CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

[pittsburghpj]

I've been wanting to get into the CRT PJ hobby for quite some time now, but with a limited budget and bad luck in finding a CRT projector locally I have been just lurking the forums anonymously and reading up on what i can.

Finally last week I found a sony 1030q1 on craigslists for 50 bucks. It was owned by a college student who bought it off craigslist 2 years ago and never hooked it up. I fired it up at his place and all 3 tubes light up. So i bought it. I know its old and cannot do anything beyond 480i but i figured it would be a good entry CRT and if i fry it then no big loss just 50 bucks.

The unit fired up no problem once i got it home. Well, there was one problem, the image was upside down. I found the service manual and was able to flip the polarity and now am projecting a upright image.

Now come the questions.

1. I read through all the service manuals and they indicate i need to rotate the spacer rings around the lenses and change out spacers behind the tubes to project anything wider then a 72" screen. I wanted to project onto a blackout cloth screen I made that is 16x9 75"x42". To get a proper convergence I am guessing I would have to rotate the spacer rings and change to 100" spacers, but i do not have them. Does anyone know the approximate size of the spacers, if so could i just replicate them by using washers on the bolts behind the CRT tubes?

2. When i took off the lens assembly to my surprise all 3 tubes have no visible wear that i can see. However at the top of all 3 tubes there is an air bubble. I presume this is where the Liquid coolant is but is it bad that there is an air bubble, does this mean i am low on fluid?

3. I know Curt's site says this unit will only do 480i but the 1030q1 manual states the horizontal frequency is 15 to 32khz and vertical is 50hz to 100hz. It also states it has a "Graphic dot capacity of 1024 X 500 dots". Unless i misunderstand something this means i should be able to project 480P off a RGB input. Is that correct?

[Curt Palme]

Apparently that idiot Curt's site is wrong. You're right, it will do 480p via a line doubler.

You shouldn't need t worry about the spacers, the L-R shift controls for each color should have enough range to converge the set properly.

An air bubble is fine in each tube, that's normal.

[Curt Palme]

Apparently that idiot Curt's site is wrong. You're right, it will do 480p via a line doubler.

You shouldn't need t worry about the spacers, the L-R shift controls for each color should have enough range to converge the set properly.

An air bubble is fine in each tube, that's normal.