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The tri-pot gun design was phased out in the mid 80's. From that point on Zenith (probably their Rauland division mfd.) used a simplified in line gun with seperate cathode\G1 assemblies and a unitized g2 structure pretty much like everybody else with the exception of Sony. Its generically known as a COTY tube (computer optimized tube\yoke) Some Manufacturers, Esp. Rca decided to bond their yokes to their tube necks so if one go, both are useless. This was supposed to minimize convergence errrors and few adjustments. I've pulled tubes from 80's to 90's Philips, Rca, Zenith, Panasonic and various chinese knockoffs time and time again and have seen the same COTY III imprint in the glass of all of them. My MOM just retired her '86 swivel base 25" Zenith because of brightness loss and severe red bleed-I'm eventually gonna re-tube it. I gave her a 36" JVC I rescued so she can see it better (she's 82!). Anyhow it was one of the early good Zenith COTY tubes. A friend of mine who is a tech for a Zenith distributor swears the whole CRT mess started prior to the '95 buyout of Zenith by LG of Korea - he says Zenith was Rebadgeing Goldstar blemish Crts early on. I have seen this on some early 90's 19" sets with the 23mm Neck, so who knows. At the end of the day, all during the 90's, there was some real crap crts with Zenith - Made in USA wrote all over them. I've had some luck subbing in used crts out of some competitors sets but sometimes you have to get creative with the mounting hardware. This is a little easier in wood sets than in the all molded plastic thingys. I've never been one that was tied to conventional wisdom (I've just had a lot of junk to play with) You know, this whole thing is taking time away from my first and second gen. Motorola Quasars that are begging for attention (not to mention my Roundies) I will take my leave now. Regards to everyone subject to my ramblings. Your a patient lot!
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