Oh, the days of analog TV. I almost expected that you would make your own old-time TV station and broadcast to it. Now that would be cool. What an amazing little TV.
I'm tempted - I have plenty of analogue TV outputs around, but there is a little problem with this device, it needs a good service... I remember analogue tV in chicago - tim the tool man taylor was on a lot and there were a few great wood working shows too!
@@DubiousEngineering this intrigued me more than I thought. I've looked into them a bit and seen that you can actually tune old games machines into it as well which I thought was pretty cool (although not the neatest way to do it lol)
IIRC if you have something with an RF output (eg VHS deck) and an RF cable (and have the cable reasonably near the aerial) - you may be able to get this to tune into it.
In 1980 Sir Clive Sinclair showed me the tube from his TV at his house and explained how it worked. The video is essentially correct - the line and frame scan are deflected electrostatically (as in a oscilloscope CRT) and then the beam bent around to strike the phosphor anode. One advantage of this according to Sir Clive was with the screen at the rear of the tube, it could be fitted with a large heat sink, and the power increased significantly, perhaps sufficient for projection. A draw back was the display was monochrome, so the niche only existed for a short time until LED/LCD based pocket colour TV's emerged in the 90's. Minor notes: - it's a cathode not an emitter - the tube is a thermionic valve not a transistor. Surface mount only became a thing in the mid 1980's. The first device I owned with much of it was a Technophone Mk1 in March 1986, by which time market penetration was about 10% and Surface Mount magazine was published (now SMT?)
Hi Mt Clayton! Wow! Great info, and my apologies for the many mistakes! Must admit, it was the first time I'd seen anything like it, so I guess I was winging it a little. But a genuinely magnificent invention either way!!... yup, sadly, tvs have become disposable these days!
The CRT is very neat. Looks like a lot of tech derived from VFD manufacturing was used to make it. I wouldn't be surprised if IEEE or norikake actually made the tube.
Wow - what a gorgeous CRT :) kinda disappointed you didn't get a picture on it though. No analogue broadcasts are going, but any old videogame, or ... perhaps ... an old ZX Spectrum or ZX81 ought to be able to give you an RF signal you could shove into it
I have a lot of capacitors to change and a full screen calibration and alignment to do before we can get an rf modulated signal injected into it. It’s a lot of work. Sadly, I only have an Acorn Electron or BBC micro to connect to it. ... I may need to go search for a 48k spectrum :-)
@@DubiousEngineering Heh - well, both those machines have RF out sockets. If you want to keep it all Sinclair, though, I have a ZX Spectrum you can have but you'll have to promise to take care of it and love it and feed it (email on my about page)
@@howiem i can’t see your email and have even looked through your blog... my email is on my RU-vid about section too. Let’s discuss - I may also want to use some of your music in my videos ... clearly you get a nice credit and shoutout
Small nit: surface mount tech existed at that time (it's as old as transistors), it just wasn't used in typical consumer electronics production because special equipment was required and the components were hard to source. The mainstream transition to SMT began in the early 90s as the demand for higher density rose, and higher frequencies made PTH less attractive due to inductance.
Very cool! That has to be the absolute strangest CRT I have ever seen. And I always thought that the Sony Watchman CRT's that were flat and fired up were very unusual. Not anymore. When people bought those portable televisions did the BBC shake them down for a TV license for that too?
Very cool. I've got a casio one (LCD). Anyone know if there is a DVB to analogue converter/short range transmitter so could see these things work again?
Even though TV stations no longer transmit analog, you could use an ESP32 to transmit to it and get a usable picture: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SSiRkpgwVKY.html Or figure out where on the PCB to feed it a composite signal.
