My very first mechanical TV

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My very first mechanical TV

Postby aussie_bloke » Tue May 01, 2012 2:10 am

G'day all.

I'm an enthusiast/collector of vintage TVs, video machines and video cameras and have just started getting into the art of mechanical television and have built my very first mechanical televisor. Being a beginner at the art I looked for the simplest mechanical televisor design possible with easy to get components and found the perfect easy to build televisor on this webpage http://g8cye.fortunecity.com/html/nbtv.html .

So I round up the parts in my workshop and constructed my televisor according to that design, with some modifications such as using a bank of 6 orange LEDs instead of 2 and a bit more powerful DC motor running from 9V instead of 4.5V. The Nipkow disc I simply printed out on cardboard paper and sandwiched it between 2 smaller plastic discs cut from container lids for better rigidity near the motor.

After some testing and modification, I got the televisor to work and display recognisable pictures when in sync but synchronisation is bad as I have to keep adjusting the motor speed but that comes with this simple design as mentioned on the page. Amazingly too the pictures are not too bad despite the flimsy cardboard paper Nipkow disc being warped and wonky.

I of course used the Video2NBTV software from this site http://users.tpg.com.au/users/gmillard/nbtv/nbtv.htm to convert videos and pictures to mechanical standard which I settled on NBTVA setting and I converted the WAV files to MP3 for the convenience of plugging my MP3 player into the video input of the TV, the LED circuit.

Anyways there you have it, a slap together grass roots simple mechanical televisor made from common easy to get parts. I have uploaded some pics of my set and some photo snaps of the pictures from the screen. I also have uploaded to my YouTube channel http://www.youtube.com/user/troysvisualarts a 15 part video series of the construction, testing and operation of my mechanical televisor, part 1 can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LY6BiRuDmpo .
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aussie_bloke
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Postby Steve Anderson » Tue May 01, 2012 12:09 pm

Hello 'Aussie Bloke'...

Welcome, you join several other Antipodeans here.

Excellent work, we'll be seeing more in the future hopefully.

Just a hint, not a criticism, if you wish your pictures (jpg, gif, whatever) to show in-line within your posting, use an image processor to reduce the width to 750 pixels or less, there doesn't appear to be a limit on height though. Don't ask me why, it's just the way the BBS software works. The usual like Photoshop etc are fine. But for simple re-sizing the free downloadable Irfanview (Google it) is perfect.

Again, welcome,

Steve A.
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Re: My very first mechanical TV

Postby Harry Dalek » Tue May 01, 2012 5:08 pm

Hi Troy

Good to see another Aussie into this Hobby must be at least a hand full of us now but we all sticking the the east coast .
I will check out your video construction on you tube///
funny we are using the same circuit for the led video driver...but i am using a luxeon and and a Lm317 to adjust the voltage to it ...i would use the club circuit as it gives a better adjustment of the video than this does ..but i have run out of ic's at the moment/
Steves hint on the picture program its good and small i also use photoscape
which is free. its a muchness but i think every one likes to just see than download .
Very good work Troy /
The electromagnetic spectrum has no theoretical limit at either end. If all the mass/energy in the Universe is considered a 'limit', then that would be the only real theoretical limit to the maximum frequency attainable.
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Postby Metallica Man X » Thu May 03, 2012 6:54 pm

Good stuff! Maybe someday I should post up pics of my pile of crap televisor XD
I mostly lurk..don't be surprised when I actually post!
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Postby aussie_bloke » Fri May 04, 2012 1:07 am

Thanks everyone for the great comments on my very first televisor. I'm amazed how well it turned out, now I have thoughts on building a larger precision 60 line televisor with auto motor synchronisation for stable picture.

Steve, thanks for pointing that out with the pics, I kind of think I went a bit overkill with picture size as well as file size so I will reduce horizontal resolution 750 pixels as you suggested, I do most of my image processing in classic Corel Photopaint 9.

Harry, great to see more Aussies building mechanical televisors too, I have found your YouTube channel and watched all your videos on your mirror drum televisor and Holtzman drum monitor and other experiments and I totally enjoyed them, excellent work! I recognized your name from somewhere and realize you post in the Videokarma forums sometimes. How many Aussies do you know of that are building mechanical TVs? I know so far yourself, Chris Long and Daniel Gosson.

Anyways going a bit off topic thought I was meaning to mention my website featuring my collection of old video gear when I first post but my site was down, but now that it's back up here's my website http://troysvintagevideo.0catch.com/ . As mentioned I'm an enthusiast of old television related equipment and have quite a collection of vintage cameras, TVs and pre-VHS videotape recorders and most of my gear is on my site for those interested in checking it out. I also feature some of my other projects on there, one most notable project is my homemade vidicon tube B&W video camera based off a 1970s circuit design http://troysvintagevideo.0catch.com/mycamera.html , it works too!:D I will of course be featuring my mechanical televisor on my site next time I update it.

Lastly I am going to soon upload to YouTube some videos of my televisor screen filmed on a couple of my old trinicon/saticon tube cameras, old tube cameras are to my opinion the better choice of camera to film a mechanical TV screen opposed to modern CCD cameras as there's no picture breakup due to after image persistence so the filmed mechanical picture looks the same as our eyes see it. Only downside though is they are not too sensitive in low light and so pictures are dull.
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Postby Harry Dalek » Fri May 04, 2012 2:35 pm

aussie_bloke wrote:Thanks everyone for the great comments on my very first televisor. I'm amazed how well it turned out, now I have thoughts on building a larger precision 60 line televisor with auto motor synchronisation for stable picture.

