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Other Vintage Household Electrical or Electromechanical Items For discussions about other vintage (over 25 years old) electrical and electromechanical household items. See the sticky thread for details. |
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31st Oct 2016, 10:23 am | #61 |
Dekatron
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
PIFCO seemed to offer brighter, more vulgar ('blingy', if you like) torches which, although popular amongst home-users, never quite had the cachet of 'Ever Ready' when it came to professional use. I refer to those nationalised industries like British Steel and the BBC, who had 'buy British' policies, and PIFCO products were invariably 'Empire Made' (Hong-Kong). That said, British Steel issued Ray-O-Vac torches to their staff at one point, and I'm not sure whether these were made in the UK or the USA.
I note that one or two PIFCO patterns seemed to be imitations of Ever Ready products (front bicycle lamp, 800 3V battery). To be fair, there'd only be so much design latitude. I had a lovely PIFCO headtorch, years and years before headtorches became 'mainstream'. It consisted of a grey rectangular steel stove-enamelled case that took 4 'D'-Cells (U2 or SP2 back then) and a thin figure-of-eight cable to a large chrome and glass headpiece secured by a wide piece of woven elastic. Like on the 4th Picture in Post #61 (just saw that...)
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Regds, Russell W. B. G4YLI. Last edited by russell_w_b; 31st Oct 2016 at 10:29 am. |
31st Oct 2016, 10:59 am | #62 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I raised eyebrows when buying Rayovac Vidor Roughnecks (Two D cells) about 25 years ago, as the packaging boasted a lifetime guarantee! The quality control wasn't infallible, but if you got a good one they outlasted others by miles.
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31st Oct 2016, 11:51 am | #63 | |
Nonode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
You mentioned a grey rubber torch, I saw one on eBay earlier, labelled Ever ready. Regards, Lloyd. |
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31st Oct 2016, 11:55 am | #64 |
Nonode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I picked up and old Carbide mining lamp torch a while ago from a charity shop of all places .
A real work of art |
31st Oct 2016, 1:53 pm | #65 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Hi Phil I was replying to post 48 regarding the Grosvenor.
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Kevin |
31st Oct 2016, 2:57 pm | #66 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Thanks for all the interesting info, photos and scans - really good stuff and I wish that I could go back and pick up some more items from that era. I have spent the weekend french polishing a really tatty old Ever Ready that looked so sad that it was almost 'parts only' but with care I am getting there in making it work again. I plan to modify it to a 'Winter morning light' for those pitch black days when putting the bedroom light on is too much. I will use a single D battery which will run a 1.5 Volt 'Gibraltar' lamp - from the 1940's. I have done a test and the 0.3 Watts of light is just perfect for night time and the run time will be at least 30 hours on one cell. It has a hammered reflector which gives a beam that looks like gently swirling water in a rock pool - most relaxing. I'll photograph it when I have finished.
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31st Oct 2016, 5:27 pm | #67 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I've ever collected torches, I found battery's to be the main problem with most of the old stuff, from old valve hands free phone kit to the metal detector I have,
If I want to use them, I would have to be convert them, not that easy with multi output battery's. I do have a MELAS dynamo torch, I have posted up before, but know one knows anything about it. |
31st Oct 2016, 6:17 pm | #68 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Ah, I see, sorry Kevin, that wasn't clear.
Since my previous posting, I have got my old torch working again!
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31st Oct 2016, 8:17 pm | #69 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
The man around the back of Gripton's TV shop is good with torches....
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Kevin |
31st Oct 2016, 9:25 pm | #70 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Chuckle! Kevin, you have a PM.
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31st Oct 2016, 10:31 pm | #71 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I remember that in the late 1950's/early 1960's, the large 3V Ray-O-Vac cycle lamp batteries used to carry a notice saying that any cycle lamp damaged by a leaking battery would be replaced free of charge. These were the metal-clad cells - "Cased in steel" - that I only ever saw sold in cycle shops. My uncle used to use them on his bike, and never had to claim. (My dad's bike had a dynamo, so never used them.)
