Friend magnetized his TV. Any suggestions?

[Icebreak]

A friend of mine (has the same name and looks just like me) hooked up a new TV last year. Not wanting to spring for new speakers, Dipstick (this is what I like to call him when he does stuff like this) ran some old speakers through an old stereo and stacked them up next to the TV. (Yeah, I know, might as well keep a shake light on top of the monitor.) A few days before the warrantee ran out he observed two opposing convex shapes taking up most of the screen. Each shape seemed to subtract two primary colors. IOW, if you where looking at a red barn there would be an hour glass shaped red swath through the middle, a blue convex swath on the right and a yellow convex on the left.

Dingdong, calls Se*rs A/V department and the first thing they ask about is speakers. They explained the warrantee was void. Not buying that and after a long conversation with the store manager he was told to bring the TV back and they would honor the warrantee. So Brainiac loads up the TV and off to Se*rs he goes. This resulted in them offering him a gift card valued @ 2/3 what he paid for it. With thoughts of legal action and consumer protection dancing in his head, he rejected the offer.

Goofy, hauls the TV back home. He decides to move the speakers a foot away before he hooks the set back up. Well now, how about that? Huh, huh. The shapes have shrunk and barely noticable. A day later they have gone away completely. Case closed, or so Brillant Boy thought. Last night it happened again. So he (now get this) wraps a hammer in a sock and gently wipes the screen thinking he can capture the residual magnatism. Probably a coincidence but it seemed to work. Now the problem is intermittant but it being Super Bowl Sunday, it has presented itself again.

Tweeldle Dum is really not what I would term a stupid man, ignorant yes. He's really a kinda nice sort of fellow. I have noticed he has some difficulty getting the first pickle out of the pickle jar. The last olive in the olive jar? He gave up on that years ago. It's always an escapee.

Anyone have any suggestions for my friend?

Thanks,

Tweedle Dee

 

[**DONOTDELETE**]

...yeah, don't go here:

http://www.wondermagnet.com/dev/main.shtml

..it's been about a year, the green smudge on the Sony is getting fainter all the time..

 

[laynlow]

Most TV's have a degaussing circuit built in. The circuit works each time the TV is turned on. For maximum effect turn the TV off for about an hour, and then turn it back on. Repeat a couple times. If this does not cure what ails ya, you may need to make or buy a more powerful hand-held degaussing coil.

The following instructions were saved from a web site, and I don't remember where. Use at your own risk.

"To make your own, find a big spool of magnet wire, about 22 gauge. Preferably, this is a "found" spool of wire, paying for it defeats the purpose. Then you flip over your stool. The magnet wire is then wound (loosely, so that it can be removed) around the stool legs until the bundle is a bit bigger around than your thumb. Wrap a few tabs of electrical tape around to keep the coil together, then pull it off the legs. Strip the ends of the magnet wire and solder them to a line cord. Insulate the connections with heat-shrink tubing. Wrap the whole coil tightly with electrical tape. Install one of those in-line power switches in the cord at a point that is easy to reach with one hand while you hold the coil on your other hand. You now have a degaussing coil.

To use this coil, turn on the unit to be degaussed and display a picture. This is not really necessary, but if you degauss the unit without watching the picture, you're missing out on quite a show. Hold the coil right in front of the screen, then turn it on. You'll see a rather spectacular "rainbow" effect in the image. Slowly withdraw the coil from the screen while moving it around to cover the entire area of the screen. When you can't see the rainbow effect any more (about 3 to 4 feet away), turn the coil sideways and cut the power. None of this is too critical, just remember that if you cut the power while you can still see the "rainbow" you have about a 50% (depending on what part of the cycle the switch opens at) chance of leaving the unit magnetized. "

 

[Icebreak]

Ted the Led-

Good advice.

laynlow-

Thanks!

I Wonder if Radio Shack has these. I'm afraid Tweedle Dum would build a toaster instead.

 

[Rothrandir]

suggestions...?

sony makes a pretty nice televison...you could sure use a plasma...big screen hdtv's are the way to go...get something with firewire...how about a projection unit (over 100"!)...getting a bunch of little tv's and hooking them together is a good idea...

 

[laynlow]

Icebreak,

You can buy the magwire at radio shack for a few bucks. Get yourself a line cord and follow the instructions and you should have a nice coil built for under ten bucks.

You could also take it to a repair shop, but in my experience they want at least fifty just to say hello.

 

[e=mc²]

Here is a coil that I found: Degaussing Coil which seems to be the going rate for such.

Ed

 

[Icebreak]

Rothrandir-

All excellent choices. Always creative solutions from you. I expect no less from a "ModMan".

Thanks.

*edit*

laynlow -

Out of respect for your handle please option to not respond to these two questions. I'll get whipped for this question but what is a line cord?. Also, how far away should I keep these unshielded speakers from the televison?

e=mc² -

Thanks.

