Old tech I’ve never heard of

DickCappels

Joined Aug 21, 2008
10,661
They were used the same as transistors between the time Julius Lilenfeld invented MOSFETs in the 1920's and Bell Labs commercialized bipolar transistors in the early 1950's.
 

camerart

Joined Feb 25, 2013
3,831
Hi,
I worked in an electricity museum, with lots of odd equipment, but I'll save you from a long list.

My first house had gas pipes under the floor boards and in the walls.

I sold a high voltage oscilloscope on ebay, from here in the UK, to New York. The man asked me how much the postage would be and it was about £58. The item was quite expensive, but he paid up front including the postage, + £20 for my trouble. I tracked it to the NY postal depot, where they marked it 'incorrect address return to sender' I frantically search for the man to ask him to pick it up, but he was rather unconcerned. It arrived, to my relief.
The man is the New York vigilante (Look him up)
C.
 

ronsimpson

Joined Oct 7, 2019
4,702
Before I could really read, got a book about Marconi. (Mom read to me) I built a very simple spark gap transmitter. Used a lantern battery for power and coat hangers for antenna. Some where I have the telegraph key. Wound coils on toilet paper tubes. (was not pretty like the picture)
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Thread Starter

Wolframore

Joined Jan 21, 2019
2,619
I didn't mean to troll you guys, I was at the tail end of the tube era, our Zenith TV had tubes... I had a blown rectifier tube in my electromagnetic vise, I replaced it a 4 diodes and it works great. I like the old stuff, they had so much presence... it's easy to tell people "don't touch" when you have 300-400 V plate voltage.
 

Ramussons

Joined May 3, 2013
1,568
How about 48 Volt power plants for Telephone Exchanges using Magnetic Amplifiers? They were, perhaps, the first Solid State Devices.
 

DickCappels

Joined Aug 21, 2008
10,661
I am surprised nobody mentioned this. I spent many nights when I was supposed to be sleeping listening to talk radio from San Francisco, 50 miles away.

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