Predicta Debutante restoration
 

The owner of the Predicta Pedestal I restored recently dropped off a Debutante. It's got a bright raster and appears to have never been worked on.

It was a dark brown cabinet and the UHF option.
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While I have the chassis out, I also plan on finally restoring my Princess (top chassis) using the Debutante for a reference. More on that in a separate thread.

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Time to get busy!
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It's dirty, but otherwise looks very good.
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Almost all the tubes are the original Philcos.
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I pulled the main board out for a full recap.
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This cap has seen better days :yuck:
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Quite to my surprise, I found unused pads for mounting three of the electrolytic caps. It's as if they anticipated there would be caps small enough someday and routed traces and pads for them :thmbsp:
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Very nice set, different from the usual cream colored ones. There's one at an antique mall near me just like it with the stand for $500. Seem's high to me though, but it's mint. After I finally figure out my briefcase 19 and finish my holiday, I think I'm going to move on to one of my two debutantes. Your restorations are a great help to me, thanks!

Fascinating! I'll have to remember this if I ever restore one of these.

Nice day part of the 17" sets us they are transformer chassis which run cooler and are more reliable long term. I just sold my 17" example today at the DVHRC antique radio meet in Kutztown PA. I completely rebuilt it and is a strong daily player. Let it go under $500 but was still a fair price.

Here it is with the main board recapped and wired back in. A couple of the original electrolytics are still there and will be replaced shortly.
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We have a picture and sound :banana:
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Then I decided to clean off some nastiness inside the screen cover
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Even better now after some control tweaking :)
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Looks great!

Looks awesome! I wished my Predicta restoration went that smooth. I just started my first and it began with a bad flyback...

Just curious, did the replacement flyback come as a complete unit, or did you have to re-use the cores, c-clamp, and terminal board?

I haven't got it yet, it's on the way. It's a good original nicely recoated.

I finally finished replacing the eletrolytics and put the set back together.
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I was careful to follow the lead dress instructions in the service manual. That includes keeping the video signal away from the other CRT and yoke wires.
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Not perfect but pretty respectable linearity I think.
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The picture is quite bright and easily viewed in a well lit room. I think the owner will be happy with it :yes:
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Predictas seem to draw a lot of bad press, but I like working on them. the unitized construction of the transformer chassis makes them easy to pull and fit on the bench. And as you can see, they make a pretty good pic when well setup (nice work btw).

Thanks. The more I work on them, the more I like them too.

While working on this set I've also been restoring a Predicta Princess. It's one of the first sets I ever acquired and I think the first I ever posted about here: http://www.videokarma.org/showthread.php?t=226707
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I'll start a new thread on it soon. Then moving on to a pair of Dumonts...

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Another great Predicta restoration Bob. Interesting mention of the lead dress of the video cable. I wonder how much effect it has to seperate it like that, when they will be near each other as they go to the board?

Video lead plugs into the board but the rest plug into the flyback cage. No problem keeping them away.

These dark grey Debutantes are coming out of the woodwork recently. This year, two have come up on craigslist locally, and three have been through the shop. I'd love to know where they came from.

There's a dark brown debutante, with its original stand near me for $400. They won't budge on the price, but I'm not paying that. It is a very nice example though and has its original on/off and contrast knobs; which are usually missing.

Yeah, too much. Debutantes are by no means rare.