Can't get to the TV core!

I allways smash the tube. ALLWAYS!

Mostly I do it with a 3 foot long steel bar. I take a big swipe across the board stuck to the end of the tube.
I used to just rotate the board and let it crack the end of the tube and listen to the air whistle in.

That's fun when there's someone watching... I get ready, breathe in and out a few times, take a deep breath, then twist a crack, let the air go in slowly, then run about 20 feet away and inhale.
Because the watcher don't know what I'm doing, I say "You don't want to inhale that gas, its dangerous".....

Small thing amuse creative minds...

But, with the long bar thing, I crack most of the end tube and don't have to worry about the clamps, it all falls into the tube.

Now, I know what you are thinking... 'he smashs the tube!!!!'

Well, one day, when I first started scrapping CRTs, I have the full vacum tube sitting on the top of the rubbish bin, I insert a flat screwdriver under the band to lever it off and BOOM!!!!!!!!



I'm standing there with the band in my left hand, screwdriver in the right hand and a ten foot radius of glass shards.
I actually saw the shockwave from the explosion.
The shards, they were a square profile, from about a inch long, to three or four long.
They completly covered the ground around me, the only bit missing was where I was standing.

I still can't believe I didn't get cut, let alone blinded. God was looking out for me then, I know.

In hindsight, what I had done was crack it on its weak point, the connection between the two glasses.
It cracked right around there and the vacuum did the rest.
Untill you have seen it, you won't understand the pent up power instilled into these screens.

Also, don't trust the band around the screen, it may have been tight once... but it may get loose.
If you pick up a screen by the band, the actual screen may fall out of it.

I leave the screen in the plastic case. Devacuum, remove coil, cut the red wire to the suction cup looking bit, then pull out the degausing cable after covering the broken end of the tube with something.
I cut the red wire because if you don't, when you pull out the degaussing cable, if you yank it, the 'flyback transformer' will 'fly back' out at you, normally smacking you in the face.
Then I remove the board to get the components and refit the back of the tv casing.

Ok, people do this all differently, but that's how I do it. One explosion was enough to teach me that that's the most dangerous thing in scrapping except maybe loosening the band around the brake housing of the vacuum brakes of a truck....
Nah, the CRT was more dangerous.