Post by JoergSo you'd need a new house along with that TV. Oh man. What would have
happened if that wheel went out of balance?
Not much. Most of the original versions were intended for the 9"
round displays of the late 1940's. The wheel was located inside the
cabinet for safety reasons. There were "scanning adapters" that
converted B&W sets into color TV, which were external. The disk was
fairly light weight, which served to reduce damage, injuries, and
fatalities. The only big external wheel was the monster that RCA
dragged into the FCC hearing room to demonstrate how badly the CBS
system scaled.
Despite the obvious disadvantages of the CBS system, it has several
major advantages.
1. It was cheaper than any of the others.
2. It was using a known technology (Nipov scanner).
3. The pictures were absolutely gorgeous compared to the RCA "dot
sequential" system.
<http://novia.net/~ereitan/CBS_Chronology_rev_h_edit.htm>
(Who needs HDTV anyway?)
4. It can be used to "convert" a B&W TV into a color TV.
5. It can be resurrected from the dead today by using 2-5msec
persistence LCD screens.
CBS eventually gave up on color wheels and switched back to their
earlier "field sequential" system, but piggy backed on the RCA/NTSC
system in order to insure B&W set compatibility. Field sequential
also produced color better than RCA's dot sequential:
<http://www.earlytelevision.org/chromacoder.html>
Note the "scanning adapter".
<http://www.earlytelevision.org/cbs_color_system.html>
You might find the chronology of the CBS system and the FCC hearings
of interest. Nobody wanted the CBS system, but everything else was a
kludge:
<http://www.earlytelevision.org/color_tv_cooper.html>
Post by JoergAh, a "stench fax"? A stylus hovered over sensitive paper and arced away
stuff to write. After a few pages the air in the room became unbearable.
Who knows what was in that air.
Nope, although I did own WXFAX contrivance that used spark gap
imaging. If you do it right, you can set fire to the paper. It
worked best with a small spark gap and Thermofax paper. I don't
recall any smell other than the usual toxic ozone stench and vaporized
heavy metal smog. Somewhat earlier, I ran the college print shop. We
used a Gestetner stencil cutter for the mimeograph printer, which used
a spark gap to blast holes in the stencil. I'm not sure what they did
different, but there was very little smell, and no smoke.
The contrivance I helped resurrect was basically a rotating pen
plotter. I took a Koh-i-noor drafting pen, feed it with a reservoir
full of India Ink, and uses a solenoid to move the pen up and down.
The major challenge was to not spray ink all over the place, which was
partly solved by using the smallest 00 or 000 pen available.
Unfortunately, it would usually clog if left standing for more than a
few minutes. I think I was 16 years old at the time, so please don't
expect much in the way of engineering elegance.
Post by JoergHopefully that wasn't beryllium oxyde ...
It was. Lots of ceramic fragments flying around. Fortunately, the
power amp wasn't running long enough to get them hot. Still, I had a
few small cuts and piece of ceramic imbedded in my face. The
attendant crowd was debating whether to drag me to the local emergency
room, or to complete my execution in retaliation for destroying the
last remaining VMOS transistors. While they debated, I picked out the
pieces of ceramic with a tweezer, and fell asleep under my desk. Since
the employee handbook does not cover murdering sleeping employees, I
survived.
Post by JoergBut HV created that impressive bang when something went.
Bah. Real devastation can only be appreciated by the overwhelming
application of power, not voltage. Hot slag spewing from the shorting
bar. Melted copper and immolated components. Burning components,
circuit boards, and insulation. While admittedly, high voltage can
destroy a greater variety of devices and components, truly massive and
permanent devastation requires lots of watts.
Remember: Learn by Destroying, which means if you haven't destroyed
it, you don't understand it.
--
Jeff Liebermann ***@cruzio.com
150 Felker St #D http://www.LearnByDestroying.com
Santa Cruz CA 95060 http://802.11junk.com
Skype: JeffLiebermann AE6KS 831-336-2558