CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[skypuppy]

Register to remove this ad. It's free!

I have the neck boards of an original Thompson tube 9000 that I'd like to get upgraded with the latest and greatest improvements. Also, one of the boards needs some minor repair, a resistor replaced and maybe the transistor (but not sure about that.) If needed, I have the pinouts that correspond to these boards. All the signals are there just in different spots compared to the later editions using Panasonic tubes. Charlie at VDC made me some brand new tubes with the Thompson pinouts. All three tubes come up just fine (when I swap around the damaged board but I need to get that one repaired and would very much enjoy having the newest hardware on all three! Anyone willing to do this? Curt says he is currently swamped or he would. He was going to do it last year but my cancer came back and other things took priority. <sigh> Now, I'm ready to work on my PJ again, yay.

Thanks,
David
Huntsville, Alabama

[gjaky]

If you have serious plans with 1080P I would recommend to forget those old boards... The Thomson tubed E'homes were the very early release, they lack from any improvement...
Two years ago I had the chance to refurbish a (late model) marquee 9000 and an (early model) 8110 at the same time. The neck boards in the 9000 had the old metal can type transistors, the 8110 had the newer plastic ones. I did all the capacitor and resistor upgrades for both types and the newer board was notieceably sharper at 1080P, for 720P or 1080I I don't know maybe it would be very subtle, but again this was a late model 9000 neckboard with factory mods as well. Get the new type boards and ask someone to rewire them to Thomson pin-out.

[skypuppy]

Works for me! Will the neck boards in an 8500 work with the 9 inch tubes if there pinouts are changed? That is my plan for the 9 inch tubes,to use the 8500 chassis which I recently acquired. Is changing the pinouts something I could do? thanks for the idea!

[gjaky]

The 180DMB22 tubes have the same pinout as the P19LCP09s, so it differs from your Thomson pinout tubes, you said you have wiring diagrams for it, so if you share with us we can find out what is needed to be rewired, if you post where are you located someone might chimne in from your neighborhood who can do the job for you.

[skypuppy]

Huntsville, Alabama. I don't know what 180DMB22 tubes are.

pinouts:

1 -- F -- F
2 -- BL -- G1
3 -- BL -- G1
4 -- BL -- BL
5 -- G2 -- BL
6 -- BL -- BL
7 -- BL -- G2
8 -- BL -- BL
9 -- GRD -- BL
10 -- BL -- G1
11 -- G1 -- G2
12 -- BL -- BL
13 -- K -- K
14 -- F -- F
15 -- F -- F

and the notes say:
Jump 7-to-5
clip 7, 9, 11, 2, 3

Does this make sense to anyone?

[gjaky]

I think your new tubes don't have the thomson pinout, what you posted is a guide to convert a thomson neckboard for your new tube (the first column is the original thomson tube pinout, the second is your new tube's pinout)

I modded the table corresponding to the 8500's neckboard pinout
pin -- 8500 -- new tubes
1 -- BL -- F
2 -- G2 -- G1
3 -- BL -- G1
4 -- BL -- BL
5 -- G1 -- BL
6 -- BL -- BL
7 -- BL -- G2
8 -- K -- BL
9 -- F -- BL
10 -- F -- G1
11 -- G1 -- G2
12 -- G1 -- BL
13 -- BL -- K
14 -- BL -- F
15 -- BL -- F

where BL stands for blank, F for Filament (aka. heater), K for Cathode, G1 for first grid, G2 for second grid.
Unfortunately this mod need to completely rewire the 8500's neckboard, but for a trained service personel it 's not a problem

[skypuppy]

EXTREMELY cool!

Can people tell which is which in the tubes that Charley made by looking at them? I know there are a couple long things that indicate what is what... (Sorry, obviously my knowledge domain lies elsewhere.)

Thank you, thank you!
David

[gjaky]

Yes, a trained eye can decide which pin goes where.
Ok, let's start over, I was thoughtless, you state in your thread starting post that the tubes coming up well with the thomson neck boards (except the one which has issues) so they actualy throw a nice image? -I mean not a full white window or something like that.

[skypuppy]

In the old 9000 chassis, with the original neck boards and the new tubes from VDC (Charley), all three tubes came up with a display, with white display and with tv picture. Sometime between now and then, one of the neck boards developed a physical problem, an obvious blown resistor and a shop said one of the transistors on that board was dead. At the same time, due to *everyone* saying I should not use the old 9000 chassis, I obtained an 8500, planning to put the brand new 9 inch tubes into the 8500 chassis. I also want to get all the boards (eventually) upgraded to be the best signal handling we can get -- but that has to be over time due to the high costs of everything. Right now, the 8500 shows a picture just fine but I want the 9 inch tubes to work, for the better picture and resolution. So, as far as I can tell, I still need:
1. get my neck boards repaired and upgraded to fit the new tubes, or get the 8500 neck boards upgraded assuming they will physically fit the 9 inch tubes.
2. take the necessary hardware from the 9000 and put it into the 8500 to accommodate the 9 inch tubes, which should not be all that difficult, just tedious.
3. Fiddle with the yokes until they are positioned the best I can get them.
3a. Over time, get all the relevant boards all upgraded.
4. Do the 100 hour burn-in with pure white screen at medium intensity (is this still thought to be a good idea?)
5. Calibrate the 8500 with the new 9 inch tubes for optimum picture.
6. FINALLY, enjoy the best moving pictures I can get!

Charley said these new tubes will give me the equivalent of a 9500LC something or other, in the 8500 or 9500 chassis as these are not rebuilt but new tubes, just pinouts changed to fit the old neck boards.

Am I missing something? Hopefully not something too expensive or important.

[Phoenixed]

David -

Have your boards been modded or upgraded ? If they haven't I HIGHLY recommend you pm Dragan on here and get his upgrades. It will make a huge difference in your 8500. Plus if you DO decide to go the 9 inch route your machine will already be hotrodded.

[gjaky]

What type are these tubes actually? Because the original thomson tubes not just differed in pinout from the later Panasonic tubes, but they required a (special) 40kV HVPS, but the modern tubes needed only 34.9kV, so if you still have the older type power supply in your 9000 chassis then your new tubes are greatly endangered.
As for the neckboard conversion: the 8500 neck board should fit physically to the new tubes, they just needed to be rewired according to the pictures (and not the tables)

[skypuppy]

These are the newer tubes. My old 9000 has the 40kv hvps but the 8500 has the 34. The tubes worked ok with 40kv, though. Charley wasn't sure if they would but he tried and they worked. I still want to put them into the 8500, though, because of all the other improvements. Receipt says they are P19LCP09xxx, if that helps.

[gjaky]

[skypuppy]

Maybe shipping won't be that bad. Can't weigh more than a couple pounds.

[skypuppy]

Also, shouldn't I be able to simply install the 9000 (Thompson) neck boards, once repaired and improved, into the 8500? That way, no pinouts would need to be changed.

[Phoenixed]

Its not the weight that's an issue, its that gjaky is based out of Hungary which means high dollars to ship stuff to and back.

[gjaky]

[skypuppy]

Now 1080i as a maximum defeats the whole purpose.

[Phoenixed]

I would ask Curt for some or Tim from Phoenix first. Curt is our gracious host after all. If none of those pan out I have a set of MP modded neck cards from my 9500 part out. They're not as cheap though.

[gjaky]