Peter Yanczer mechanical kit

[Dave A]

The late Peter Yanczer sold a kit with his design of a 30's scanning camera and a scanning receiver in separate camera/receiver boxes. It was connected via a RCA cable. Mine was working fine but has now gone bad.

It does see the image but on the receiving end it is hash. Something is there but garbled. If I put my hand on the pickup cover foil around the photocell on the camera, I can get something better. Hand capicitance I suspect.

I have no schematics on Peter's boxes...only construction notes. Any ideas
or anyone with the same units to use to compare?

This thing is too rare to give up on. Pix when I can.

[old_tv_nut]

You probably have the info on earlytelevision.org, but here it is anyway:
https://www.earlytelevision.org/peter_yanczer.html

The narrow band television association in England:
http://www.nbtv.wyenet.co.uk/
sells a CD with both 32 and 30 line images
http://www.nbtv.wyenet.co.uk/cd2.htm
Using this would be a good way to separate camera and receiver problems.

-----
I built a receiver using one of Peter's laser-machined disks (I think 32 lines).
http://www.bretl.com/mechtvprogress/mechtvprogress.htm
http://www.bretl.com/mechtvprogress2...vprogress2.htm

I had thoughts of building a camera, but never got to it. The receiver is on a shelf in my garage, but the power supplies, portable CD player and CDs are in a box somewhere that got separated in the move 6 years ago.

I tried to improve the sync separation of the simple circuit the club provided, to get frame sync as well as line sync, but discovered that there will always be a problem due to the low ratio of 30 or 32 between line rate and frame rate. I ended up with something that would sometimes frame sync, usually one line off, depending on video content.

[rld-tv01]

You might look at Peter Yanczer's book online https://www.earlytelevision.org/pdf/...television.pdf

Chapter nine discusses building a camera and receiver. It's a different camera and receiver then his kit but Peter probably used the ideas from his kit to build this other camera and receiver. There are schematics for a video amp in Chapter 7.

I have my mechanical tv camera here at home and my mechanical tv receiver in Storage about 7 miles away. You should be able to record the output of the camera as an audio signal to computer sound card, audio tape or CD/DVD etc. I think the CD from the narrow band television association that Wayne mentioned is recorded images from a camera in their format. I would suggest experimenting with a stationary image at first. I think Peter provided a large bold letter "A" printed on a 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper for this purpose. I will try getting out to my storage area and bringing my receiver home. I'll hook my camera-receiver up and see if it still works. If it does I could record an audio file of the image and send it to you as a .wav or mp3 file. This would help isolate if it's your camera or receiver causing the problem.

-Richard

[pearsonk]

I feel fortunate to have a signed copy of TAYLORVISION, by Edmund Taylor.
This book is an illustrated monograph of a mechanically scanned solid state
television system, published in 1984.
I suggest those interested in making a mechanical system read this book.

[old_tv_nut]

Originally Posted by pearsonk

I feel fortunate to have a signed copy of TAYLORVISION, by Edmund Taylor.
This book is an illustrated monograph of a mechanically scanned solid state
television system, published in 1984.
I suggest those interested in making a mechanical system read this book.

Apparently there is only one currently known copy for sale, referred to by many sellers:
https://www.bookfinder.com/search/?a...ion%2520system

[rld-tv01]

I felt fortunate to have met Edmund Taylor at an ETF conference years ago. I already had his book which wasn't with me so I didn't get it signed.

[rld-tv01]

I retrieved my mechanical TV receiver from storage this morning. I have to find an RCA cable to hook my camera with the receiver. I haven't turned the camera or receiver on in over 10+ years.

I found several RCA cables in my back room. I have to find a flat surface to put the camera and receiver side by side to test them out. I've got several folding tables but eveything gets stored in front of everything else.

I'll let you know if I have success in getting a picture.

[rld-tv01]

I set a table up with the camera and receiver. No recognizable picture. My camera is loosely sitting in the camera box. I don't remember how far the camera should be back from the lens and how far the subject should be in front of the lens. . I'll have to review the build manual. Attached is a photo of the receiver with both disks synched?

[Dave A]

RLD - thanks for the effort. Between us we may figure this out. It may take a dive in to Peter's mystery boxes. I like your idea of recording your camera data to a computer to test on my receiver. That should be an easy email attachment. Now it looks like I should do the same for you to test. And I will try to make a test "A" card in Word. Mine vanished. Your camera should be in the box for complete image/focus alignment. The receiver can be out of the box.

I remember that mine needed to be about 3' away. It was good for a Phillie Phanatic stuffed toy image with a lot of light. A latter day Felix. Anything beyond that was too low an image to show anything. Too much information and too few lines to resolve. Just blobs. Close ups only like the time. Now my lens cardboard is quite stiff and moving the lens for focus is troublesome. If I can get it out it may get a candle wax coating to see if that helps.

Did you try your hand on the photocell foil coating that seemed to help the image? That may give a clue that we have an in-common problem.