I must have got through dozens of sets of 6 blue U2 batteries throughout the 1960's to power my EL3585 tape recorder, and never had a single one leak, despite regularly subjecting them to "recharging" by being connected in parallel with a very basic 9V DC mains unit that dad built from a PW article (bell transformer, one silicon diode, one zener, and one electrolytic capacitor). The mains unit's smoothing wasn't up top much, so I tried connecting it in parallel with the batteries and found that, not only was the hum much reduced, but the batteries gave out more voltage after the mains unit was disconnected. Conversely, the early Ever-Ready (white ) "Sealed" U2s did leak, and the early (orange) alkaline HP2 batteries produced too high a voltage for the tape recorder's simple regulator to cope with, so I never used them. |
31st Oct 2016, 11:45 pm | #72 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
The modern mag-lites said a similar thing, free repair if you'd used certain brands of battery and they'd leaked. (possibly Duracell and Energiser, I forget). Trouble was, mine had leaked and I couldnt remember what was in there because they'd jammed solid! In the end my brother drilled it all out for me.
We had one of those 60's ever ready all-rubber torches (rubber clad) with seperate push on and off buttons. That rotted so badly that only the rubber was left and it all just fell apart in a powdery mess. Owning a decent torch seems to be a new 'thing' with this advent of ultra bright LEDs. I remember making trips to the camping shops as a child and buying a 2-cell ever-ready, vidor or pifco torch was quite an event for a child and very exciting. One day when I was a kid I found a corroded Pifco with one of those red flashing lights on top. I cleaned it all up and got it working with a new flasher bulb from the petrol station and spend hours just letting it flash while I stared at it in wonder. How we were easily entertained!
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31st Oct 2016, 11:55 pm | #73 | |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
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Regds, Russell W. B. G4YLI. |
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1st Nov 2016, 12:26 am | #74 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
This must be vintage by now.
Ex. British Railways Bardic, red & green aspects. Last edited by brunel; 1st Nov 2016 at 12:27 am. Reason: correct info. |
1st Nov 2016, 2:13 am | #75 | |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
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1st Nov 2016, 11:41 am | #76 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
This is a 3 D cell all plastic torch that is supposed to be safe to use in explosive atmospheres. It certainly screws together tightly.
Jim |
1st Nov 2016, 12:04 pm | #77 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I have a 40's era (vehicle mounted?) inspection lamp that has a long rubber extension lead stored inside- it unrolls as a tape measure would and the whole lantern assembly inside rotates at the same time. It has two threaded bosses at either side suggesting an up and down swivel mount with facility to detach and wander. I am thinking it may be off a Ferret or something similar, when i can find it i will do a pic. It is certainly not a signalling lamp, more of a spot lamp- the switch is very well made- a 90 degree 'clunk' job
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1st Nov 2016, 1:17 pm | #78 | |
Nonode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
Good used examples are often listed on ebay, and NOS examples turn up from time to time. They were manufactured in several case colours including. "silver" British rail and successor companies. Olive green, military Blue, flameproof version to be used by train drivers visiting oil terminals, explosives factories and the like. Yellow, other uses including private railways and industrial use. The standard colour change mechanism was for 4 colours, red, green, white, and yellow. The lamps issued to railway guards had a segmented washer that prevented the yellow being selected, the yellow filter is still fitted but can't be selected unless the segmented washer is removed. Back in the day, railway staff often used these Bardic lamps as bicycle lamps, They are still used as headlights and tail lights on horse drawn vehicles and steam road vehicles not equipped with other lights. A far less common version of these lamps can show a red, green, BLUE or white light, intended for police use but never caught on. The correct battery is an AD28, still available but only made by Eveready AFAIK. It is simple to fit a holder for 3 D cells if required instead of the AD28. The original bulb was a standard prefocus type 3.8 volt, 0.3amp. A modern LED bulb is a good retrofit. |
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1st Nov 2016, 2:09 pm | #79 | |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
Not very durable, and I haven't seen one for years. |
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1st Nov 2016, 2:48 pm | #80 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I actually dug one out of my rummel box last week. Just as I remember, thin tangly flex, fragile plug and overdriven bulb - they ran hot and hard and blew quickly. Replacement 12V bulbs were very yellow as they were meant for car use and hundreds of hours of run time. The original bulbs have no ratings - they are probably 6 Volts.
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