I'm just grasping at straws. The ZW is 60 years old plus or minus 5 years, and has never had any service on it. (Hasn't needed it, actually). Thinking about it, I did meter the A/U & D/U posts recently and they're both putting out 18 - 20 volts.
I'm am suspicious of the diode string with the six pairs. Can you briefly describe which of the two leads of each diode pair do I connect together? Also, wouldn't the continuity test I performed on each individual diode reveal which one was bad?