Tek 7603 Scope restorationBeen working on the thing here and there. There is good and bad.
1) Display randomly deciding to move up and down : recapping the Vertical amp board did nothing. Next candidate : the two wires / pins for the deflection plates, that plug into the CRT glass. Those pins were extremely loose. Simply the "springiness" of the short piece of PVC insulated wire that was connecting them to the amp board, would be constantly on the verge of pulling the pins out of the CRT, at least partially.
So I "worked" those pins a bit to get a tighter fit... but sadly that fixed nothing. Trouble now being that the only way I can see for this kind of random and wild abrupt vertical movements would be ... if the bad contact i snot in the pins... then it's probably a spot weld inside the CRT itself. Given the huge hit this scope suffered during shipping, it's all too plausible. Which means this scope is doomed... the problem will never go away and can only get worse and worse and one day hell, the welds might give up the ghost completely and the scope will be in the darkness forever.
-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=1723742;image)
2) Mixed sweep would not engage on one of my two horizontal plugins. I noticed earlier that the little red CAL knob supposed to engage mixed sweep, would not come out nearly as much as it should. So I was hoping for a simple / quick to diagnose mechanical issue rather an electrical issue. I got lucky, obvious mechanical issue it was indeed : THe metal frame of the switch is held in place with little tabs bent 90° under the switch... typical construction. Well the tabs worked their way out and the switch is not holding together anymore, and it's jammed. I managed to force it back together again. It's still extremely but at least it's not jammed anymore and can now work. I tested the plugin, works perfectly. I would need to desolder the switch to work on it properly and bend the 4 tabs properly under the switch... but getting to the solder side of the PCB looks like quite an endeavour so not sure I will bother

-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=1723760;image)
3) One of the 3 light bulbs that illuminate the CRT graticule... is blown. Trouble is : it's not readily available and the "best" deal I could find wa sa pack of 5 from the UK for 50 Euros + 13 Euros shipping + VAT + Customs tax shit = No thank you.
https://www.ebay.fr/itm/2546456398494) The RF shield on the mainframe, by the left most plugin location, is mangled. Great.
-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=1723766;image)
5) CRT bezel : there is a 3 pin electrical connector on the left edge, to power the Tek film camera. Other than begin heavily yellowed... its plastic is very.. very brittle and is shattering like glass. I don't intend to ever use a vintage camera on my scopes so I just got rid of that connector altogether. Looks much nicer/cleaner. I think there exists a "plug" / place holder.
-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=1723772;image)
Other than that, I finally cleaned the front panel, much nicer to interact with, no need for gloves any more.
The ivory buttons need retrobrigthing but I am not risking these for now... want to experiment first on donour buttons. Need to find some cheap Tek TE in a sad state that I could steal the buttons from and "train" on.
I noticed that my vertical plugins are not equal... cosmetics-wise. One one of them the inpu coupling switch is nice and black, as are the CAL "pop-up" knobs. However on the other plugins these knobs look like they suffered heavy sun damage, they are heavily discouloured. Black turned in light grey....
-group-therapy-thread/?action=dlattach;attach=1723778;image)
So I guess that's the end of the road for ths scope. I am already 120 Euros into it, time to stop. Can't justify throwing another 100 at tit to resolve the minor remaining issues especially since it's now probable the CRT is damaged.
I will do the retrobrighting as that's cheap and make using the scope that much more pleasurable. But 70+ Euros to replace a light bulb no, not gonna happen. RF shield, unless someone has one for free laying around, I can't justify paying XXX Euros for that one little piece.
So I guess it's time to move on to the next piece of TE....