Any Sencore CR31 Super Mack users?

DarrenF

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I'm in the process of repairing one of these. I signed up for access to the sencore.com online CRT database, as the set-up book that came with it is too old for some of the tubes I've got. The online database is pretty decent... so I wrote a little script to run wget and leech all of the data from it, then little perl extract all the set-up data from the HTML.

Anyhow, now I have a their full database of CRT #, type, adapter #, heater voltage, and bias settings... 11,210 CRT numbers in total. It's in plain text (CSV, right now) so you can import it into a spreadsheet and search sort & manipulate and way you please.

Anyone else have a use for this?
 
I'm in the process of repairing one of these. I signed up for access to the sencore.com online CRT database, as the set-up book that came with it is too old for some of the tubes I've got. The online database is pretty decent... so I wrote a little script to run wget and leech all of the data from it, then little perl extract all the set-up data from the HTML.

Anyhow, now I have a their full database of CRT #, type, adapter #, heater voltage, and bias settings... 11,210 CRT numbers in total. It's in plain text (CSV, right now) so you can import it into a spreadsheet and search sort & manipulate and way you please.

Anyone else have a use for this?

Yes, I have one and I would love that
Wooo Hoooo Darren :)
 
OK, I've uploaded it to my webhost:
http://www.finck.net/arcade/sencore_cr31_setup.zip

In the zip is a .csv (comma separated values) file, containing one line per entry. The first line has headings. I forgot what the last field is (it's a 'yes/no' field), but it's not in the book I have.

I'm sure the creator of that online look-up tool could incorporate this data into that tool, or another, if he wished to. And anyone can download it, import into a spreadsheet, and slice/dice/sort/search/analyze the data however you please. Personally, I despise on-line-only access. I'd much rather have a copy of raw data than rely on connectivity to access information (That's why I leeched the data from Sencore...)

FWIW:

The top 5 most frequently listed adapters are 23 (3073 entries), 3 (1435), 5 (1149), 9 (1039) and X23 (722).

About 62% of entries use bias D, 19% use C, 15% B and 4% are A.

Nearly 90% of all tubes listed use 6.3V for the filament.
 
OK, I've uploaded it to my webhost:
http://www.finck.net/arcade/sencore_cr31_setup.zip

In the zip is a .csv (comma separated values) file, containing one line per entry. The first line has headings. I forgot what the last field is (it's a 'yes/no' field), but it's not in the book I have.

I'm sure the creator of that online look-up tool could incorporate this data into that tool, or another, if he wished to. And anyone can download it, import into a spreadsheet, and slice/dice/sort/search/analyze the data however you please. Personally, I despise on-line-only access. I'd much rather have a copy of raw data than rely on connectivity to access information (That's why I leeched the data from Sencore...)

FWIW:

The top 5 most frequently listed adapters are 23 (3073 entries), 3 (1435), 5 (1149), 9 (1039) and X23 (722).

About 62% of entries use bias D, 19% use C, 15% B and 4% are A.

Nearly 90% of all tubes listed use 6.3V for the filament.

Thank you,
and cleverly done :eek:
 
Thanks for the data! Ideally I'd like it if a single tool could work for both brands of rejuvenators, but it might be better if this is separate. Either way, I'll have something that makes use of the data soon.

I'm glad that people are finding that tool useful. I use it all the time now that I have a rejuvenator myself.
 
Thanks for the data! Ideally I'd like it if a single tool could work for both brands of rejuvenators, but it might be better if this is separate. Either way, I'll have something that makes use of the data soon.

I'm glad that people are finding that tool useful. I use it all the time now that I have a rejuvenator myself.

With this info, I can now complete the spreadsheet I am working on, to provide that exact info - Both
 
Looking through this, there appears to be quite a bit missing, and some duplicated. For example, there are five entries for tube 088X037-001, but the only info is the heater voltage and an unlabeled "No."

Can someone more familiar with Sencore can explain what the Bias field is? Do all Sencore adapters start with "X?" e.g. is adapter "23" "X23?"
 
Looking through this, there appears to be quite a bit missing, and some duplicated. For example, there are five entries for tube 088X037-001, but the only info is the heater voltage and an unlabeled "No."

Can someone more familiar with Sencore can explain what the Bias field is? Do all Sencore adapters start with "X?" e.g. is adapter "23" "X23?"

Are you sure you got it all?

I have downloaded a huge database, lots of 23's
 
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Yes, quite sure.

Interesting figures:

Tubes listed in the Sencore chart which are not in the BK chart: 3,463.
Tubes listed in the BK chart which aren't in the Sencore: 1,253.
Total unique tubes covered: 12,412.
 
Looking through this, there appears to be quite a bit missing, and some duplicated. For example, there are five entries for tube 088X037-001, but the only info is the heater voltage and an unlabeled "No."

Can someone more familiar with Sencore can explain what the Bias field is? Do all Sencore adapters start with "X?" e.g. is adapter "23" "X23?"

