1960s electronics kit - Page 3 - UK Vintage Radio Repair and Restoration Discussion Forum

Lucien Nunes · 14th Jul 2016, 11:23 pm

Quote:

some very entertaining Chinglish project titles

Those are hilarious, and an extreme example of something that always amused me about many of these kits, which was the mindless permutation of project sub-sections to get maximum mileage from minimum parts. If there's a solar-powered radio receiver and a burglar alarm with 2-tone siren then you will probably also be encouraged to build a solar-powered burglar alarm and a radio with 2-tone siren. Can I guess that #839 is the 'Magnet-controlled acousto-optic buzz sound of machine gun,' and that #869 is the 'Magnet-controlled red light warning sound of machine gun'.

I never had the Philips kits (although I fancy collecting a set now) but from what little I know of them they were above this banality. I had (and still have) Denshi-Block which was quite effective and flexible. The projects generally worked first time, they were easy to expand in size and range and I made a few of my own blocks. They were nonetheless given to promoting the merits of the 3-transistor water-detecting 2-tone TRF fire-alarm with morse key. As it said of one project 'You might hear a nice music'!

MrBungle · 15th Jul 2016, 5:18 pm

Interesting video here on those Philips EE kits showing what you could do with them - they even shipped a scope with one of them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dPQ0WVMBjE - Edit: more detailed video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7k6DABRTR9k

Mine was a bit later I think and proportionately less good. Christmas 1979.

Blew up the LED display, all the transistors, the IC, the diodes, the solar cell, the transformer, the speaker, the meter, the bulb and the relay within a month. This turned out to be advantageous as it meant I had to source replacements which lead to a deep interest in the subject! I did discover you could make a relay oscillator with the relay provided and use the rather high voltage inductive kickback to zap my sister much to her dismay.

I have grown up since then, maybe.

julie_m · 15th Jul 2016, 8:28 pm

I had one of those Tandy 160-in-1 kits myself. Much fun .....

red16v · 15th Jul 2016, 10:06 pm

Yes, I had one of this kits too, sometime around the early 60's. My mum worked in the local Mullard factory in Southampton and of course they were available in the staff shop. I suppose she was nurturing an early interest I had shown in electronics and I'm almost embarrassed to say that I went from that Philips electronics kit to being in charge of the maintenance of a rather large set of TV studios in London. Good old Mum!

PS. As an aside my Mum was on the production line, along with others, putting the red dot on the side of the transistors (remember the emitter red dot?) She put the transistor legs on a production line device and dependent on which way the needle deflected so they painted the red dot on one side of the transistor or the other.

PS 2. As an adult I got to know one or two people there at a slightly higher management level than dear old Mum and they said in the initial stages Philips couldn't get the mass manufacturing technique right and the first years worth of production ended up under the foundations of the perimeter road around the factory!

PS 3. I had never been in such a security conscious factory - the reason being a whole weeks worth of production could simply leave the factory in the back of a 'rogue' transit van!

and finally PS 4 - the factory was flattened several years ago.

No .. there is a PS 5, I still have the EL3585/00 that Mum bought at the same time as a Christmas present for the whole family.

cathy_vintage · 15th Sep 2016, 10:55 am

Ash here .. Yes I too started out with those Philips kits in the '60's. The basic set and then the add-on kit that gave you loudspeakers and an extra AC126 ! It had the little red 'cows udders' as I named them that fitted over the transistor leads, presumably to give strain relief and prevent the leads fatiguing. I remember breaking a lead of one of the resistors used in the 'electronic organ project', so I trundled off to town (Hull) on the bus to get a replacement. I didn't go to a shop down the arcade nicknamed 'Fansharks' (acually Fanthorpes) as the old man had ripped me off previously for an OA90 diode, so I went to another shop in Hull centre called RSC. The guy in there was a stuffy, posh gentleman and seemed a bit reluctant to sell me a single resistor but asked me what tolerance I wanted, so I said I didn't know and opted for the cheapest. That taught me a lesson about the 4th band on resistors, as I duly fitted it and the organ was way out of tune so I had to trundle back to the shop and, with my tail between my legs', ask him for a 5% one. I seem to remember the Philips kit's manual being excellent , it even went into semiconductor doping, holes etc and probably had a table in it explaining resistor tolerances.

