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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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27th Oct 2016, 8:04 pm | #21 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Oh no, another thing to collect.
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27th Oct 2016, 8:22 pm | #22 |
Dekatron
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Do a Google forum search for torch and you'll find quite a few threads started by members who collect them too (as well as plenty of ones re. modern torches etc.).
https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=008872...rch&gsc.page=1 |
27th Oct 2016, 9:28 pm | #23 |
Heptode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Thanks for the input - love to see them all! Just up my street. Looking at the home made lights those are just amazing and I would never have thought of doing that - yet they look so practical.
As another little project I had a REALLY tatty 1920's Ever Ready 3 cell torch which was so rotten that the tube was holed through and the switch was rattling about inside the tube. The spring at the bottom was just a crusty web. Yet with a few new bits and some liquid metal it is now my main work light - now upgraded to a 10 Watt bulb and Eneloop cells - it works really well. Amazing this old tech, so rugged and easy to work on. |
27th Oct 2016, 10:42 pm | #24 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Some years ago I found that the tagged NiCd cells from a (very old) old 12V mobile phone battery pack were about the same size as the individual cells of a No.8 battery, and used two in an old torch that I had at the time.
A quick check with distributors' catalogues suggests that they may have been 2/3 CS (or SC: different manufacturers use different codes for the same size) cells, which are a nominal 34mm x 23mm dia. Two cells are slightly shorter and slightly wider than a No.8 battery (approx 22mm x 75 mm). Farnell only carry the longer CS (SC?) cells, but RS do carry the shorter ones: Sanyo NiCd, code 377-7876 @£5.13 each, and RS Pro NiMH, code 199-747 @£7.76. Not really an economic proposition to buy new. |
27th Oct 2016, 11:14 pm | #25 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Here's my sole vintage torch, a Steamship which had always lived at the parental home before I was born and came with me here 20 years ago.
Nowadays I use zinc-carbon batteries because I'm tired of alkaline D-cells leaking. This is my 'power-cut' torch and lives in the cupboard. If anyone's interested I have a couple of inter-war catalogues with lots of torches in them I could scan.
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28th Oct 2016, 9:40 am | #26 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Does this count as a vintage torch. I had one like it as a very small boy, possibly 1960's. This one belonged to the misses, it has been hanging off the side of the freezer in the kitchen for years. I have just cleaned off a thick layer of grime to take some photos.
Mike |
28th Oct 2016, 11:02 am | #27 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
The SC nomenclature probably stands for 'Sub C', most useful for repacking cordless tools where the manufacturer does not supply new batteries. The problem of fitting them in when using solder rather than the original spot weld, is catered for by supply of '4/5 Sub C'- very useful. I think i got mine from Batteries Plus.
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28th Oct 2016, 12:07 pm | #28 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I had one of those! I wish I'd had a shilling for every torch I've owned...
I love this thread and can remember my first torch bought for me when I was four (a three-colour model that ran off a 3LR12 4.5V battery - the colours were changed by sliding the lenses in the end) through all the torches I've ever owned: Woollies was 'torch heaven'. I saw one of the colour-light torches I owned on here, post #17. Regrettably, the only 'classic' torch I now own is a NOS Ever Ready rubber torch from the 1970s, bought from the top, dusty shelf of a TV shop in Penrith as the owner was was closing down the business.
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28th Oct 2016, 12:26 pm | #29 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I used to have two trimlites and a penlite from the seventies. One of the trimlites was destroyed on one of the regular occasions when my mother gathered up 'junk' in a cardboard box, took it down the bottom of the garden and burnt it. The junk bit back on this occasion however as amongst it was half a dozen .40 to .50cal bullets which cooked off despite being nearly 100 years old at the time.
And people wonder why i still collect stuff! |
28th Oct 2016, 5:46 pm | #30 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
That looks just like the one I have. Last time I spotted it was about 2 years ago so it should still be there. I am pretty sure there were no batteries in it.
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28th Oct 2016, 7:27 pm | #31 |
Heptode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
My dad had one of those screwdriver/torch thingies. Stopped working as a torch long before I was born (1969) but it was a very good screwdriver...
