes. If the lamp lights normally when the cord is plugged into an outlet and the switch thrown on, you can be fairly sure that all is well with the power supply system and can go ahead with further testing. However, if the lamp lights to full brightness and suddenly burns out with a white flash as soon as the cord is plugged in and/or the unit switched on, there is a problem somewhere in the power supply or elsewhere in the unit that is causing an abnormally high current draw. This must be repaired before the unit is used again.

I never cared for instant-on, in televisions or anything else. I am old enough, at 50 (I grew up in the seventies, during the energy crisis) to remember when instant-on first appeared in TV sets. This was a good idea at the time, IMHO (before solid-state became the norm in electronics), but the instant-on system had the potential to create a fire hazard because the tube filaments remained on, albeit at lower voltage, as long as the set was plugged into a live outlet, even after the TV was turned off with the main power switch. Another problem was that the instant-on diode was connected directly across (in shunt with) the AC power switch. Many times when lightning would strike near the power line the TV was plugged into, the instant-on diode would instantly short, effectively locking the switch on. The only way to turn off the TV in this case would be to physically unplug the set's line cord from the wall outlet. Many people dealt with the problem in that manner, with a wall switch on the outlet powering the TV, or by removing the diode, either themselves (if they knew where to look and what to look for) or by having a serviceman remove the diode the next time the TV required repair service. For all sets with instant-on, there was a defeat switch somewhere on the set so that the instant-on circuitry could be disabled if so desired, but unplugging the set from the AC outlet gave 100 percent protection against fire and was often done if the TV were to be left unattended for an extended period of time.

What's funny is that all the early solid state color sets seemed to have instant on, on the CRT filament...the picture did indeed appear the moment the switch was turned on, but it really only takes 10 sec or so for the CRT to warm up. Seems like a gimmick to make the solid state set appear even more dramatic in coming on quickly.

The series string tube type sets usually used the diode but the solid state sets usually used a 4 volt constantly powered standby filament transformer whose secondary was wired in series with the main transformer filament winding, which then added 2 volts to give the CRT the full 6 volts when the power was switched on. I have rewired the power line circuitry in these sets to put the standby transformer on the normally open side of the power switch to defeat the instant on.
The RCA XL-100 sets with this feature often did not include a defeat switch.