I have the NBTV CD disc and may give that a shot to see if it tries even though the disc line count mismatch. And for those of you following along, the disc came rrom this "science fair" kit from England. Out of stock at the moment. It does give you the idea. https://mindsetsonline.co.uk/shop/televisor/ Try again later.

I will try some pix tomorrow.

[rld-tv01]

I looked over Peter Yanczer's camera build instructions and he specifies a coaxial cable with RCA connectors to connect the camera and receiver. I misplaced my original cable with came with the camera kit and tried with a regular RCA analog audio cable. That is the only change since it was all stored away 10 years ago when I moved from Virginia to California. I want to get a proper cable before going down a rabbit hole.

[old_tv_nut]

Unless the camera output is high impedance (which it shouldn't be), practically any cable should work, as the signal is only in the audio frequency range. Even if it is high impedance, the worst effect should be some smearing of the image from stray capacitance.

[rld-tv01]

Dave, from Peter Yancer's troubleshooting in the camera build manual:

-Using an ohmmeter, see that there is continuity between the foil covering the rear cover and the tube. If the is not, cut another 5"x5" square of foil and apply it to the rear cover, in addition to the first layer.

-Use an ohmmeter to measure resistance at the RCA jack center connection and its outside shell. It should measure between 35,000 and 45,000 ohms. if not in this range , check the connections on the P.E. Cell Assembly and make any necessary corrections. Measure the resistance from the RCA jack outer shell to the aluminum foil on the rear cover, it must be near zero ohms.

For everyone reading; the P. E. Cell at this point is inside a paper tube wrapped in aluminum foil. To test the photo cell you would have to cut the aluminum foil to remove the back panel the P.E. cell is attached to. Also to check the optical setup referenced in the build manual you have to remove the back panel and look through the tube with the lens on front and evaluate (measure) the distance (approx 2 - 4 feet) between the object to be videoed and the front of the lens. I simulated this by removing the chassis from the cabinet and looking through the lens and measuring.

I ordered a coaxial cable with RCA connectors from Amazon. As Wayne stated there shouldn't be much difference but Peter referenced a Coaxial cable in the build instructions so it couldn't hurt. $7.50 on Amazon. $4.95 at Best Buy but they only have one in stock. From prior experience at Best Buy if they only have 1-2 in stock it will get hidden somewhere and something more expensive will take it place on the shelf.

Testing the P.E. Cell and Video Amplifier. First level is whether any signal is coming out of the P.E. Cell and the same type test for any signal coming out of the camera amplifier.

Last resort is taking the back panel off the photocell tube and measure the voltages on the P.E. Cell. Then opening up the amplifier which is glued to a piece of wood and enclosed in a paper cover designed by Peter Y. I doubt if any of the components inside the amp are malfunctioning but last result might be testing them. Before this Dave A and I should trade signal output information.

[Dave A]

rld...I will try your ideas.

Your first note about adding foil gets near my note about my hand contact with the foil in a hand capacitance manner. I have thought about changing the power cords to a grounded cord. Maybe? I will measure the other items.

Another thought is that the signal from the camera should be audible via a connection from the camera to any audio amp. We should be able to hear a modulation (buzz) change as the camera goes from dark to light. Low to high. It could be wave of the hand over the lens from dark to light or a flashlight. Something should change frequency and the sound for a quick test.

The other amazing thing is that there are only two of us going at this. Did Peter sell that few kits? As I remember, they were quite expensive.

We will continue with trading signals. Your cam to my receiver, my camera to your receiver. Felix will prevail...or the Phillie Phanatic.

[Dave A]

So far I have;

Good grounds everywhere on the camera side. Foil to foil, foil to both RCA connectors, RCA to RCA.

39K ohms on the PE internal measurement within rld notes and specs.

Tested the PE output with a flashlight. On a 200maDC scale I got levels between .1 and .4.
It sees light as I move the flashlight around but not sure if that is a correct level.

Using the same 200ma I measured the main out audio. I got -0 to -104 or so. Minus?

Using my 1992 RS mini amp/speaker I listened to the output.
I got loud modulation hash with it changing pitch via the flashlight.

I cleaned the 24 ports on the disc. All good.

The camera seems to be trying to make a picture. Time to move on to the receiver. I will start with the NBTV disc to see if it can be stable even with the scan mismatch. 24 vs 32.
I am also thinking of changing the power cords to a grounded version. It cannot hurt. Peter's amps are well sealed and a problem to open. Still working on the letter "A" test card.

rld...I will try to record the flashlight test version via Audacity. It will be a moving blob but will tell you if your receiver can see it. It should be a small file if you send me your email.

[Electronic M]

You know if there's defined sync in the audio waveform it might be possible to visualize a simple test pattern in audacity by taking one field of video cutting it at the end of each line and stacking lines. Of course IIRC there are PC programs to encode and decode SS TV audio to and from pictures.