We sold these in my days as a tech at our local RCA dealer. One of the selling points was you could hide the remote from your kids so they couldn't watch TV when you didn't want them to.
Beautiful RCA color! A rare bird there, both now, and back in the day! I remember delivering and setting up a few of the later model of this set, that were branded RCA ColorTrack, when they were brand new, and I was working at the TV repair shop! I have a 1976, RCA XL-100, manually tuned and controlled 19" tabletop set, still with a delta gun CRT, it works great too. Good job on your video there, Richard! I am looking forward to seeing more of your sets featured.
Wow, what an oddball set! That's VERY strange for a set back then not to have controls on it for power, channel, and volume. This is dating back to the days where there were still plenty of manual-tune sets out there, even ones you could buy new. Early electronics in these, and thus, prone to flaws, such as that triac. But yet, there were still enough discrete components that the relay mod you mentioned could be performed. I have an RCA ColorTrak 2000 (I believe) in the bedroom. It has absolutely countless hours on it. I think it was purchased in May of 1985. 27", wood cabinet, stereo speakers. Also has a huge remote, but does have buttons right on the front for power, volume, and channel, in fact separate buttons for each number. That set was given to me by someone I used to work with back in the very very late 90s or early 2000s. He had bought it brand new back in 1985. He told me it had to be repaired once over the years, and it was never the same since. The picture tube is still bright as ever, but a lot of the capacitors are probably dried up. It has a discoloration spot, also has some noise in the video display, and 2 permanent "noise bars" towards the left side of the screen, all of those were there when I got it. Also has quite a bit of overscan. The on screen display has the same blocky characters, they used that for years it seems, xjoe81x used to have an RCA 19" from early 80s that used that as well. Your set is the first time I've seen the display in a color OTHER than white! The on screen display will sometimes do weird stuff, like for example I keep it on the composite input (channel A1) which it displays at power on along with the clock. Sometimes at power on, I get A1A1A1A1A1A1A1 all along the bottom of the screen. Other times I'll just be watching and the picture will get these large black stripes going through it horizontally, scrolling slowly. A swift smack on the side makes it right again, and the on screen display comes up by itself. That also tends to reset the clock on it, so I don't even bother setting it anymore. I'm amazed that set still works with all the hours it has on it, it has well outlived its useful service life. It gets the most hours of all TVs in the house, and yet keeps on working. It'll be sad the day it finally goes, but I have plenty of other CRTs to replace it with.
I find my '80s RCA set interesting when turned off. It acts much like most flat panels and just goes blank. That set has a green display like this one. It has a CTC 120 chassis. My grandmother had a Sears brand TV with an RCA chassis from circa 1991 with the same shut down characteristic. I still have that set but the vertical failed not long after she died in 2013. It also had other miscellaneous issues when it died. I have a feeling that set will be a bear to revive now.
