[Charlie]

Chad,

Thank you for the pointers. I never really cared for dealing with HV problems, and luckily they're few and far between for me.

I've made the checks you mentioned, and so far have made a few adjustments here and there. The 1000 ohm resistor you mentioned is not included in my set. From the Sams diagram, it looks like it isn't used in all of the models.

Since making these current adjustments involves using two meters at the same time, I made a trip to Rat Shack and bought another. Before that, I was having to joggle my meter back and forth between the HO tube and regulator.

My first readings on the cathode lead of the regulator was roughly 1500uA... far more than it needed to be. It would fluctuate some, but in any case it was somewhat high. A local friend suggested changing the HV rectifier, and so I did. This brought the current down to to 950uA initially, but I notice that it fluctuates and slowly falls as the set continues to run. In fact, it slowly falls as far down as 300uA after operating nearly an hour. In the meantime, Sam mentions not letting it fall below 850. I did try changing the regulator tube, but doing so had no affect.

The 1.5 meg resistors in the regulator circuit check right on the money.

The HV was running at 24,000 volts, so I tuned that down to 23,000. It seems to be pretty steady.

I've got the HO tube current tuned down to 202mA, and it's pretty steady as well.

With all this being said, the flyback still gets hot, but not near as bad or quickly as before. Before these adjustments and changing the rectifier, it would get damn hot after 30 minutes of operation... enough for wax to bubble. Now, it takes at least an hour to get hot... but this time without wax spitting out of it. So, it has cooled down some, but not enough. BTW... I still have a good stable picture.

Could my flyback simply have a minor short? Or could there be something else causing my problem?