 

[Rothrandir]

seriously icebreak...why are you complaining? this is the perfect excuse to go out and buy a new unit!

(i really do recommend firewire capabilities...)

try this: "ok honey, i tried and tried to fix the darn tv...i guess the only thing to do is go and get a new one...

darnit why did it have to quit working?! i hate new tv's!!"

 

[Icebreak]

I guess every problem is an opportunity in disguise.

 

[Saaby]

Heh heh awhile back when I had a real computer with a cheap, cheap 14" monitor (That I ran at 1024X768--no wonder my eyes are so bad) a friend of mine, or maybe it was me--but he was over here--put a strong magnet a little too close to the screen. Being a cheap monitor it had to degauss built in BUT after thinking about it a bit I had a brilliant idea.

Ever been in a computer lab or in a computer store when someone turns on a monitor and it degausses? All the ones next to it wiggle. With this in mind we carefully unhooked my monitor and drug it upstairs to my sisters room. I positioned my monitor so the screens were facing and degaussed her monitor, degaussing mine as well in the process.

Now my brother had a TV with a red spot up in the corner. After seeing me do this he tried it on his TV (Held monitor to TV). It worked but he would have to do it every couple months.

So if you're feelign real adventurous pull a monitor up to the TV and degauss it.

Good Luck

 

[**DONOTDELETE**]

wow, interesting suggestion there Saaby, and my new 17" eMac is small enough to carry over to where my 13" TV is..I wonder why the red spot came back though...?
Do you turn the computer on while the TV is on or off?

 

[Icebreak]

What about a bulk tape eraser? I mean for adventure sake. No? Yeah, I think I'll stick with standard fixes on this deal but good one Sabby. Sure have never heard of that before but it makes sense.

 

[laynlow]

Line cord = length of electric cord with a standard two prong plug on one end and two bare wires on the other. Soldier the bare wires to the ends of the coil and insulate the connection. Install a switch on one of the wires and you have a nice coil.

I have a tape eraser, and I bet it would work. I have never tried it though. I also have a demagnetizing tool for tape deck heads, but doubt it is strong enough.

How far away should unshielded speakers be placed? Well, the easy answer is "it depends."

The distance is going to be determined by the size and strength of the magnet(s) inside the speaker enclosure. Since the TV is already messed up, you can place the speakers close to the TV then move them out until the artifact on the screen is gone (or in your case stops changing in appearance). That would be the minimum distance. I would go a bit further than that.

Since your going to make/purchase a coil, you have some freedom to experiment with placement. After-all, you're not really hurting anything you're just demagnetizing the shadow mask inside the TV.

 

[lemlux]

I have one of the larger degaussing rings back from the mid '80's that hasn't been used for while. I used it on the monitor for my TI Professional computer and on some old back-up tapes. I was always amazed that it could only be run for a couple of minutes at a time and needed to cool off at least 20 minutes between uses.

$30 shipped to anyone who wants it. (I think I can find it in the garage, unless my wife gave it away when I wasn't looking.)

 

[Albany Tom]

I think what you really need is a caller ID device. Then when your buddy calls, you can ignore the call. This will save you some grief.

If that doesn't work, what you need is a bunch of sheets of soft iron. Wrap the TV, the speakers, and perhaps your friend in the iron, and everything should go back to normal.

 

[Icebreak]

lemlux-

You have a PM.

 

[lemlux]

Icebreak:

The PM hasn't arrived. You might copy the PM to an email.

edit at 3:10 -- PM delivered and responded to.

 

[Icebreak]

Albany Tom -

My friend is the same guy that did not know what to do with SPAM. I told him to put it in a toaster oven but that's a whole other Saaby. I do like your suggestion. It would match our aluminum hats.

 

[jmm]

I was faced with a weird TV/magnet dilema years ago when my then new slot loaded isobaric subwoofer with a ton (or so it seemed) of unshielded magnets in it didn't want to "fit" anywhere except close enough to the TV to almost completely obliterate the picture. The TV was a console Heathkit that always had the tube too close to the floor for my taste, so up it went on oak leg extensions and the subwoofer went right underneath. Mu metal would have provided the best shielding, but the amount I would have needed would have been too expensive so I started out concealing large pieces of 16 or so gauge cold rolled steel inside and underneath everything. I got things to the point where the picture was almost decent, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't get acceptable purity or convergence (using the Heathkits built in generator). I was about to give up when for some unknown reason I decided to get a bunch of not particularly big or strong circular ceramic magnet slugs, and tried sticking them to the metal shields in various locations to try to counteract the remaining magnetic eddys. It worked, and it ran that way for 10 + years, but every couple of years I had to tweak few of them around a bit to keep the purity and convergence in spec.

So, it might be worth a try if you want to diddle with a couple of small cheap magnets before your degaussing coil arrives.

Sometimes I really miss Heathkits, some of them were so cool.

John