On Thursday 27 February 2025 10:03:09 am wn4isx via groups.io wrote:
Hey it was a lot cheaper then a 600V battery!
I remember running into stuff that used various batteries whose voltage tended toward higher than flashlights, 15V, 22-1/2V, 30V, 45V, 67-1/2V, and 90V. Some projects in sixties Popular Electronics actually used 90V batteries. I was dealing with some garage door openers that used the 15V ones, but that situation involved a lot of constant downward price pressure and I eventually walked away from it.
Back when I was doing the battery store gig, a guy came in with a portable flourescent ilght and wanted to know if I could get him a battery for it. I can't recall exactly, but I think it was something like 130V. Unobtainium at the time...
Given a transformer with a center-tapped winding, say 12VCT to 120V, how would you make an oscillator that would work with that? I have plenty of salvaged transistors of all sorts, going all the way back to TO-3 germanium parts, though I'd be more inclined to go with TO-220.
I remember a guy (sadly no longer with us) who described a setup he had with a couple of germanium power transistors in an oscillator that was powered by a couple of dissimlar metal plates that were buried in his yard. As long as there was at least some moisture in the soild that setup actually generated some usable power, on a very small scale. I never did get the details of that from him, unfortunately.
--
Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and
ablest -- form of life in this section of space, ?a critter that can
be killed but can't be tamed. ?--Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters"
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Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James
M Dakin