I found the problem with the dupes. There were only 745 pages, but my script tried to download 749. The sencore database serves up the last page when a page number too high is requested. So up 10 entries got duped 5 times. Looks like I may have missed the 1st page, too... I'll reprocess with a few corrections and upload a revised file.

Bias on the Sencore is a 4-way switch. You select A, B, C or D. They correspond to a G1 bias voltage (negative) of 20, 35, 50 and 70V (nominally).

No, not all Sencore adapters start with "X". They started making "X" ones later on. They are unique; "23" and "X23" are totally different adapters.
 
OK, it was easier to just manually move those 10 cases of dupes from the list than it would have been to re-process from the beginning (there were a number of corrections to the Sencore data I had done... like changing 6.O to 6.0, and removing a double decimal (6..3), etc., etc.)

Anyhow, the file (same link) has been revised. Please re-download if you care.

I still find one (entirely) duplicate line, but it was a dupe in the original Sencore database, so not my fault (this time). There are also 8 other cases of duplicated CRT # fields, with differing data on the rest of the line; they are also dupes in the original Sencore data.
 
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I found the problem with the dupes. There were only 745 pages, but my script tried to download 749. The sencore database serves up the last page when a page number too high is requested. So up 10 entries got duped 5 times. Looks like I may have missed the 1st page, too... I'll reprocess with a few corrections and upload a revised file.

Bias on the Sencore is a 4-way switch. You select A, B, C or D. They correspond to a G1 bias voltage (negative) of 20, 35, 50 and 70V (nominally).

No, not all Sencore adapters start with "X". They started making "X" ones later on. They are unique; "23" and "X23" are totally different adapters.

OK, it was easier to just manually move those 10 cases of dupes from the list than it would have been to re-process from the beginning (there were a number of corrections to the Sencore data I had done... like changing 6.O to 6.0, and removing a double decimal (6..3), etc., etc.)

Anyhow, the file (same link) has been revised. Please re-download if you care.

I still find one (entirely) duplicate line, but it was a dupe in the original Sencore database, so not my fault (this time). There are also 8 other cases of duplicated CRT # fields, with differing data on the rest of the line; there are also dupes in the original Sencore data.

Got it. Thanks for the info.
 
Hm. I was hoping that the adapters would map pretty much 1:1, so I could infer what Sencore adapter to use from the BK adapter and get good coverage for both makes, but it's not even close. For example, tubes which use a CR-70 use all the following Sencore adapters: X81, X102, 23, X155, X147, X112, X111. Likewise, tubes listed as using the X81 can use the CR-42, CR-45, or CR-70.

So I can include the Sencore adapter number, but programmatically deciding which Sencore adapters are compatible with what BK adapters is likely not possible. Upshot is that the coverage for a BK rejuvenator won't be any better, so combining them doesn't make much sense.
 
Hm. I was hoping that the adapters would map pretty much 1:1, so I could infer what Sencore adapter to use from the BK adapter and get good coverage for both makes, but it's not even close. For example, tubes which use a CR-70 use all the following Sencore adapters: X81, X102, 23, X155, X147, X112, X111. Likewise, tubes listed as using the X81 can use the CR-42, CR-45, or CR-70.

So I can include the Sencore adapter number, but programmatically deciding which Sencore adapters are compatible with what BK adapters is likely not possible. Upshot is that the coverage for a BK rejuvenator won't be any better, so combining them doesn't make much sense.

Yeah, I tried creating a "conversion chart" a few days ago, using my book and online BK data, but quickly came to the same conclusion (that it either wasn't a good idea, or wasn't possible).

Part of it is that B&K just made notes in their set-up table if, say, two colors were swapped. Doesn't look like Sencore did that... they made another adapter (hence there were over 150 different adapters for Sencore). Other reasons could be that one manufacturer may have built an adapter without a keying "wedge", so it would physically fit more tubes... but the other guys may not have done so.

Anyhow, I'm glad to have a complete set of data for the Sencore. If anyone wants the same data extracted for the CR70 (different Sencore Model), say something. It would be pretty simple to modify the scripts I've got to leech that too.

[It's unfortunate that Sencore used "CR" in their device model numbers, and B&K used them as the prefix for their adapters... creates the potential for confusion.]
 
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...an unlabeled "No."

One other thing, I logged back in to look, and the "yes/no" field is named "direct heat". I have no idea what that means; it's not mentioned at all in the CR31 Super Mack manual...
 
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Interesting. Still not really sure why it's in there. I also read the manual for the CR71, and it doesn't have any setting, adjustment, or procedure for "direct heat."

Speaking of the CR71, I understand that it's designed to require less adapters, but more knob settings [only 1 adapter for each mechanical socket design, electrical differences handled with switches]. As a result, you need the pinout info from the Sencore database in order to use the CR71. That's not as easy to get, so I won't be leeching it... I'll leave it to an industrious CR71 owner.
 
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