"Michael A. Terrell" wrote in message
...
blanking wrote:

Thanks but I want to give it a go myself, for 2 reasons, the cost of
servicing compared to buying a new similar tv and I am reasonably handy
myself with although limited electronic knowledge. I know there can be
dangerous voltages left in the capacitors after turn off so I presume if
I
short the power plug phase and neutral pins to the earth pin I will
discharge any voltage in the caps.


Very wrong, and a good way to die. see: http://www.repairfaq.org/

Thanks, I should not really have said that as I knew it was not quite right,
all I really knew was that the caps would retain a dangerous voltage after
turn-off and would require discharging, I was laways going to research this
bit before going ahead.



The fact that it responds to a tap on the
top of the tv makes me think it is probably not in the circuit board, it
has
settled down at the moment but the next time it goes haywire I will
trying
tapping different parts of the tv and see if i can narrow things down a
little there before opening it up. Is it possible for dust to cause this
sort of problem or are there no conductive parts exposed to the dust?


No, it isn't. There is a 99.5% probability of a cracked solder
joint. The other .5% is a damaged connector. If you look closely at
the solder work on the PC boards you will see more than one cracked
joint. the more you beat on the TV, the more damage will occur from the
vibration.



Thanks for clearing that up, the advice here has given me a chance of
getting the tv going again, if the problem lies outside the scope of what
has been suggested here I will obviously give it up as I do not have the
technical knowledge of the workings of television.