80 volt battery?

[ms660]

Anyone know of an 80 volt HT battery ? A receiver I have has +ve & -ve 80 volt terminals on it.

Lawrence.

[Hartley118]

It sounds unusual - 72V & 90V were the common ones. But it's most unlikely to be critical because HT battery voltage varied enormously over its working life. For example a 90V dry cell battery would probably have dropped to 70V before it was deemed ready for replacement.

I'm constantly intrigued by the unnecessary precision of specified HT voltages on vintage battery radios - I guess it was just because they could!

Martin

[happytiger]

Because the set is designed at the specified voltage. You have to have a standard to work from,even though the set may work from half this voltage.

[ms660]

The receiver in question might have had bright emitters fitted originally, R type or TM type possibly, according to the Valve Museum the R Type had a max anode voltage of 100 volts so maybe hence the 80 volt terminals, I'm running another thread on the receiver in the vintage domestic radio section.. Recepteur RI 221...

The receiver intrigues me.

Lawrence.

[Hartley118]

It's odd that 80V isn't a multiple of 1.5V cells. Was it intended for a 40 cell multiple 2V lead accumulator battery I wonder?

The most complex battery requirement among my sets is a Pye 'rising sun' 4-valve TRF transportable that specifies +66V +72V +105V and +114V. Oh - and -9V GB plus 2V for the filaments. The only explanation I can think of for the unwarranted precision of supplies is that Pye were in cahoots with Ever Ready who then had assured sales of a bespoke HT battery with multiple tappings!

Martin

[Peter.N.]

I suppose it saved the cost of a few resistors in the set. I remember selling HT batteries with a number of tappings on them in the '50s.

Peter

[Brian R Pateman]

This thread concerns the existence or otherwise of 80 V batteries.

The harmonisation, or otherwise, of mains voltages is off topic.

[emeritus]

Possibly it was indeed designed for use with a rechargeable lead-acid 80V HT battery.

Rechargeable HT batteries were available before WWII that consisted of groups of lead acid cells arranged in 10V or 20V groups that could be connected in parallel for charging, and series for use. An example of a group of cells from such a battery was posted on a thread on this site a couple of years ago. I have never seen any myself, but techniques for charging them are described in the 1942 edition of "Accumulator Charging" by W.S.Ibbotson. At that date they were said to be "almost a thing of the past".

Extract from the book attached.

[ms660]

Thanks for the link.

The receiver appears to be French, maybe a French battery manufacture made an 80 volt dry cell job, failing that it might have been designed for an accumulator jobie.

Lawrence.

[McMurdo]

A quick look through a 30's electrical supplies catalogue shows 'exide' 2V lead acid cells 'suitable for making HT batteries' complete with metal trays each holding 40V's worth. The extensive section on dry HT batteries shows, as others have said, ranges in multiples of 1.5V as we'd expect, and a footnote saying 'please enquire for special voltages not shown'. However I believe most dry ht cells were made in factories stacking their stock 1.5V cells. Could they make an 80V dry cell battery? I assume this is a late 20's/early 30's set?

[Skywave]

1.5 v. re-chargeable cells; 80 v. required. 53 x 1.5 = 79.5. Close enough?

Al.

[G3VKM_Roger]

Originally Posted by pwdrive

Anyone know of an 80 volt HT battery ? A receiver I have has +ve & -ve 80 volt terminals on it.

Wasn't + or - 80 volts a mark/space switching voltage for teleprinters? Is it a communications receiver?

Roger

[broadgage]

Whilst 80 volts implies a lead acid battery, these were not common for HT supplies to domestic valve receivers.
Lead acid HT batteries were more common for applications with a substantial HT demand such as public address amplifiers at outdoor events, small radio transmitters, and possibly radio receivers for listening by a large crowd in say a hall.
A lead acid HT battery was a costly item that required a fair bit of maintenance and was unlikely to be justified for a domestic receiver.

I consider it more likely that the "80 volt" battery was in fact 79.5 volts and consisted of standard zinc carbon dry cells in series.

Home made HT lead acid batteries used to be used in very isolated places where HT dry batteries were not readily obtainable. Usually if engine driven generating plant was available for lighting etc, and as a secondary function for recharging a crude HT lead acid battery.

[TonyDuell]

Is a zinc-carbon dry cell _exactly_ 1.5V?

Various figures on the web for new ones suggest 1.55V or 1.6V (the latter if zinc chloride is added).

I would guess the original 80V battery (if a zinc-carbon type dry cell was used) was 50-55 such cells in series. I will bet a fair amount that said receiver (assuming no faults) will work correctly on a nominal 79.5 or nominal 81V battery (those being the multiples of '1.5V' either side of 80V

[ms660]

Originally Posted by McMurdo

A quick look through a 30's electrical supplies catalogue shows 'exide' 2V lead acid cells 'suitable for making HT batteries' complete with metal trays each holding 40V's worth. The extensive section on dry HT batteries shows, as others have said, ranges in multiples of 1.5V as we'd expect, and a footnote saying 'please enquire for special voltages not shown'. However I believe most dry ht cells were made in factories stacking their stock 1.5V cells. Could they make an 80V dry cell battery? I assume this is a late 20's/early 30's set?

At the moment I'm guessing early to mid 1920's for the receiver, no web info on it as yet.

Lawrence.

Roger wrote: "Wasn't + or - 80 volts a mark/space switching voltage for teleprinters? Is it a communications recever"

The two output terminals are labeled Telephones + (&) -
The receiver has five separate tuning ranges, the receiver can also be configured as a 4, 3 or 2 valve receiver.

There's more info in the Recepteur 221 thread I'm running in the Vintage Radio Domestic section, it's origins are still a mystery.

Lawrence.

[Hartley118]

Originally Posted by pwdrive

The receiver appears to be French, maybe a French battery manufacture made an 80 volt dry cell job, failing that it might have been designed for an accumulator jobie.

Well, continuing to look across the channel, Georges Leclanche did claim an open circuit EMF of just 1.4V for his cells, (using ammonium chloride electrolyte, without zinc chloride). 57 of those would reach pretty close to 80V, but it's still a curious number for a nominal HT requirement.

Martin

[Radio_Dave]

Here's a Japanese 80V lead acid battery http://www.japanradiomuseum.jp/batte...BK-80%E5%9E%8B

David

[ms660]

Here's a photo of a receiver?

80 volts and 4 volt, the terminals are marked the same as the ones in the receiver I have, and the common connection is the same eg: 80 volts -ve to 4 volts +ve.

Any ideas for the receiver in the photo?

http://www.doctsf.com/forum/viewtopi...t=9717&p=64726

Lawrence.

[ms660]

Looks like 4v/80v was standard, see items 40 to 41 in the link below:

http://jcverdier.museum.online.fr/nouvellepage9.htm

Lawrence.

[Hartley118]

So - rechargeable batteries then - makes sense, being a multiple of 2V. So typical of French engineers to do stuff essentially differently but remarkably effectively!

Martin