Beam index type color cathode ray tube

A beam index type color cathode ray tube including a screen having a screen surface adapted to be scanned by a single electron beam making successive sweeps in a widthwise direction of said screen surface to generate successive horizontal lines of an image, comprising:

• a large number of red, green and blue phosphor stripes having widths W.sub.R, W.sub.G and W.sub.B, respectively, arranged cyclically in said widthwise direction on the screen surface of the cathode ray tube and extending in parallel with one another perpendicular to said widthwise direction and in sets of three phosphor stripes including one of each color, adjoining ones of said stripes being separated in said widthwise direction by a parallel guard band, each guard band having a width at least as large as a minimum width;
• m index stripes associated with n of said sets of three color phosphor stripes being arranged over respective ones of said guard bands, n and m being natural numbers that are relatively prime;
• widthwise center-to-center distances between the adjoining color phosphor stripes being equal to one another;
• the width of at least one of the red, green and blue phosphor stripes being different from the widths of the other color phosphor stripes;
• the index stripes being of a constant width approximately as large as the minimum width of the guard bands;
• and
• the index stripes being arranged with widthwise centers thereof coincident with widthwise centers of the respective guard bands, said index stripes being irregularly spaced in said widthwise direction in a pattern repeating every.sup.m index stripes.