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I played with the CRT bias and drive controls as well as cleaned the tuner and other controls and I now have a better picture. I can tell, however, that the CRT is starting to show it's age. The chassis is of the single board type and it uses an oddball inline CRT (510MRB22). The back uses the standard AC interlock with the notice something like "this cover is provided with an AC interlock to prevent dangerous electrical shock. Remove back cover completely for servicing." You'd think since this is a SS set, it would have the "no user servicable parts inside" warning. I don't know what I'll do with this set. I guess it depends on how hard up for money I become in the near future.
While we were at the SA, my neighbor saw two 5" B&W portables. One was an almost current $14.99 Chinese special. The other was a '92 Bentley Korean special. He wanted the newest one; but, I told him that he'd be better off to leave that one alone. He asked the clerk about the Bentley and she said $25. Since these portables will no longer be portable very soon, I tried to get him to hold off. He wound up buying the set anyway when he got them down to $15. He said that he was buying it for some kid in his family and it would only be used on AC power. Heck, I could have given him a 12" B&W had I known his intentions before paying $15 for a soon to be paperweight. Personally, I wouldn't give them $15 for every B&W in the store since they are all '80's crap.
Also, the manager hit me up about fixing a 27" Panasonic TV/DVD/VCR combo with vertical sweep problems. I told him it would probably cost $75 to fix it. He said he'd consult his superior because he felt like he could get $200 for such a TV. I'm sure they thought I'd fix it for nothing or very cheap; but, I'm not going down that road again. I've already "been there and done that" when my Brother-in-law was involved with a church ran thrift store. I wound up fixing all of their broken TV's for free or for the cost of parts. It got to the point where they took my services for granted and expected me to drop everything for them. Also, they tried to charge me $100 for a late '50's Zenith console stereo and when I told them that was too much; I was told that I could either pay the marked price or leave it. I figured they'd be willing to work with me on the stereo since it was DONATED to them and I was DONATING my time fixing all of their junk; but, nope! I told them that I'd remember that the next time they had a load of crap TV's for me to fix. One day, my BIL contacted me about repairing some more TV's and I told him it would be $45 labor + parts for each TV. I wasn't bothered by them again! So, I'm sure you can see why I don't want to get roped into anything at the SA.
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