CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

zGman · Joined: 22 May 2006 Posts: 599

Hi Kris,

Here is a closeup pic of the results of a beam collapse on a G90, (actually
multiple collapses, since it happened several times during testing.)

I have three tubes (RGB) with this type of damage, and plenty of pics -
if you need them just PM...

I think it should be obvious that there is nothing subtle about it.
If your g90 was having a problem, all your tubes would be burnt -
just like this - all together at once - end of story.

Your experience will certainly influence any future consideration
of doing business with this company, for myself and many other
CRT enthusiasts. I find it very unsettling that they have been
unwilling to continue to work toward an equitable solution.

G

jkruger · Joined: 24 Oct 2007 Posts: 2435 Location: Carlsbad, CA

I think we need to get them to look at this thread.

KrisRoberts · Joined: 21 Jan 2007 Posts: 115 Location: San Diego

I think I will proceed with the suggestion of sending the tube to VDC for a second opinion.

In the mean time I have opened a dispute with PayPal, since the transaction actually happened in September it seems prudent to start that process immediately. Here's the message I presented:

huggy · Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 11:27 am Post subject:

Sorry to hear about your misfortunes Sad

I am in need of a green p19 lug and was going to ask the question about "tubular outlet" I don't see any need now,this thread,although bringing grief to one,has served as a deterent for me and I think many others aswell,this is terrible bussiness practice Thumbs Down

Wish you all the best mate,and hope you can at least get a refund.

Dave

dochlywd · Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 2:45 pm Post subject:

I'll have to agree with huggy. No way I'd ever risk a grand with these guys! Too risky!

Doc

**Curt Palme** · Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 3:16 pm Post subject:

Just for everyone's information, I just got a call from Tubular. Effective immediately, they will no longer be selling tubes to the consumers such as ourselves. Now our only source will be VDC... at $1650 per tube.

As they said, the consumer sales to people like us are well under 1% of their total sales, but with 100% of the bad press. (I paraphrase).

I personally didn't have an issue with their service, in fact with the last tube, they sent me a warranty replacement ahead of time, before getting their defective one back, so that was plenty good for me.

The naysayers will undoubtedly say 'good riddance', but for guys like me, having a place to get tubes from at almost 50% of the VDC price was a nice option. No more I'm afraid, folks.

CRT_Ben · Joined: 28 Aug 2006 Posts: 1684 Location: Northern Virginia

Well I'm sorry to hear that for your sake - I won't say good riddance, as it's always good to have options, especially with things as rare as tubes. However, 50% success rates on $1,000 items is not a good business model, whether they provide warranty replacements or not...and when they don't, well, it's just a bad bet.

KrisRoberts · Joined: 21 Jan 2007 Posts: 115 Location: San Diego

Resolution.

I just spoke with Martin, one of the owners of Tubular. The plan is to send the tube back to Terry to have the mounting hardware removed and return it to Tubular. When they get it back they will refund my money.

Curt - I'm sorry if this has a negative impact on your business, that was never my intent. If they sent you a tube that showed the same thing and responded to you in the same manner that they did to me, I expect your course of action would have been similar and the end result would have probably been the same.

**Curt Palme** · Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 4:23 pm Post subject:

Nope, no offense taken, just passing on information...for when people bitch that 9" sets can't be had for $1.50.. Very Happy

caligraphic · Joined: 31 Oct 2008 Posts: 5

This is one of the owners of the company in question.

For the record the CRT referred to below exhibits two very distinct phosphor burn patterns that were not on the CRT when it left this facility. I fail to see how any company can survive by offering drastically reduced pricing, excellent support and yet still be expected to cover other peoples failures.

You buy a CRT from any other company and burn it, see if they will replace under warranty.

When we started this service some months ago we lived through a great deal of negative publicity from the home theatre community in that we 'must be too good to be true'. We kept our head down and tried to offer a service that would be appreciated and would eventually provide some positive feedback for us. this has not happened until l2 hours ago when i pulled the plug. I think we miss read the market and the community.

Some people appear to be content to hang companies and individuals with little or no evidence and I have little time to have my company and reputation trashed when there appears no need requirement to provide substantiation or evidence for these accusations.

When the CRT is returned to me I will refund the money and will have it evaluated and will advise Curte of the results who may or may not decide to post the results for you all. You will all find that someone within your community has burnt a CRT and blamed the vendor. This has resulted in the vendor deciding to take his efforts elsewhere.

I am sure VDC will be relieved.

I apologize for wasting your time.

regards

p.s.

for the record no one out there makes Panasonic CRT's anymore. Only Panasonic can make a Panasonic CRT and they have sold their manufacturing facility to mikado. As such they make a 'Panasonic compatible CRT' as does VDC who also make a 'Panasonic Compatible CRT'. The comments regarding the delivery of a particular type of CRT are erroneous. We have a considerable stock of Panasonic CRT's along with Mikado CRT's. They are the same item with different labels but have the same part number and the same performance and are made on the same machines by the same staff who made CRT's at Panasonic. There has been no deception on our part in trying to pass off one type of CRT for another. if this is the impression then I apologize, but if so then no one is making Panasonic CRT's anymore yet there is still a number of them on shelves. we intended to update our website soon to show both pan and Mk CRT's and over the following months remove the reference to Pan.

