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Old 1st May 2013, 8:53 am   #201
Tractorfan
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Smile Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Hi,
Is this what you were thinking of? I used to have the matching plug, but I think it's been lost in the mists of time. There are no markings on it apart from "RADIO".
Cheers, Pete
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Old 1st May 2013, 8:00 pm   #202
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

I've got a matching plug on my '30s GEC extension speaker.

My primary school had these sockets in every classroom with C&S speakers connected to them.

Nick
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Old 1st May 2013, 10:19 pm   #203
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

My school had 3-pin sockets of this type in some classrooms too. A 1952 Belling-Lee catalogue identifies the 3-pin plug type as being in accordance with BS666.

The 1936 Bulgin catalogue has 2 pin [unillustrated] and 4 pin [similar configuration] types, the 4 pin type being for use with speakers having energised field coils.
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Old 2nd May 2013, 1:07 pm   #204
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

My primary school had the 2 pole versions with a switch box to select channels of radio. I think it was centre OFF one side PROG1 the other PROG 2. In practice it was always switched to the side which gave the 'Home Service' so we could cavort about to the exhortations of Miss Percival (Music & Movement), once a week. Heaven knows what would have happened had teacher's hand slipped and the 'Light Programme' been selected; the effect of those Beat Combos on our tender minds .......
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Old 2nd May 2013, 9:06 pm   #205
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Hi Gents, this type of plug was used in schools and homes in NE England as part of the Reddifusion "wired sound" system. It used 100v line distribution and 4 programmes were available. Selector switch was usually by a rear window and a resistive "chain" fader was fitted to the speaker box. This connected to the selector switch by the plug/ socket shown.

Ed
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Old 4th May 2013, 3:19 pm   #206
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

We had this in Rammy until the mid nineties Ed for TV/Radio. I think Dave Moll has the selector switch from my house on Bury New Road. I thought the signals came out on a 9 Meg feed [twisted pair] or have I got that wrong? The ref to a 100v line has confused me. Don't want to go off topic with this but I am relying on the "some other questions" aspect of the Thread Title to meet the regulations.
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Old 4th May 2013, 5:01 pm   #207
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

The schools in our area had some sort of radio/gram hidden away somewhere and C&S speakers with switched volume controls. I thought they switched resistors but they could just have well been transformer taps.

Just seeing the connector re-creates the sounds ding-de-dong, ding-de-dong, DING-DE-DONG, DING-DE-DONG, BONG! Are you sitting comfortably?

David
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Old 4th May 2013, 8:43 pm   #208
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Hi Dave W, 100v line was for radio, TV was on separate leads, probably twisted as you say and screened. From memory it was about an 8 meg signal.

Ed
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Old 4th May 2013, 10:42 pm   #209
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Thanks for the clarification Ed. At least I wasn't entirely folowing the wrong "lead".

Dave W
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Old 13th Jul 2013, 5:31 pm   #210
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

I picked up a few 1956 editions of Practical Householder last weekend and found this advert for "The King Pin".

Oddly at the same market but a totally unrelated stall, someone had one of these very plugs and a scrap of old fabric cord attached to it (covered in mud). The joker wanted £15!!!! So I bid him farewell.

Anyway, interesting ad nontehless
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Old 13th Jul 2013, 9:38 pm   #211
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Surely fuses don't blow often enough for this to have ever been of any use...?
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Old 15th Jul 2013, 10:28 am   #212
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Oh yes they did !
Back in the good old days, when power sockets were rather a new idea, fuses blew regularly.
Some appliances used a full 15 amps and therefore got through 13 amp fuses regularly.

And of course mains voltages differed, I doubt that a 110 volt heater would have survived long on 240 volts, but many old 210 or 220 volt heaters got used in 240 volt districts and used 16 amps or so.

