Red tent monitor

[smonroe]

Scott here from today's video reader mail. Here's the whole story with details of the situation.

The monitor was flakey. Troxel took it out of the tent and back to his place to do a cap kit and replaced something else. The monitor had been fine since. 2 weeks ago I was playing that side of the cab and the game reset itself but had no monitor issues short of an occasional jump or color shift. When I started it up last weekend, I instantly got a whir sound and the click click click sound. The game played blind. The other side still plays fine. I could see the graphics thru the tornado.

That being said... I turned it on a few days later to see if a could get a better idea of what was going on. After letting the game play blind for about 2 minutes, the monitor went down, along with the sound. So the game no longer boots, but the other side is fine. It does coin up.

I suspect I blew a fuse, which leads me to thinking it's the flyback. I was told by PinballDan (who I bought it from) that replacing the caps can overload the flyback and create this issue. And John mentioned the click sound being a bad flyback. I didn't see any arcing but that doesn't mean I know what it wasn't. Some klov users swear it's the yoke and got into a flame war about it. Ugh.

My knowledge of monitors is limited. I don't want to scrap the monitor but I will need some help in diagnosis and repair.

Thanks to all for the help.

[John's Arcade]

Yeah, don't scrap the monitor. There is hope.

My Red Tent monitor was freaking out and I was also told it was a Yoke issue. Turned out it was a cold solder joint somewhere. I reflowed the solder everywhere and it fixed my issue. I don't really remember what it was doing but it was an odd issue maybe similar to yours. I truly have forgotten.

If you turns the light out and watch the flyback, do you see it arcing?

Have you checked the B+? I don't think this is the issue but it's worth checking.

The sound amp is on the monitor. Sounds like you did blow a fuse. In my experience, blown fuses on these monitors is HOT and Flyback. I know it's a shot in the dark... but maybe replace both and the fuses? Couldn't hurt but I don't know if it's gonna fix your issue.

[smonroe]

Thanks John. Here's hoping?

[smonroe]

Just an update.... In line at arcadeup. Hopefully we will have some answers in a few more weeks.

[smonroe]

For those curious, here's what Chad said was wrong...

*bad b+ control / not stable.  - bad ic's
*missing colors - bad transitors
*no brightness control  - bad transistors

Looking forward to getting back in the machine.

[smonroe]

Got it back. Connected back to the tube and plugged it in. Music started up but no power to the tube. Any ideas?

[smonroe]

Thinking the tube might be bad. Anyone know if I can test the Sharp xm801 board on a Sanyo 20ez tube? Wasn't sure if they are compatible.

[iankellogg]

I doubt the tube is dead. It takes quite a bit to kill a tube. I'm curious as to why it was only those 3 things that were bad. It almost sounds like the flyback went which could do some damage. I trust chad though.

Try to swap the PCB to the other tube and see how it goes.

I can't comment on if the tubes are compatible with 20ez.

[smonroe]

They are compatible and I actually have a Sanyo 19 cocktail from a popeye. The laundry list was long but those were the highlights. Planning on trying another pcb on the tube before giving up hope.