Harry, great to see more Aussies building mechanical televisors too, I have found your YouTube channel and watched all your videos on your mirror drum televisor and Holtzman drum monitor and other experiments and I totally enjoyed them, excellent work! I recognized your name from somewhere and realize you post in the Videokarma forums sometimes. How many Aussies do you know of that are building mechanical TVs? I know so far yourself, Chris Long and Daniel Gosson.





Hi troy

Lots of ways to go on the 60 liner just getting there last time badly i did learn you need every thing pretty balanced vibration free or best you can do ...it would be best to try for 48 line work your way up ,if you do a 2 drum 2 disk monitor it can be a multi system monitor ,either way you need a lot of motor speed !

Yes View Holtzmans posts,and you may pick up on my posts copying he's
monitor.

Its very enjoyable trying troy its one good hobby here ,yes i have been about on the net but like this forum best so don't bother with the others anymore .

Theres also Marcus and Gary and Andrew are you still out there Andrew have not heard from you for a while ...Steve used you live here so he's an honorary Aussie
:wink:
The electromagnetic spectrum has no theoretical limit at either end. If all the mass/energy in the Universe is considered a 'limit', then that would be the only real theoretical limit to the maximum frequency attainable.
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Postby gary » Sat May 05, 2012 2:20 pm

BTW that "easy to build televisor webpage" seems to no longer exist...
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Postby aussie_bloke » Sat May 05, 2012 2:33 pm

gary wrote:BTW that "easy to build televisor webpage" seems to no longer exist...


Yeah noticed that a few days ago, just as well I came across it while it was still there!
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Postby aussie_bloke » Sun May 20, 2012 2:29 am

G'day all. I have just uploaded 57 minute telerecording of this televisor in operation using two of my vintage tube cameras, a 1984 National WVP-100N saticon tube colour camera and a 1980 Sony HVC-3000P trinicon tube colour camera. Filming with tube cameras pretty much eliminates image breakup from different refresh rates due to after image persistence of image tube cameras. Anyhow the video can be viewed here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nxZW2tRYXE . The only major drawback with those cameras is poor low light sensitivity so I had to really jack the brightness, contrast and gain of the picture up sky high which of course amplified the noise level. Anyhow you'll see this set in action with its poor synchronisation and barely recognizable pictures, enjoy!;)
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Postby Andrew Davie » Sat Jun 02, 2012 10:26 pm

harry dalek wrote:...and Andrew are you still out there Andrew have not heard from you for a while


I pop in from time to time!
Cheers
A
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Postby Harry Dalek » Sun Jun 03, 2012 1:12 am

Andrew Davie wrote:
harry dalek wrote:...and Andrew are you still out there Andrew have not heard from you for a while


I pop in from time to time!
Cheers
A



No worries Andrew good to see another Aussie back :wink:
The electromagnetic spectrum has no theoretical limit at either end. If all the mass/energy in the Universe is considered a 'limit', then that would be the only real theoretical limit to the maximum frequency attainable.
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My site

Postby Steve G8CYE » Sat Dec 29, 2012 11:04 pm

Sadly my site referred to in the original post is no more. The host got bought out and I didn't know and now I can't re-activate it for technical reasons. Also most of my gear is in storage pending a move to Portugal.

Funnily enough, we were discussing "ancient" technology at work the other day, and someone pulled up your videos on Yotube! They've asked me to make another monitor as a teaching aid, hence me re-joining the forum. I'm using similar ideas to my original, but with a couple of minor mods.
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Postby Phil Hunter » Sat Dec 29, 2012 11:58 pm

Hi
Congratulations on your completed Televisor

Regards

Phil
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Re: My site

Postby aussie_bloke » Thu Jan 03, 2013 11:33 am

Steve G8CYE wrote:Sadly my site referred to in the original post is no more. The host got bought out and I didn't know and now I can't re-activate it for technical reasons. Also most of my gear is in storage pending a move to Portugal.

Funnily enough, we were discussing "ancient" technology at work the other day, and someone pulled up your videos on Yotube! They've asked me to make another monitor as a teaching aid, hence me re-joining the forum. I'm using similar ideas to my original, but with a couple of minor mods.


G'day Steve. Thanks for your comment on my YouTube video and glad to see you in the forums, as mentioned your simple televisor is what got me into NBTV in the first place and those circuits have been great for all my televisors! :D

Anyways in regards of your site, I've got some good news, I have managed to download your NBTV televisor page when it was still up and here it is for you in a zip file :)
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aussie_bloke
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simple mechanical

Postby Steve G8CYE » Fri Jan 04, 2013 4:48 am

Much appreciated Aussie-bloke. Hopefully I will get it reloaded to a new site soon. I've actually been playing with the same idea again, and could I get it to work? I tried three different motors, and finally the one that got closest was the type used in the MUTR televisor. I'm now working on adding sync.

Sadly I never got to Oz when I was in the southern hemisphere, only managed Christchurch NZ about 10 years ago, even got close to marrying a Kiwi, her friends kept calling me a Whingeing Pom.
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