CTC-25 Rescue

[bgadow]

First, many thanks to leadlike for posting about this in the classifieds. This was up in Lancaster; we usually take a daytrip to the area once or twice a year so this worked out well. I kinda threw it together at the last minute, luckily the seller was accomodating.

The owner is a retired RCA engineer. My initial thought was this had been his "daily driver" but actually, he had tried his hand at TV repair on the side. This was a set he had bought to turn around; no telling how long he had it. It was still plugged in down in his basement; I couldn't stop him from powering it up. It only displayed a horizontal line, which I figured must be caused by a service switch. My wife & I hauled it up the steps and into the truck. Luckily it is fairly lightweight as these things go. (I actually picked it up out of the truck and brought it inside all by myself, something I should not have done.)

I powered it up at home and got the same horizontal line, unaffected by me playing with the switch. Fooling with the vert hold finally brought a raster. (dirty pot) But, no reception. I pulled the back and found the culprit-the 3rd video had gone to air. (I guess the Radio Shack lifetime guarantee doesn't apply to broken glass?) After replacement I was greeted with green faces. Jiggling the color tubes one by one found a dirty socket on the R-Y/B-Y amp. With that, I just sat back and watched for a half hour while I enjoyed my late night snack. (a whoopee pie, bought at a stand near Lancaster) Sadly, the picture developed a horizontal jitter followed immediatly by a sizzle, a burning smell and a collapsing raster. I shut her down. Flyback was hot but I think the problem is elsewhere in the circuit. I am going to do my level best to not tinker with it for now, as I have way too many other projects to tackle. Anyway, I wanted to share. If anybody falls in love with this, I will sell it for what I have in it. Not that I don't like it myself, just that space is at a premium. One interesting fact that occured to me: I have had maybe 200 TV sets pass through my hands over the years but this is actually the first complete RCA tube chassis rectangular console.

Oh, it is a CTC-25XA chassis, date codes put it in the 4th quarter of '66. The crt is an RCA Hi-Lite which I initially thought to be original but then I wiped away some dust and noticed a date code of 6752. So, I'm guessing the crt died around its first birthday. I haven't tested this one but it seems strong enough, if not overwhelming.