Anyone remember 'Fahnestock clips' I read about them in American books as a boy but never got my hands on any.

space charge · 15th Sep 2016, 2:06 pm

to fulfil your boyhood dream fahnestock clips are stocked by www.modernradiolabs.com
pierce ei7ka

Aub · 15th Sep 2016, 2:16 pm

Just before I got interested in radio and electronics, i was fascinated by torches, so I was very pleased to get this for Christmas:-

https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rc...=AFQjCNEK_ASgQ
ElLedM6qzB6wGx-G7Lr_A&ust=1474031557488942

Aub

PaulR · 15th Sep 2016, 2:56 pm

Oh yes I had one of those. I had completely forgotten. I made a mains version using a cardboard box and a 60w bulb and burnt a hole in the chair seat I put it on.

russell_w_b · 15th Sep 2016, 8:27 pm

I had one too. Slide-shows under the stairs! And I made an epidiascope as described in J. W. Sims' 'The Boy Electrician'. My version was a 230V 60W lamp, a batten-lampholder, a biscuit tin (I learned lots about thermal conductivity of materials

) and the lens from an old 'Ensign' camera.

'The Boy Electrician' I owned was given to me with a pile of ex-school library books by a teacher friend of mother's, and was written nearly ten years before I was born. It preceded electronics kits but encouraged home-construction and experimentation, and I was naive enough as a youngster to think that Atkinson's radio shop in Workington would have a ready stock of the components and machined parts of dynamos and Wimshurst machines suggested for the projects described, as might have been available twenty-odd years previously!

I became the proud owner of a Philips Radionics kit (the one with the PCB and screw-in components described earlier on in this thread) not long afterwards.

cathy_vintage · 16th Sep 2016, 9:35 am

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aub

Just before I got interested in radio and electronics, i was fascinated by torches, so I was very pleased to get this for Christmas:-

Ash here .. Wow ..I had one of those too.

Bet this is the holy-grail of kid's kits

http://gajitz.com/1950s-radioactive-...rous-toy-ever/

grampy2 · 16th Sep 2016, 10:30 am

Still have one of Tandys offerings bought years ago for grandson and never used,on the day I got it it kept setting theft detection alarms off in every next shop I went into.

Welsh Anorak · 16th Sep 2016, 1:48 pm

Ah - I remember those red 'cow's udders' on the AF116s in the Philips kit (post 45). I broke the lead off the ORP12 LDR much to my chagrin - I had to order a new one (no handy electronic shops here) which cost me TEN SHILLINGS! I treated the new one with the utmost care from then on.
I know I made the organ but I can't quite remember what the keys were made from - were they metal strips that sprung back? Put the Stylophone to shame...and years before it too.
Glyn

cathy_vintage · 16th Sep 2016, 2:46 pm

I think the strips were nickel plated and possibly used grommets combined with those brass rounded headed clips with two bendable tangs or possible the hair pin spring thingy's and dual dia springs as used for connection to wires. Someone else is bound to remember more clearly. I used the transistor output radio project with pair of BBC headphones at the time in brown bakelite type material with 'Stalloy' (was it ?) diaphragms and plaited cloth leads. Wish I had those still. I think the AC126's also had appropriate type 'cows udders' to put on their leads.

There was also a Philips Mechanical Engineers Kit but it's possibly breaking the rules to list it here !

Never actually saw or knew anyone who had one

TonyDuell · 16th Sep 2016, 3:00 pm

If the Mods will tolerate me mentioning it, I have an ME1200 (Philips mechanical engineer) kit. It's rather ingenious as you'd expect from Philips, the spindles are metal tubes and you can fit one inside the next one up. You make gears by putting pins into holes in the plastic disks.

Ir's really an electromechanical kit, you get a couple of bulbs and an electric motor and make switches and battery holders from the disks/pins/springs. Some of the projects are of course purely mechanical (there are 2 or 3 designs for weight-driven clocks), others are electromechanical (I remember a device that flashes ...---... on the bulb automatically).

What set it apart (in my opinion) from the other kits of the time (and what makes it marginally on-topic here) is that you could combine it with the EE kits. There were designs for cars that turned on their lights when it got dark, or that stopped when in the shade, that sort of thing. Yes, simple by today's standards, but at the time it was not something that other kits did.

Unfortunately (for me), the ME1200 kit (which I have) goes with the EE8/A20 electronics kits (which I don't have). I need an ME1201 (which I have never seen) to go with my EE1003, etc.

