Best Circuit Diagrams

[pwdrive]

In the members opinions, which company diid the best user friendly circuit diagrams for general vintage consumer radios etc.

Lawrence.

[Mark R]

Well there were only a handful, Trader, ERT, R and TV servicing and manufacturers.

Personally I prefer the Trader.

cheers Mark

[Skywave]

For their CTV products, I always thought that Philips and ITT were fairly easy to follow.

Al.

[Yorkie]

Generally, I've found the maker's to be better than Trader sheets - the ubiquitous DAC90A being a case in point. The Bush service sheet is much better than the trader sheet. Some of the ERT ones are good too - the Pye R33 ERT sheet is good. I haven't really found that any particular makers stand out above others. Some are very sparse on component layouts, leaving us to have to trace components from some known starting place such as a valve-holder pin, smoothing cap etc. I must say that it's far easier these days with manuals on searchable DVDs than fumbling through R&TV books, of which I have quite a collection, but rarely refer to these days. It's surprising what can be found on t'internet too nowadays, often FOC, and broadband makes life so much easier in that regard.

[Mark Hennessy]

I know I sound like a cracked record, but you need to have a look at a Hacker manual

The diagrams are very clear, and there is a lot of detail about the circuit operation and line-up - the earlier ones being the best. The majority of them are freely available on the Yahoo Hacker groups.

Just another reason for my obsession with this marque.

All the best,

Mark

[tiv48]

i know i dont likr some grudig mainly colour tv i find them hard to follow early phillips were good as were bush pye gec
rob t

[AlanBeckett]

Early valve Tektronics Diagrams are wonderful.
The later Transistor/IC/PCB ones are a disaster. Even Al struggles with them
Alan

[Aerodyne]

I never had trouble following Thorn's diagrams.
-Tony

[Skywave]

Yes, Alan, that I certainly do!

IMHO, they are laid out in a manner which although they do attempt to show the main logical flow, there are 'bits' of auxiliary circuitry that are drawn physically dissociated from the main parts of a given drawing. And that wouldn't be so bad if, on the main drawing, there was some note to give you a clue that not only are there 'bits' elsewhere - but where to find them. On top of that, the main body of the drawings are drawn 'piece-meal' - as you would expect in an engineering sketch during the development phase. I'll forgive the various drawing errors I have met of some of their drawings - e.g., the Tek. 475, which after all, is a complicated beast - but I can't bring myself to forgive Tek's. poor layouts, as outlined above. Of course, if I was a full-time Tek. 'scope repair technician, I'd eventually get used to that 'style' - but I'm not - so I can't.

I level all that above criticism based on many years of working for a wide assortment of electronics engineering companies. During these employments, one of my many responsibilities was often the preparation of cct. diags. of prototype equipment and vetting drawings between design & development and the D.O. Having spent many years as a test engineer / repair tech. / installation engineer / field service engineer / technical trainer & lecturer / tech. support engineer, I readily appreciate the importance of quality tech. manuals and well-presented cct. diagrams.

Al.

[pwdrive]

For some reason I used to like Murphy diagrams.

Lawrence.