I remember a relative who had an old fashioned 3 bar electric heater in which I noticed that the elements seemed bright orange rather than dull red.
I found out later that the elements were designed for 200/210 volts.
They threw it out when moving to a house with the new fangled 13 amp sockets because it kept blowing fuses. It worked fine on a 15 amp plug, probably with a 20 amp fuse at the fuseboard.
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Old 24th Sep 2013, 5:20 am   #213
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Smile Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Here's a 1906 Hubbell Catalog of US electric sockets and receptacles.

http://archive.org/details/Electrica...No.9August1906

Gene
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Old 24th Sep 2013, 2:20 pm   #214
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Fascinating read Gene, particularly liked the table lamp, thanks for that link.
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Old 25th Sep 2013, 12:03 am   #215
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Thanks. I'm glad you liked it. This catalog also gave me a clear look into early American plug technology. I was told appliances could either be hard-wired or fitted with an Edison base. There might have been other plug-socket schemes,but Hubbell's won out.

It's interesting that he started with a tandem blade design, then for some odd reason settled on the parallel blade (NEMA 1-15 or 125V/15A) design that we have to this day for household use.

The tandem design was not discontinued,but assigned as a NEMA 2-15 or a 250V/15A plug.

For a while 120V outlets were designed to take both. Here is a 1940s era socket in my bathroom.
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Old 2nd Apr 2014, 9:07 pm   #216
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Hello forum. I'm newly joined. Attached is a quick sketch (from memory) of a British plug and socket that I'm trying to identify.

My childhood home was built some time around 1900. Each room in the house had one socket of the type shown, fitted to the skirting board.

Both plug and socket were heavy duty (about 1.75-2.00 inches in diameter), with large diameter pins. I think they were rated at 15A. I remember one plug was fitted to a two-bar reflector fire, another to a Cossor valve radio. Unusual features of the plug were the brass case, and the ‘goose-neck’ flexible metal sheath to provide strain relief (some had a moulded rubber sleeve instead). A pair of brass ears were held in place by a knurled cap, to ease removal of the plug.

I've never seen a similar connector in any other house, then or since. I've trawled the internet for some years now, hoping to see a similar example, but with no luck.

All clues gratefully accepted.
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Old 3rd Apr 2014, 5:41 pm   #217
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Smile Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Hi,
It looks a bit like the industrial plugs & sockets that used to be made by 'Reyrolle'. The power station I used to work at used them for the 110volt portable power tool system. We also had a miniature version for the 25volt SELV hand lamps.
The 250volt version had a different keyway to avoid the wrong socket being used.
Maybe your house had a domestic version?
Cheers, Pete.
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Old 3rd Apr 2014, 7:14 pm   #218
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

That looks like it could be a derivative of the "Niphan" military/industrial-type plugs/sockets. They were also used extensively in the railways-world.
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Old 3rd Apr 2014, 11:11 pm   #219
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

Definitely industrial, probably "liberated" from somewhere. Given your location, possibly a mine?
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Old 4th Apr 2014, 2:19 am   #220
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Default Re: Another unusual plug and some other questions

I have only just noticed #216 and the most interesting linked Hubbell catalogue, having been taken ill on holiday last year when it was originally posted.

In my earlier post #68 I mentioned Hubbell's patent US776,326. Pages 52 -57 of the catalogue feature "Multiple Attachment Plugs" similar to those shown in that patent, but modified for the then-new flat pin plugs. Pages 56 and 57 indicate that the illustrated example of a plug for a "receptacle of any ordinary type" shown in Figs 2, 3 and 4 of the patent, and which Hubbell implicitly acknowledges was already in use before his patent was filed in 1903, was called a "Chapman Receptacle". Google produced a photo of one here:

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/or...d8eba434e3.jpg

as well as a few examples of early literature where such receptacles are mentioned. Its contact arrangement is similar to the "Kliegl" connector that was used for studio/stage lighting well into the second half of the 20th century, but whereas the Kliegl has a resilient contact on the plug, the Chapman has resilient receptacle contacts.

If I ever get round to learning how to make entries on Wikipedia, I might correct the caption to the drawing of the early Hubbell plug of US 774,250 (filed on the same date as US 776,326 and showing the same type of plug) that, at the time of writing, appears on the "AC power plugs and sockets" pages. I am sure I saw the drawing and caption some years ago in an account of Hubbell's history that used to appear on their web site, and which has since been revised.

Thanks, Gene, for clearing up that mystery!

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