15th Jul 2016, 5:18 pm	#42
MrBungle Dekatron Join Date: Jun 2016 Location: London, UK. Posts: 3,687	Re: 1960s electronics kit Interesting video here on those Philips EE kits showing what you could do with them - they even shipped a scope with one of them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dPQ0WVMBjE - Edit: more detailed video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7k6DABRTR9k Mine was a bit later I think and proportionately less good. Christmas 1979. Blew up the LED display, all the transistors, the IC, the diodes, the solar cell, the transformer, the speaker, the meter, the bulb and the relay within a month. This turned out to be advantageous as it meant I had to source replacements which lead to a deep interest in the subject! I did discover you could make a relay oscillator with the relay provided and use the rather high voltage inductive kickback to zap my sister much to her dismay. I have grown up since then, maybe. Attached Thumbnails

15th Jul 2016, 8:28 pm	#43
julie_m Dekatron Join Date: May 2008 Location: Derby, UK. Posts: 7,735	Re: 1960s electronics kit I had one of those Tandy 160-in-1 kits myself. Much fun ..... __________________ If I have seen further than others, it is because I was standing on a pile of failed experiments.

15th Jul 2016, 10:06 pm	#44
red16v Heptode Join Date: Jul 2006 Location: Winchester, Hampshire, UK. Posts: 638	Re: 1960s electronics kit Yes, I had one of this kits too, sometime around the early 60's. My mum worked in the local Mullard factory in Southampton and of course they were available in the staff shop. I suppose she was nurturing an early interest I had shown in electronics and I'm almost embarrassed to say that I went from that Philips electronics kit to being in charge of the maintenance of a rather large set of TV studios in London. Good old Mum! PS. As an aside my Mum was on the production line, along with others, putting the red dot on the side of the transistors (remember the emitter red dot?) She put the transistor legs on a production line device and dependent on which way the needle deflected so they painted the red dot on one side of the transistor or the other. PS 2. As an adult I got to know one or two people there at a slightly higher management level than dear old Mum and they said in the initial stages Philips couldn't get the mass manufacturing technique right and the first years worth of production ended up under the foundations of the perimeter road around the factory! PS 3. I had never been in such a security conscious factory - the reason being a whole weeks worth of production could simply leave the factory in the back of a 'rogue' transit van! and finally PS 4 - the factory was flattened several years ago. No .. there is a PS 5, I still have the EL3585/00 that Mum bought at the same time as a Christmas present for the whole family.

15th Sep 2016, 10:55 am	#45
cathy_vintage Pentode Join Date: Sep 2016 Location: Willerby, East Yorkshire, UK. Posts: 191	Re: 1960s electronics kit Ash here .. Yes I too started out with those Philips kits in the '60's. The basic set and then the add-on kit that gave you loudspeakers and an extra AC126 ! It had the little red 'cows udders' as I named them that fitted over the transistor leads, presumably to give strain relief and prevent the leads fatiguing. I remember breaking a lead of one of the resistors used in the 'electronic organ project', so I trundled off to town (Hull) on the bus to get a replacement. I didn't go to a shop down the arcade nicknamed 'Fansharks' (acually Fanthorpes) as the old man had ripped me off previously for an OA90 diode, so I went to another shop in Hull centre called RSC. The guy in there was a stuffy, posh gentleman and seemed a bit reluctant to sell me a single resistor but asked me what tolerance I wanted, so I said I didn't know and opted for the cheapest. That taught me a lesson about the 4th band on resistors, as I duly fitted it and the organ was way out of tune so I had to trundle back to the shop and, with my tail between my legs', ask him for a 5% one. I seem to remember the Philips kit's manual being excellent , it even went into semiconductor doping, holes etc and probably had a table in it explaining resistor tolerances. Anyone remember 'Fahnestock clips' I read about them in American books as a boy but never got my hands on any. Last edited by cathy_vintage; 15th Sep 2016 at 11:05 am.

15th Sep 2016, 2:06 pm	#46
space charge Tetrode Join Date: May 2013 Location: Enniscorthy, County Wexford, Ireland. Posts: 74	Re: 1960s electronics kit to fulfil your boyhood dream fahnestock clips are stocked by www.modernradiolabs.com pierce ei7ka

15th Sep 2016, 2:16 pm	#47
Aub Nonode Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Nuneaton, Warwickshire, UK. Posts: 2,038	Re: 1960s electronics kit Just before I got interested in radio and electronics, i was fascinated by torches, so I was very pleased to get this for Christmas:- https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=i&rc...=AFQjCNEK_ASgQ ElLedM6qzB6wGx-G7Lr_A&ust=1474031557488942 Aub __________________ Life's a long song, but the tune ends too soon for us all.

