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An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.automaticwasher.org/TV/tv-restoration.htm

Last February, while out on my usual estate sale Saturday runs, I stopped at a sale in the western Minneapolis suburb of Minnetonka. I usually go to between five and ten estate sales every Saturday looking for vintage automatic washers.

Down in the basement, hidden in the corner, was this beautiful 1951 RCA wood consol television set. Needless to say (although many have asked) it's a black and white set, color TV's were not introduced until 1954. The cabinet was in very nice shape and everything seemed intact with all of its original knobs. Since I had my camera with me, I was able to shoot a picture of the exact house and spot in the house I found it in.

One thing your[sic] not suppose[sic] to do to an old radio or TV that hasn't been run for many years is just go and plug the thing in and flip the power switch on. The best thing to do is use a device called a Variac which allows you to slowly bring up the power to a full 120 volts over the course of many hours, sometimes days. You start it out about 20 volts and every few hours up the control dial another 10 volts or so and watch for any adverse reactions (you know, adverse like smoke, fire, explosions, etc) until you reach a full 120 volts, just like normal house voltage.

But I noticed that this TV was already plugged in, so I assumed that someone else has already tried it out at the sale today, I decided to just let it rip. After warming up a minute the TV came alive with near perfect sound and a very blurry, rolling, out of sync picture. Well that's a good sign, at least the picture tube worked. I figured it would be a fun new learning experience; I always wanted to know how a TV set worked and now was my chance. I bought the set for $30 and schlepped it home.

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