After battling for the past month or so with not one but three awkward colour Thorn chassis sets, namely the 8500, 9905 and the 9000, I decided to hoist something simple up on the bench and see if a quick repair could be achieved.
I took a fancy to this 1973 GEC 2114 "Junior Fineline" and thought what better than this to have a go at. The 2114 I believe was GEC's all transistor successor to their popular valved Crystal 13, the 2015. Its quite unusual as the ones I've seen elsewhere invariably have all white surrounds, whereas this one has a black facia around the CRT.
So without further ado up on the bench to introduce power. No nasty flashes, bangs or the magic smoke, the screen however remained blank. After tuning around I could hear the test tone but nothing visible on screen at all. With the blinds closed and lights out, a very dim raster could be seen. Adjusting the brightness made no difference but the contrast adjusted to max made it a bit easier to see and tune to the test card. With the camera set to max exposure I managed to take a photo (see below) which makes it look a lot brighter than it actually was.
Opening up revealed a rather nice little chassis which once extended gives really good service access. My first thoughts were to have a gander around the brightness circuit and see if anything was high or leaky. Once the chassis was flipped over it was quite apparent what the potential cause of the fault might be, that being dry joints galore. The whole underside was terrible, I decided before I delve in too deeply trying to diagnose a fault I would run the iron over every joint then take it from there.
Once this tedious task was complete I powered on again and was rewarded with a nice bright raster. A little adjustment of height, picture centring and linearity gave a reasonable test card.
So there we have it a five min repair ( well more like 30 mins ) the geometry still needs a little tweak and I've not checked the 11-volt preset for the correct width but it can't be very far off, well that's for another day. Still its a big improvement on where it was earlier.
Edit: I've got the R&TS servicing data and ERT data, also LLJ service info which is free-to-view for non members here:-
https://www.radios-tv.co.uk/servicing-the-black-white-sets/
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Definitely check that 11 volt supply. I think the CRT heater is fed directly from it....unless I'm getting mixed up with another set.
Hi Rich you are correct I believe its the same set up as the Philips 11TG190AT. That also used an AD149 for 11volt stabilisation, so yes If the supply had been a fair bit higher than 11V, or the transistor had failed O/C the set and CRT heater would have blown.
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Well done Chris, the set looks quite cute in it's own way
Now once again after all your hard work blood sweat and tears you've earned a break...
5 mins and a cuppa should just about cover this one !
Marc.
Marc
BVWS member
RSGB call sign 2E0VTN
Indeed it was a nice little diversion and a lull in my colour battles, as in a little under 10 days time my G6 arrives.
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I've seen a few Fine lines on eBay over the last year or two, and quite fancy the idea of getting one at some point.. Nice little "fettle up" for you there, and way too simple after all that Thorn complexity.
Chris. Your a brave man tackling a G6 . They were complex for the time
Mind you a good G6 is good.Good luck.
Now then... A G6, lovely!
I can remember being given the run around by a several G6s, and if they're determined not to play ball, they won't. The ones my granddad had were mostly ex rentals and done the mileage, but some were very good and once fettled up, gave excellent results. One of the biggest issues was the self detatching wires that would just "ping" off the panels at the drop of hat, or should that be cat!? There's a tale, or should that be tail!? about that.
Hardened plastic insulation, brittle copper wiring with metal fatigue from the chassis being lowered and raised more times than a department store lift. Unfortunately, you can't really "harness" the wiring because that would cause all sorts of interesting effects through mutual interference of different signals on different wires. Consequently, there were multitudes of single wires soldered to pads all over the panels and running down to the chassis. Lower the chassis, raise the chassis, and "ping" there goes another one - and do you know? You can spend hours looking for the place where some of them belong. But I digress.
Nice little set, that GEC, and bit of a sanity restorer.....
Marion
Hi Chris,
I remember the Junior Fineline 2114 well. I sold a lot of them in 1973/4 A very popular set with my customers, they liked the rather unique styling. Not too many problems with the set, in fact I had more trouble with the Ferguson and Marconi 3816 and 4616, the sets with 1590 series chassis. What saved the day was the availability of the then new 1N5401 3 amp diode for the power supplies. Early production sets used the BY126. You'd be surprised at the limited number of special semiconductor devices available for portable TVs in those times.
I do remember one modification that had to be done to the 2114. The coupling capacitor between the video amplifier and the base of the sync separator had to changed in value.If my memory serves me well it was initially 0.1mfd and it was suggested that it should be replaced with a 1 microfarad component.
Till Eulenspiegel.