Regards, Paul
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28th Oct 2016, 8:09 pm | #32 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I had the opposite experience with a (cheap HK) 1970's screwdriver torch: the screwdriver blades disintegrated under mild force, but I kept the handle in the car for use as a torch: no hot-spot like a conventional torch with a prefocussed bulb, so better for map reading.
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28th Oct 2016, 8:59 pm | #33 |
Octode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
They are collecting, must make me a collector ... I must admit to fitting a couple with Cree LED bulbs.
Tony |
28th Oct 2016, 9:31 pm | #34 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
From my 1929 SUNCO catalogue...
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29th Oct 2016, 6:45 pm | #35 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Hi,
Not a torch collector myself, but glad of the opportunity to show off the most reliable torch I've ever owned. I paid the princely sum of three quid for this Ever Ready hand lamp from the end-of-lines bin at our local newsagent way back in the very early 70s. It uses two 996 lantern batteries in parallel, which I found difficult to afford back then. Apart from a replacement lamp or two, it's been faultless. The hospital boiler house I worked in as a lad had a rechargeable version with a shallower battery case and an inbuilt charger. As a boy I received an Ever Ready 'Solar 2000' for Christmas. It had a two tone brown case. These were available in various sizes with different numbers of U2 or HP2 cells. Cheers, Pete.
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29th Oct 2016, 7:38 pm | #36 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I have no idea who owns these torches and other junk on these shelves.
A very early No8 battery can be seen behind that glass lamp shade together with some wood cased examples from the 'Dads Army'era. A much later No8 is seen in another picture together with an old AVO battery. The 'dog' torch dates from around 1952. You push his tail and he lights up. Sorry they didn't market a cat version. I think the whole lot should be scrapped in case I start collecting even more junk. Regards, John. |
29th Oct 2016, 9:28 pm | #37 | |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
Then I did a very silly thing... This was in the days before LED replacement lamps. I bought a 10W lamp from a bike shop, instead of the usual 2.5W (or whatever it was) and melted the reflector. D'oh!
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29th Oct 2016, 9:45 pm | #38 |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
I did something similar with a 1970's Ever-Ready front cycle lamp, the plastic type taking 2 x U2 cells with a bar and two bolts for attachment to the metal front lamp bracket of older bikes. As my journey to the station included a mile of unlit, unsurfaced, road and a poorly-lit tarmac path through the woods, I needed a light to see by rather than one to be seen, and fitted a 12V bulb powered by a rechargeable lead-acid battery that I kept in my briefcase. I didn't consider the effect of the extra heat on the plastic. It only melted the plastic threaded sleeve that holds the bulb in place, so the lamp did remain usable once the bulb was in position, but I replaced it with a metal front lamp from an old Miller dynamo set.
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30th Oct 2016, 2:42 pm | #39 | |
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
Quote:
Some good examples being shown and reminding me of some of the ones that I've had in the past that haven't survived. The three coloured torch that I showed in post #17 is one that I've had for a very long time but wasn't one that I bought, or had from new and I can't actually remember where it came from. However, I did have another version of this torch that I had new as a kid which had the centre of the lens blanked off with red and green cylinders that slid up round the bulb to produce the different colours. This torch disappeared many years ago, probably victim of rotting batteries. After looking in an old tool box, I've found another two of the screwdriver bits for the screwdriver torch shown in post #18, so that's three out of the original four - just one more to go for the complete set. |
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30th Oct 2016, 4:26 pm | #40 |
Nonode
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Re: Old torches - anyone here collect them?
The large Eveready hand lamps that take two PJ996 batteries are indeed a quality product, I have several of them.
No longer manufactured, but good examples turn up regularly on ebay. The recommended bulb was 5.4 volt, but I used the 4.75 volt bulbs intended for a single PJ996 or 4 D cells. This noticeably improved the light though at the cost of rather frequent bulb replacements. An LED bulb is a good upgrade, indeed one supplier of these LED bulbs features an Eveready powerbeam lantern in their advert. A 1 watt LED bulb should give approaching 100 hours service on one pair of batteries. A particular merit of this design of hand lamp is almost complete immunity from damage caused by leaking batteries. The batteries can and do leak, but provided that the lamp is stored the right way up, then the leak only affects the plastic base and not any metallic parts. |