Admiral 20X122 is now finished project! Pictures attached..

Well, I've both good, and, bad news...........
Good. It hasn't blown up.......
I have a less washed out picture, and, slightly less audio buzz.
Bad. HV still low, and, width short on damper side.
This could be just a bad tube. I'll have to try another.

Set is slightly better.
Vertical is still unstable when cold, but, gets more stable as it plays.
LV power supply seems to lose 1-3 volts as set warms up.
Heh...........
Bill Cahill

Well, I've got good, and, bad news............
Hv problem was a shorted damper tube. Replaced that, got more hv.
Then, 5U4 failed. four tries later found one that worked properly.
NOw, vert. has failed.
It comes on as full picture, then, starts to get short on the bottom, then, boom! Very short, and, vertical fold over!
Back to the drawing board.
Bill Cahill

Some minor good news. I don't reccommend this to anyone, but, since I had nothing to lose, I worked very hard on I F alignment by eye. I'm sure I'm still off, but, as a whole, I have all channels working better than they were.
Picture is more clear, and,, less distorted, and, alot less buzz in the sound. The tuning was very far off.

I'm waiting for some industrial strenghth tubes to come to try in vert. circuit. It acts like the tube is breaking down.
They are running the 12AU7 in vertical stage, and, voltage is way too high for the set to handle. The tube can't handle it.
I am, however, back to having horizontal oscilator issues, and, the hv has again dropped somewhat dut to this.
Oscilator wants to hunt, and, sometimes stops oscilating totally.
Bill Cahill

Well, shoot. I thought I had part of my problem fixed. I put an industrial strenghth tube in, and, replaced two suspicious capacitors in vert. intergrator circuit today.
It worked right for about 30 min., then, went back to its' old shenanigans.
Picture jumps in size. Gets larger, and, smaller vertically very fast on its' own.
Tried a different picture tube in case that was my focus problem. It wasn't.
Still have some audio issues, also.
I have I F 's tuned better, though.
Back to the drawing board.
Bill Cahill

Could it be something breaking down due to heat? Freeze spray or a hair dryer might help with the isolation of the problem?

I don't know, and, I'm out of freeze spray for the moment...........
Thanks. I'll be thinking. May take a break from it.......
Bill Cahill

It's hard to say on the vertical problem. I may start watching voltages to see what's going on, but, I've got an idea first.
Thanks for the ideas.
Bill Cahill

I think these tv threads are interesting and all of the stuff you go through to get one fixed . The last tv set i restored was a Philco 16'' predicta . It started out in real clean nice condition though . It works good now .

Bill what is a ''mask''

The mask is the surround in front of the picture tube that shows the shape of the picture. For instance.
A double D maks means two half round sides.
A porthole mask means the picture is completely round.
The Admiral has a Double D mask.
The Philco predicta you restored has a rectangular mask for the rectangular tube.
Bill Cahill

I am still confused . A mask is something that covers a face . I am thinking its the clear lens that is in front of the tube . A surround would be out around the edges of the tube .

At any rate can you polish it with something ?

NO, in the case of television, the mask is the part that "Masks off" the part of the tube not wished to be seen. Easy example.
The lone ranger wore a mask so that you could only see the parts of his face he wanted you to see.......
The lens in front is usually a safety glass. It can be called a lens, though usually it didn't amplify the size of the picture.
It's just simply a lens you look through. It does no hiding of the tube.
A lens, by definition, is a device you look through. Our eyes have lenses so we can see. The lens is part of the eyeball.
Bill Cahill

And, on the lens on the Admiral, I can probably do something to improve it more. What I did so far took some of the minor scratches, and, discoloration out.
Not sure how much better I can make it, though, and, a couple of the scratches are very deep.
Bill Cahill

Did you ever have one of those days where nothing went right?? I just did...............

Triedworking on Admiral. Replaced two power supply resistors, inclding the one going tto focus pot.
The problem is one end of the second one goes to Sync, and audio circuit.
They are on the same terminal strip as the vertical intergrator. I wasn't careful enough, and, connected it to intergrator instead oof audio, and, sync circuits.
When I brought up variac, I got smoke, and, immediately shut it down.
Found my prollem, and, fixed it.
Tried set. No play, and, something was crackling.
I shut it down, and, found out a wire wasn't soldered. This one wasn't my fault.
tried set again. It now plays again, but, now the picture is extremely dim. Almost not seeable at all. I suspect I've dammaged the flyback.
Oh, boy...............
Bill Cahill

Sorry to see that.

You did not damage the flyback .

Then, what did I dammage?
Most of the set wasn't receiving any voltage because of that mistake. But, the vertical output, damper, horizontal output, and, flyback were.
Bill Cahill

What smoked ?

Didn't see, and, turned it off fast.
I just saw, and, smelled smoke.
Tv is playing again, but, worse.
And, I still have my vertical problem.
Resistor on horiz. osc. coli is bad.
It calls for a 75K. Someone put in a 68k.
It tests 175K.
I don't have either resistor, and, need some two watt resistors as well.

Bill Cahill

LET PROCLIMATIONS GO THROUT THE WORLD!! The Admiral is coming back to life!
I did a jury rig. I found a 68K 1 watt resistor that checked an even 74K non variable. I needed a 75K for the horizontal oscilator.
Well, it made a MAJOR difference!
After adjustments, I now have alot more brightness, almost decent contrast, and, focus is now centered with decent focus.
The control is ablut exactly in the middle of it's range, now.
Obviously, this has dramatically increased my HV.

I still have major vertical problems, and, several other more minor ones, but, the good news is I am now looking at the best, brightest, most in focus picture that I have ever looked at on this set!!!!!!!!1

I am now convinced this tv is going to live again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Bill Cahill

Bill, your patience and persistance has paid off!

I knew you'd make it!

Thanks, but, it's still not fixed. I have some ways to go on that.
I did notice something last night that might be a hint of what's going on...
For the first time ever, with chassis on its' side, every time the picture size junmps, which is often, I can hear a slight tick, tick, tick around the vertical section of the set. Possibly one of the transformers is shorting out??
Bill Cahill

Something probably is. I used to do QA testing on HV power supplies, and when such conditions we could check the transformers separately from the supplies.

Maybe a light thermal test on the transformer might show up a change in the fault or indicate it's not the source.

I found, and, fixed my audio output voltage problem. An important wire going from one of the filters on C3 going to the junction of the 820 ohm resistor and, the audio tube broke. Also, another feed wire had broken. Both caused excessive voltage, and, audio hum.
Both are fixed, and, hum is gone, and, voltage on audio out. is back to where it shouldbe. That 820 ohm is used as a load for the audio section. It was feeding full B+ to the tube through one end, without the load down, and, the filter to the tube wasn't even connected, causing the hum.

Now, on vert. Problem, I guess the ticking was my poor connections, and, a broken solder joint on sync plate, as well. That wasn't my fault. It wasn't enough solder.That is a B+ resistor feeding 35V DC to one of the plates of the sync tube, 6SN7, in fact. They use that tube for half the sync, and, the other half of tube is audio pre amp.
This set sisn't exactly the best design.

On powering up the set vert. still had it's problem for the first two min., then, stabilized. Wha the???
I'll try it from a cold start again.
Bill Cahill
Picture is getting better. Sync is now stable.