Mr. Green

CRT_Ben · Joined: 28 Aug 2006 Posts: 1684 Location: Northern Virginia

Sorry that you feel you have been attacked with a torch and pitchfork mentality. However, if the Mikado CRT's are truly of equal quality, how do you explain the flip-a-coin success rate of two of the most trusted installers in the business - Curt and Terry? I have not heard of true Panasonics having such a dismal failure rate.

Tom.W · Joined: 09 Mar 2006 Posts: 6635

Well I for one hope you continue to offer CRT tubes to all of us here... I looked at the photo's posted and it appears to be a defect in the phosphor that would be hard to detect without projecting an image. Nice to see you posting here though !

Nashou66 · Joined: 12 Jan 2007 Posts: 16171 Location: West Seneca NY

Well VDC isnt the only Source I think Thomas electronics also makes CRTS for simulation and do custom work, I bet the price is high but it is an option.
And they also refurbish CRT's as well like VDC.

http://www.thomaselectronics.com/simulation/projection_crt_overview.php

The Tubes that Ben uses and The ones I am testing are made by Thomas.

Athanasios

caligraphic · Joined: 31 Oct 2008 Posts: 5

hi Ben

don't wish to be rude, have a number of answers etc... but this is no longer my concern and not my market place anymore.

I have no wish to justify and rejustify what we do. We deliver over 1000 crt's per year and have done so for a number of years.

I do not need this kind of hassle. A number of people monitoring this forum know me and my associates very well and you will find nothing about us that does not portray honest and ethical behavior in everything we do and to be honest i am sick and tired of having people who do not know us throwing this kind of crap at us.

I tell all my staff (and my kids- i have 3) that in life you need to own your problems. if we screw up we fix it. some of the so called warranty issues are not warranty at all but we find it easier to fix the problem rather than the blame this type of service is now throw n back at us to reflect poor quality. I argue about one warranty and this happens! how do you win this!!!!!!

I am afraid that as is often the case in life the most vocal individuals are the ones who sho0uld really keep quiet and the ones whose opinion is valued remain quiet. Curte has dealt with us and been very happy , but only said so when i said screw this, go figure!

it seems disappointing to me that we finally recieve a positive feedback about our support and service AFTER we throw our hands up and walk away.

This I feel says something about your community than it does about us. I am sorry for the many good customers out there, but i have a business to run.

good luck, signing off and not responding to anymore of this. We have retired!

Tom.W · Joined: 09 Mar 2006 Posts: 6635

Sorry to hear that.

David_Web · Joined: 02 May 2007 Posts: 418 Location: Sweden

"You buy a CRT from any other company and burn it, see if they will replace under warranty."

How is that relevant when the tube in question here was clearly not burned as stated by many reputable CRT gurus?
Or at least no one can figure out how it can be burned in such a way that it would make those spots.

Although we can only judge by what we see, and thus far no representable pictures have been shown with enough detail to make an clear judgment of how it behaves in different conditions. Such as showing the clear tube etc.

I'm sorry to hear that you no longer will offer your services to individuals.
I'm sure Tubular will still be selling to people like Curt as he can be trusted.

btw the similar spot i mentioned earlier appears to be a microscopic bubble just about visible to the naked eye if you look for it. It sill looks like the pictures posted on screen though.

CRT_Ben · Joined: 28 Aug 2006 Posts: 1684 Location: Northern Virginia

I would like to reply but as you're leaving I won't beat a dead horse. Best of luck in your business.

kschmit2 · Posted: Fri Oct 31, 2008 8:29 pm Post subject:

Caligraphic:

The type of phosphor impurity or uneven coating as seen on KrisRoberts's tube is not always visible upon QC after production.
In some cases it materializes within the factory burn-in period of 100 hours, but unfortunately about 10 percent of affected tubes will only show the visible defect after about 200-250 hours of regular (i.e. 100 percent within specs) use.

caligraphic · Joined: 31 Oct 2008 Posts: 5

despite my earlier spot i feel the need to reply as you seem to have evaluated this CRT in order to be so specific in you evaluation.

There are two distinct BURN patterns. i am very aware of the type of coating issue you refer to.

The two image issues on the crt in question is a distinct burn with phoshor hole down to glass and at a vector from this burn is a partial burn. On another section of the crt approx 3 inches away from initial burn is another burn and at EXACTLY the same vector from this burn is a very very similar partial burn. now forgive me for being a little ciynical here, but it looks like a dog , it barks like a dog and by golly it is Burn.

But there are a number of email posts here from people that know a great deal more about this issue on this CRT than and feel the need to burn my company at the stake i yet i am the one looking at it on my desk.

now if the customer in question really did ship it all around the community and allow all of these experts to power it up and see it sufficient for them to make these comments i would suggest that maybe one of these experts burnt the CRT.

like i said i am little cynical right now.

i am sure you will all have more luck elsewhere. i know i do. i am prepared to stand behind my service and also behind the report on this crt that will prove my stance here. either way, we are not cut out as a company to deal with this. We will deal directly with the people who know us and apparently trust us and keep it that way.

David_Web · Joined: 02 May 2007 Posts: 418 Location: Sweden

So the pictures posted by the OP is not representative of the issue?

They show three dots but you mention two burns.
I can't see any vectors or trails ether. (not that the pictures posted is up to it anyways)

Are you talking about the same tube?

Terry said he did not see anything when looking at the tube. So I guess nothing was plainly visible at the time.
Is it plainly visible now?

I kind of scratching my head here.

Not that it was any of my business in the first place, I only said what I saw.
Now I'm not sure what's what.