Picked up a 1959 RCA Sportable.
 

I won this at a local auction.

As far as I can tell it's a 1959 "Sportable" model, the one John Davidson's lugging in the Ad.

CRT tested about dead at first, after about a minute at 8 volts however it shot up to nearly 100%, it stayed there at 6.3 volts and even at 5.0 volts!

Brought it up on the Variac, on/off switch is open so I jumped it, sound at 80 volts, oscillator at about 90 followed by a raster, turned the Variac up to about 110v, the raster collapsed to a single line nearly immediately so a Cap must have shorted or gone open when it got hit with full voltage.

Someone decided it needed some color and painted the mask around the CRT Pink, not sure how I'm going to remove that, Citristrip wrecks plastic.

Most of the small knobs are missing too and the one that's left isn't too nice, the rest of the set is in good condition but very dirty.

Hey Eric congrats on your find. I had 2 of those now I have one it works all the way unrestored maybe 1 day I will have it recapped I won it off the Bay 12 years ago.. Timothy

I've had some luck softening latex paint by soaking in water. Might be some other kind of paint, of course, but it couldn't hurt to try.

If all else fails, repaint it a color that you like better.

Phil Nelson

This is a nice find! I'm impressed how RCA used a power transformer.

Nice score :) I've used oven cleaner to remove enamel paint from plastic with good results.

First thing I did when I got home was weigh it, 43 lbs, John Davidson must have had arms of Steel, especially if the Photoshoot took any time at all.

I'll test the Oven Cleaner method on an inside spot and see if it'll work.

The pink wouldn't be bad but they just globbed it on with a brush in a haphazard fashion.
There are some small nicks around the very center ring around the CRT, I figure I can fill them with Bondo and paint the ring Gold.

To me these sets always looked like they needed their Thyroid checked.

I tried the Easy Off method and it works, not only works but leaves the plastic sparkly clean, I have the mask off the set and sitting in the tub with Easy Off on it, I'll give it 30 minutes then rinse it.

Fair to say this may be the first time the front has been off and the CRT cleaned, yuk. This alone will double the brightness.Ultimately this set will get a complete teardown and a good washing but for now this is enough.

Bob, good tip about the Oven Cleaner, worked like a charm without touching the Plastic!

Awesome :thmbsp: I learned about that trick from the vintage plastic army soldier collector crowd.

Are those circuit boards mounted over cutouts in the chassis, so that you can access their underside from the "bottom" side of the chassis, without actually removing the boards themselves or are they mounted on stand-offs?

With all those wires flying everywhere, I sure hope the former!

I hope so too or recapping it will suck! :eek:

I agree, that will be a nice set to restore.

Bob, thanks for that tip about the oven cleaner. I had not heard of it before and it only makes sense! Different chemicals do different things as we all know. I had a painted chassis (Allied Radio Knight-Kit) KM-15 amplifier on which the owner had placed white medical tape and had written the tube numbers. Too harsh of a chemical would lift the paint. What didn't work was naphtha; lighter fluid, the universal label remover!!! I didn't try acetone or lacquer thinner because for sure it would buckle the paint. Rubbing alcohol did the trick! So, we have to have lots of tricks in out bag don't we?

BTW, don't try to clean the backside of audio tuner dial glass unless you REALLY know what you are doing. You will be rewarded with the magic disappearing letters...

Kewl Scroe, Eric, can't wait to see 'er done !

Nice work Eric!
Speaking of cleaning crud and latex paint removal, I had great luck putting plastic radio cabinets, 1920's metal light fixtures and similar stuff in the dishwasher, then removing them before the dry cycle.

Have to echo Maxhifi and say; Nice set and with a transformer yet
I recapped an older but similar RCA 17PT8701 with a standoff-PC board and it was a pain!

I have 3 1961 RCA Sportabout models(I know this as I have the RCA. advertizing brochure for them. The modles I have are the "Trimette" and the "URBANITE". I had all three working at one time, but the horizontal has gone off on the "URBANITE" and I need to open it up again. The two "Trimette"s that I have work fine except for the irritating buzz in the sound as they power up. Once they are up the sound is pretty good.

The "Trimettes" do not have power transformers but the "Urbanite" does. The "Urbanite also has a 6BQ5 audio output tube, kind of fancy for a B&W portable. The others have the standard 6AQ5.