The CTC-9 is here!
 

Got this one Sunday:banana: I think it is a Latham. It's very unmolested and the picture tube has a date code of 60-22. It looks like the original 21CYP22 as it has the serial numbeer still on it. And it's good and strong! The flyback has what looks like a white outer covering on it and very little wax dripping. The tag has a repair date of 1968. It was originally purchased and lived about three blocks from my house. A friend of mine found it at a hugh garage sale a few miles from here. The circuit boards are nice and brown, not black. Even under the vertical output tube. This critter has a number of bumblebees under it so I'm going to replace anything suspicious before the variac gets started.
One question... how does the front glass come off?

nice find!! IIRC there should be some little clip like retainiers around the brass trim on the front.

That's a real beauty.

Here's a link to my recent CTC-10 safety glass removal adventures. Your set looks to use the same trim mounting scheme. Take your time and don't use too much brute force.

http://www.videokarma.org/showthread.php?t=251989

That's funny, I always thought 'Colorama' meant it was a rebuild but that base says 'all new materials'.

This is what my '59 21CYP22 looks like:

http://videokarma.org/attachment.php...4&d=1315931987


Perhaps all tubes beyond a certain date ('60 or so?) were Colorama, while earlier production ones had a base like mine?

I also have a trio of 21AXP22's. The one that was rebuilt in '65 and went to air has a blank black base (probably not rebuilt by RCA), while the good RCA Colorama rebuild lives in my CTC-4. The 21-CT-55 still has it's original tube in it with a similar base to the CYP in the picture, though the tube type is stamped on the neck not engraved on the base.

The colorama threw me too but it has the serial number tag still on it. Does anyone know how long the CTC-9 was in production? I would think for at least a year (but then again, when did the model year start?)
Another question is are the older flybacks white instead if red? I hope to finish up my Admiral B/W tonight and pull the RCA chassis late tonight or tomorrow night.

Silverama and Colorama were both advertised as new tubes back in 1960. I think RCA rebuilt tubes were called red label.

My 9 had a blue rubber tire on it.

I thought that is was "Hi-Lite" for rebuilds.

It's hard to tell sometimes, they don't always make the glass welds high on the neck. I just sold a tube that looked like it had a weld right down by where the bell ends, you could tell because of the shade of internal dag coating.

The "Hi-Lite" series were new so maybe when this trade name was used the "Colorama" was delegated to rebuilt status.

I think the Hi-Lite came along later. I suppose any of them could show up today as "rebuilt"

http://books.google.com/books?id=DFA...20tube&f=false

Here's a very early ad for both Colorama and Silverama.

http://books.google.com/books?id=iAo...20tube&f=false

Have you considered the possibility of the original bakelite base being replaced early in life due to mis-handling, or a short supply of correctly labled bases at the plant causing the wrong base to be put on the tube so it could be installed in a new set?

Wow Nice set! glad the CRT is good. CTC9's are great sets. You will enjoy it.

Congrats! Nice looking TV, all original too, a perfect starting point for restoration :yes: I do wish these colour roundies were around in my neck of the woods...I feel like I'm really missing out! :)

I picked up that same set in a darker finish a few months ago. Yours looks ten times nicer than mine though! Great score.

And yes, my CTC-9 and 11 both have the original picture tubes, and both say "Colorama."

It opened it's eyes!
 

Last night I finally finished recapping the horizontal board and ran the set up without vertival or horizontal output tubes. I had checked the electrolytics a bit ago but wanted to double check for heating. They were fine so in went the tubes and in went the chassis. It had horizontal frequency WAY off frequency when I first brought it up a while ago. I was greeted by a rock solid, in frequency picture. I still have vertical issues and a lot of adjusting (checking the HOT current for the first thing). I let it run about ten minutes and all seemed well. I'll get to the vertical next!

Congratulations. I love the all wood control panel on that set. When RCA started using the metal trim control panels, IMO it was the beginning of things starting to look cheap.

Very nice set. Drool......:drool:

Never work when you are tired!
 

Started working on the Latham again the other night. After changing all the bad color tubes I decided to check /dip horizontal current. It is over 200 mils! Put the alignment tool in the waveform coil instead of linearity and promptly messed up the synchroguide peaks! Then the scope went south! Sat down and looked at the schematic and said, STUPID!
Last night brought the other scope home and realigned the synchoguide, got a great picture but still too much horizontal current! At 110 volts I can dip to 196 mils! Strange thing is the screen grid on the HOT is way to high. Around 150 volts. With high current I would think it would be low!
Any ideas?

Check shunt regulator current, it may be dragging down your HV supply. If that's not it, the screen resistor may have drifted.

High voltage 23 KV, screen voltage 160 volts, cathode current 201 milliamperes. Now the real problem, my Sam's Photofact is very different than the set. Screen resistors in Sam's says a 16k 4 watt with a 120k 2 watt in parallel. Mine has a 56k 2watt in parallel with the 16K. I put resistors in series with the 47 ohm to the screen grid to lower the screen to what Sam's says, and the cathode current dropped to 170 milliamperes. About 1 inch of width missing, poor focus, reduced vertical and a generally dismal picture. I reconnected everything as original and ran the set for 15 minutes. Glorious picture. After 15 minutes, shut it off and touched the flyback. Barely warm! Tried two meters for the current, analog and digital, both the same. Ohmed the screen circuits, all OK. Horizontal drive is -57 volts. The Sam's says CTC9F is in the bunch. Mine is a CTC9F. Anyone have an RCA schematic with these values?

Not the power transformer!?
 

A few months ago I took the CTC-9 to Mississippi to replace the Zenith roundie for a while. It wasn't long till the 'smell of death" started to come out while it was playing. I pulled the chassis and reconnected it outside the cabinet and after a short while the smell appeared to be the power transformer. I had no time to work on it then so it sat until a few weeks ago. I got curious and pulled the B+ fuse and plugged it in. It sat with the filaments on for a while and the transformer got luke warm after about an hour. I actually forgot about it as I was working around the place and late that night I saw it lit in the dining room. The transformer was still just luke warm. Fast forward to last weekend. I brought another transformer set up to do B+ adjusted by the variac at 385 volts connected to "C2" with the B+ fuse still missing. It came right up, bright snowy screen. I hooked a converter box up to it and played it for about 9 hours. After a quick setup I was very happy with the picture!
Now I'm wondering if the set has a leaky silicon rectifer in the doubler. I did see a slight ripple in the picture awhile back but none this weekend. I remember a preamplifier years ago where one diode in a bridge went slightly leaky and killed the power transformer. I replaced the transformer and it still overheated. It took some doing to find the leaky silicon rectifier but once found the transformer ran at it's normal temperature (too hot for me but the manufacturer said that was normal)
My question is, how many of you have found a slightly leaky silicon rectifier? Except for that one I have never found another. They all have been dead shorts.
Next time I'm in Mississippi I plan to check/substitute the diodes and see what happens!

Never any diode issues here, but anything is possible.

I just wish I wasn't stuck in town this coming weekend. I itching to install two new 1000 PIV silicons and see what happens.