Batteries at the sharp end

[chris w]

I blame those Philips Electronic Kits personally.

I've still got mine the EE8 (and the add-on kit - A20) from when I was 12 years old. Amazing memories when one opens it up.

Edited March 5, 2009 by chris w

[MoominPapa]

I've still got mine the EE8 (and the add-on kit - A20) from when I was 12 years old. Amazing memories when one opens it up.

Eyes mist over...... Those were the ones were the components were on plastic carriers which you bolted to the circuit board, right. So much better than the cardboard and spring jobs.

 

On my amplifier kit one of the resistors had a bit of plastic flash covering one of the terminals of a resistor biasing the driver transistor, making it open circuit. Took me ages to find that.....

 

 

Ah, happy days.

 

MP.

[Guest]

I've still got mine the EE8 (and the add-on kit - A20) from when I was 12 years old. Amazing memories when one opens it up.

Bloody hell yes, the EE8. I can remember threading the component leads under those spring type connectors. It is my guess that these kits introduced many people to electronics. I seem to remember an add on kit, but don't recognise the number; obviously brain fade. Nowt like listening to 199 medium wave on a radio that you built on a piece of board with spring connectors. Weren't many of the projects built around an LDR?

 

Look here

Edited March 6, 2009 by Guest

[alan_fincher]

Those were the ones were the components were on plastic carriers which you bolted to the circuit board, right. So much better than the cardboard and spring jobs.

The name I'd go for there is "Radionic", but Googling for it, it looks like Philips became involved.....

 

http://ee.old.no/radionic/

 

The sets we had were badged "Radionic", I'm sure, and featured a clear see through pegboard on which you laid brass strip, and, as you say, bolted the mounted components through, (the crossovers achieved by brass on upper and lower surfaces).

 

I always thought they were massively better than the "springs and wires" because....

 

1) The connections were guaranteed, and it always worked first time.

2) The constructed circuit usually looked pretty well like the schematic from which it was derived.

 

I'm always sorry it didn't stay in the family - happy days!

[MoominPapa]

The name I'd go for there is "Radionic", but Googling for it, it looks like Philips became involved.....

 

http://ee.old.no/radionic/

 

The sets we had were badged "Radionic", I'm sure, and featured a clear see through pegboard on which you laid brass strip, and, as you say, bolted the mounted components through, (the crossovers achieved by brass on upper and lower surfaces).

That's the one! I had the X20 and the X40A audio amplifier. The boards didn't have brass strip, they were heavy duty PCBs with the holes big enough for the threaded brass legs of the component carriers and a clever track pattern which allowed any of the circuit designs to be built by inserting components at different places. The tracks were on the top (component) side.

 

PNP silicon transistors, I think, apart from the output stage of the amplifier which were germanium.

 

More here including a picture of the PCB.

 

I, too, no longer have mine, sadly.

 

Happy days!

 

MP.

[alan_fincher]

That's the one! I had the X20 and the X40A audio amplifier. The boards didn't have brass strip, they were heavy duty PCBs with the holes big enough for the threaded brass legs of the component carriers and a clever track pattern which allowed any of the circuit designs to be built by inserting components at different places. The tracks were on the top (component) side.

 

PNP silicon transistors, I think, apart from the output stage of the amplifier which were germanium.

 

More here including a picture of the PCB.

 

I, too, no longer have mine, sadly.

 

Happy days!

 

MP.

Nope, despite the Radionic name that's not exactly what we had.

 

The components mounted on screw bases are the same, but not what you fix it to.

 

Ours definitely had a clear perspex 'pegboard' base, and you used brass strips, a bit like Mecano, but much more slender to create the tracks.

 

Also it was all based around germanium semiconductors, OC44, OC72, OA81, etc.

 

I shall have to do some more Googling!

[chris w]

Eyes mist over...... Those were the ones were the components were on plastic carriers which you bolted to the circuit board, right. So much better than the cardboard and spring jobs.

 

On my amplifier kit one of the resistors had a bit of plastic flash covering one of the terminals of a resistor biasing the driver transistor, making it open circuit. Took me ages to find that.....

 

 

Ah, happy days.

 

MP.

The EE8/A20 were the ones with real components (no plastic carriers) which you had to clip into springs. It definitely got me into deciding to do "electronics" as a career (the components, not the springs )

 

Chris

[Big Steve]

Hey, I feel ravished now you've hi jacked my thread!

 

On these lines, I used to teach at a certain place I'm not allowed to name, and we had a chap on a course who collected valves. He asked me if we had any GET 1's (or 100, or 101, I can' remember now) but they were the first ever commercially available transistors. I had a look in stores and we had loads of them, all on cards with original instructions, he went away a happy man, and left in exchange a triode of dubious distinction. We had a beautiful display of old valves, but it all vanished when the school shut down in the mid nineties. I hope it's all on display somewhere.

[alan_fincher]

First comercially available transistor radio ?

 

 

 

Regency TR1, about 40 USD in 1954.

 

Only 4 transistors, it seems, a far cry from modern semi-conductor devices.

 

It's many decades since I worked in the electronics industry, but I can't say I noticed any great recognition a few years ago when the commercial transistor celebrated it's 50 years. Given the impact on all out lives, I doubt whether there was a more important invention in the whole of the 20th century, really.

[Guest]

First comercially available transistor radio ?

 

 

 

Regency TR1, about 40 USD in 1954.

 

Only 4 transistors, it seems, a far cry from modern semi-conductor devices.

 

It's many decades since I worked in the electronics industry, but I can't say I noticed any great recognition a few years ago when the commercial transistor celebrated it's 50 years. Given the impact on all out lives, I doubt whether there was a more important invention in the whole of the 20th century, really.

Wash your mouth out, that man! Youre forgetting the Sinclair C5. Where would we be without that I ask you?

[Neil TNC]

Well strictly I think the very first transistors pre-date me.

 

But I do know what you are on about, and the OC series ones you list are probably the first I experimented with.

 

IIRC the higher powered version of the OC71 was the OC72 - achieved by a metal capping over it's otherwise glass case......

 

i don't think an OA81 (also germanium) diode would be a heap of use in a galvanic isolator, either.

 

Unlike the valves, I don't think I've hung on to any of this technology though.

 

I did

 

I seem to have lost my (yellow?) OC 44 and (orange?) OC45...or was that the other way round?

[Keeping Up]

Wash your mouth out, that man! Youre forgetting the Sinclair C5. Where would we be without that I ask you?

I had one of the Sinclair Micro 6 radios. It was cr*p.

[MoominPapa]

I had one of the Sinclair Micro 6 radios. It was cr*p.

I heard story that Sinclair bought a job lot of failed-QC transistors from Newmarket Transistors which were used in every product until they got used up. I have a vague memory that they had actually been used as hardcore to build the driveway at Newmarket, and were actually _dug_up_ to sell to Uncle Clive. That does sound somewhat unlikely though, so maybe I'm mis-remembering.

 

MP.

[Timleech]

I spent hours unsoldering components for re-use from pin-boards which had failed in an early Elliott computer, one of those which occupied a large room, lots of valves and point-contact germanium diodes. All that lead solder probably did my brain in

I still have a tin with some of the resistors

 

Tim

[davidandheather]

Out of interest, run the bow thruster a few times to gve a realistic discharge then measure the voltage at the bow thruster batteries when they are on charge.

 

Chris

HI

I gave the bow thruster a good discharge a then tested the volts at the battery end while charging i was getting 14.05 volts the cable size is 90mm2 over 60 foot

David