Zenith jumpy picture ...

[rwagoner]

Today I tool out the main board to look for leaking or bulging capacitors. I did not see anything bad. I obviously can't see under the caps that are mounted right on the board with no space, but didn't see anything suspicious at all. I also looked at the sweep board and everything looked pretty clean there as well.

So I put it all back together and tested it to make sure it was at least at the state it was before. It was ... kind of reminded me of a scrambled picture from the old ON-TV or SelecTV days. I left it on for a while to see if it would still clear up a little, and it did. Seemed to get better faster, but honestly I could not really tell for sure. After a while I was able to watch a fairly stable picture.

Here's where it gets weird. I am not sure if it's related to my leaving the VCR/DVD player "on," but I turned off the TV for a few hours. When I turned it on, the picture was almost watchable right from the start. I could watch the DVD I had in the player with just a little jumping, and the FireTV stick going through the converter to the RCA inputs -- though jumpier at first, settled soon after being on. This pattern repeated a few times during the day.

Just now I turned it on, and the picture was almost stable right from the start even on the Fire stick. Right now it is playing Adam 12 via the Fire stick flawlessly, just a few minutes after turning it on.

This is a total longshot, but is it at all possible that leaving the combo VCR/DVD player "on" sent enough of a signal through the RF antenna input that it "heated" the bad part and made it stay more stable?

And more importantly, would that in any way give clues as to what part of the board may have a bad part? Capacitor or not?

Alternatively, are there any recommendations for a repair place near the South Bay area of Los Angeles County (San Pedro, Rancho Palos Verdes, Torrance, Lomita, etc) who might be able to do a true diagnosis?