Samsung PCL545R Post Covergence Fix Problem

[welby]

First of all...Hello and thanks for all the wonderful information posted here. I am indebted to you all.

My issue...
I have had my Samsung PCL545R for some years now, and have had no issues with it until recently. A few weeks ago, the convergence was off, and the Blue refused to move. I was short on time, so I just ordered a replacement board from here:
http://www.partstore.com/Part/Samsun...1846D/New.aspx
I am perfectly capable of replacing the STK chips, but the price wasn't bad and saved me a lot of time.
I replaced the board, and now I am able to move the blue again. With the new board, my alignment was off, and from what I read, I needed to fix it via the service menu.

I found the repair manual online (I can email it or post it if anyone wants it, it was a pain to find for free.) and walked through the alignment procedure, and used some tips from online. I seem to have two new problems I noticed when doing the alignment.

Problem 1: There is a mysterious red and green line at the top of the screen. The lines appear even when I turn off the red and green grids. Hard to see, but look at the first picture. The strings are there for alignment, don't let it throw you.


Problem 2: The blue grid is barely there. I can see it in the center, but the edges aren't showing up. It improved a little when I adjusted the focus, but it's just clear in the center, and I still can't see it around the edges. There is also a general blue tint to the entire screen. See the last two pictures below comparing the green to the blue. The green grid picture has the blue tube on also, so that's why you see the blue blob in the middle. Again, don't let the strings throw you off.



So, any idea what's wrong? I don't want to abandon this, as it's become a crusade for me.

The green grid picture is very pixilated due to compression. In real life it's very sharp, just not aligned.

Thanks for any help you can give me.

[lcaillo]

You have the common problem with coolant contamination in the blue tube and some alignment that needs to be done. When you change the board you probably have enough variance that the red & green need to be aligned as well.

There is a thread on the coolant problem that focuses on the philps sets, but the basic problem is the same, as are the general approach to solving it.

[welby]

I thought I read somewhere that the Samsung does not have the coolant.

What is a ballpark figure for cost of coolant? I want to make sure to get a good price.

[lcaillo]

You can typically find it for under $10 for a 8 or 16 oz bottle. Look to the parts distributors that I list in the forum, such as Vance Baldwin, Acme, or Tritronics.

[welby]

Just wanted to drop a note and let you know that I was able to change the coolant fairly easily. The blue now looks great. It was so easy to do that I went ahead and changed the red and green while I was at it. The red was pretty bad, but not as bad as the blue. Ther green looked pretty good.


All I have to do now is allign it (again) and I'll be good to go.


Thanks again for your help. Now I can sell this TV soon (I went ahead and bought a 65 inch when this one went out.)

[Krankshaft]

Yuck! Glad you flushed out that old gunky coolant.

I know how you feel having to do conergence again I have a grid and I still hate to do it.

Can someone tell me why the majority of the coolant contamination is on Samsung and Phillips sets?

What was someone spitting into the coolant at the factory or something ?

The only thing that I can think of is the coolant reservoir on top of the tube was not sterile before the addition of the coolant.

Possibly to get the TVs out of the factory quicker.

[lcaillo]

One theory is that the coolant itself is contaminated to start with and the problem occurs when algae sensitive to blue and green spectra grow. Red is almost never affected. Another is that it is an inorganic coagulant precipitated by the greater heat in the blue and green. There are a number of other suggestions out there. We see it occasionally in other brands but nearly all philips set do it in both the blue and green and most of a few models of samsungs do it in the blue.

[welby]

One diffucult part of changing the fluid was that part of it had collected in the center of the lens, and was basically dried on (air bubble maybe?) I had a heck of a time getting that part off. I finally ended up soaking the bottom part of the lens in denatured alchohol overnight and then it came off with some light rubbing. There was a firly thick layer of the gunk on the bottom of the tube. Amazing how it builds up without you noticing it.



I did get the convergance done, and the picture looks better than it had in years.

Thank you again!