15th Sep 2016, 2:56 pm	#48
PaulR Dekatron Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Southport Lancashire, UK. Posts: 3,233	Re: 1960s electronics kit Oh yes I had one of those. I had completely forgotten. I made a mains version using a cardboard box and a 60w bulb and burnt a hole in the chair seat I put it on.

15th Sep 2016, 8:27 pm	#49
russell_w_b Dekatron Join Date: Jul 2007 Location: Penrith, Cumbria, UK. Posts: 3,687	Re: 1960s electronics kit I had one too. Slide-shows under the stairs! And I made an epidiascope as described in J. W. Sims' 'The Boy Electrician'. My version was a 230V 60W lamp, a batten-lampholder, a biscuit tin (I learned lots about thermal conductivity of materials ) and the lens from an old 'Ensign' camera. 'The Boy Electrician' I owned was given to me with a pile of ex-school library books by a teacher friend of mother's, and was written nearly ten years before I was born. It preceded electronics kits but encouraged home-construction and experimentation, and I was naive enough as a youngster to think that Atkinson's radio shop in Workington would have a ready stock of the components and machined parts of dynamos and Wimshurst machines suggested for the projects described, as might have been available twenty-odd years previously! I became the proud owner of a Philips Radionics kit (the one with the PCB and screw-in components described earlier on in this thread) not long afterwards. __________________ Regds, Russell W. B. G4YLI.

16th Sep 2016, 10:30 am	#51
grampy2 Retired Dormant Member Join Date: Nov 2011 Location: Nottingham, Notts. UK. Posts: 43	Re: 1960s electronics kit Still have one of Tandys offerings bought years ago for grandson and never used,on the day I got it it kept setting theft detection alarms off in every next shop I went into.

16th Sep 2016, 1:48 pm	#52
Welsh Anorak Dekatron Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: North Wales, UK. Posts: 6,916	Re: 1960s electronics kit Ah - I remember those red 'cow's udders' on the AF116s in the Philips kit (post 45). I broke the lead off the ORP12 LDR much to my chagrin - I had to order a new one (no handy electronic shops here) which cost me TEN SHILLINGS! I treated the new one with the utmost care from then on. I know I made the organ but I can't quite remember what the keys were made from - were they metal strips that sprung back? Put the Stylophone to shame...and years before it too. Glyn

16th Sep 2016, 2:46 pm	#53
cathy_vintage Pentode Join Date: Sep 2016 Location: Willerby, East Yorkshire, UK. Posts: 191	Re: 1960s electronics kit I think the strips were nickel plated and possibly used grommets combined with those brass rounded headed clips with two bendable tangs or possible the hair pin spring thingy's and dual dia springs as used for connection to wires. Someone else is bound to remember more clearly. I used the transistor output radio project with pair of BBC headphones at the time in brown bakelite type material with 'Stalloy' (was it ?) diaphragms and plaited cloth leads. Wish I had those still. I think the AC126's also had appropriate type 'cows udders' to put on their leads. There was also a Philips Mechanical Engineers Kit but it's possibly breaking the rules to list it here ! Never actually saw or knew anyone who had one Attached Thumbnails Last edited by cathy_vintage; 16th Sep 2016 at 3:00 pm.

16th Sep 2016, 3:00 pm	#54
TonyDuell Dekatron Join Date: Jun 2015 Location: Biggin Hill, London, UK. Posts: 5,208	Re: 1960s electronics kit If the Mods will tolerate me mentioning it, I have an ME1200 (Philips mechanical engineer) kit. It's rather ingenious as you'd expect from Philips, the spindles are metal tubes and you can fit one inside the next one up. You make gears by putting pins into holes in the plastic disks. Ir's really an electromechanical kit, you get a couple of bulbs and an electric motor and make switches and battery holders from the disks/pins/springs. Some of the projects are of course purely mechanical (there are 2 or 3 designs for weight-driven clocks), others are electromechanical (I remember a device that flashes ...---... on the bulb automatically). What set it apart (in my opinion) from the other kits of the time (and what makes it marginally on-topic here) is that you could combine it with the EE kits. There were designs for cars that turned on their lights when it got dark, or that stopped when in the shade, that sort of thing. Yes, simple by today's standards, but at the time it was not something that other kits did. Unfortunately (for me), the ME1200 kit (which I have) goes with the EE8/A20 electronics kits (which I don't have). I need an ME1201 (which I have never seen) to go with my EE1003, etc.