The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
On Thu 20/10/2022 11:58, nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do
people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
Probably the best are Sony units, any of the Eton or Sangean brands are
cheap and usually effective, and don't forget Roberts and Philips.
On 20/10/2022 14:12, Woody wrote:
On Thu 20/10/2022 11:58, nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do
people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
Probably the best are Sony units, any of the Eton or Sangean brands are
cheap and usually effective, and don't forget Roberts and Philips.
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
On 20/10/2022 14:53, Jeff Layman wrote:
On 20/10/2022 14:12, Woody wrote:
On Thu 20/10/2022 11:58, nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do >>>> people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
Probably the best are Sony units, any of the Eton or Sangean brands are
cheap and usually effective, and don't forget Roberts and Philips.
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
Lovely little frequency scanning radio that before the internet went everywhere with me all over the world. I had the capacitors replaced as
I didn't have the confidence to tackle it myself. Two problems. One
was finding someone who would do a little soldering job these days (due
to health and safety concerns if done commercially apparently) and the
other was having to accept somewhat oversized capacitors because the originals were so small. That didn't bother me though. Now works
perfectly.
On 20/10/2022 14:53, Jeff Layman wrote:
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
I don't that only applies to 'digital' radios. Watch The Repair Shop
and the first thing their electronics man does is to change capacitors
even with 'steam' radios.
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people
have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
On 20/10/2022 11:58, nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking about
being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people
have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
I recently bought one of these https://www.argos.co.uk/product/9162578 but
it doesn't come with a mains adapter. I work it with 4xAA rechargeable batteries.
--
Max Demian
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
On Thu 20/10/2022 11:58, nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking about
being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people
have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
Probably the best are Sony units, any of the Eton or Sangean brands are
cheap and usually effective, and don't forget Roberts and Philips.
On Thu, 20 Oct 2022 16:08:06 +0100, MB <MB@nospam.net> wrote:
On 20/10/2022 14:53, Jeff Layman wrote:
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
I don't that only applies to 'digital' radios. Watch The Repair Shop
and the first thing their electronics man does is to change capacitors
even with 'steam' radios.
Likewise Mr Carlson, and all the others who restore old radios on
Youtube, though Mr Carlson actually measures the electrical
performance of the old capacitors, using measuring equipment he has
built himself, in order to show us why they need replacing.
Then there's Alex at Northridge Fix, also on Youtube, who does
electronic microsurgery on modern surface mount circuitry (computers,
games consoles, electronic keyfobs etc), and evidently has to replace
a lot of fairly new capacitors. The first thing he does (after a
visual inspection of course) is to get the meter out and check at
strategic points on the board for short circuits. If it's not a MOSFET
it's usually a capacitor.
Rod.
I've been wondering how many people haven't twigged that their gas
central heating needs electric to run the motor and control system.
You really need a wind up radio. I'd have thought a lot of these should be around at the moment.
On 21/10/2022 10:05, Brian Gaff wrote:
You really need a wind up radio. I'd have thought a lot of these
should be
around at the moment.
The problem with a lot of wind ups is that they really work by charging
an NiMH battery, which has a limited storage life, and also they don't extract enough power from the winder to charge in a reasonable time.
The original Bayliss ones did use clockwork for energy storage, but even
they abandoned that design. I don't know what their wind time to play
time ratio was.
On 20/10/2022 17:56, Jim Lesurf wrote:
I've been wondering how many people haven't twigged that their gas
central heating needs electric to run the motor and control system.
Certainly one of my neighbours questioned, on WhatsApp, why their
heating didn't work during a power failure. With our financial services >driven and personal service backed, economy, very few people actually
need to know about how things work.
I hope if deliberate power cuts are planned, they will be done to some
kind of timetable with advanced warnings, with instructions on which
items need to be properly shut down in advance, otherwise there may be
a lot of technology that doesn't work properly when restarted.
On 20/10/2022 14:53, Jeff Layman wrote:
As long as they aren't digital. I have a Sony ICF SW1 (although it
hasn't worked for years - it needs to have the capacitors replaced).
I don't that only applies to 'digital' radios. Watch The Repair Shop
and the first thing their electronics man does is to change capacitors
even with 'steam' radios.
On 21/10/2022 in message <4315lh90thjuc0d66g0ejmtjhlfg6tf41t@4ax.com> >Roderick Stewart wrote:
I hope if deliberate power cuts are planned, they will be done to some
kind of timetable with advanced warnings, with instructions on which
items need to be properly shut down in advance, otherwise there may be
a lot of technology that doesn't work properly when restarted.
They seem to be planning things:
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11329425/Government-documents-reveals-blackouts-managed-starting-three-power-cuts-week.html
Be careful, it's the Daily Mail, click in the wrong place and goodness
knows what you might see.
On 21/10/2022 10:05, Brian Gaff wrote:
You really need a wind up radio. I'd have thought a lot of these
should be around at the moment.
The problem with a lot of wind ups is that they really work by charging
an NiMH battery, which has a limited storage life, and also they don't extract enough power from the winder to charge in a reasonable time.
On mine, I did discover that you can get at the NiMH pack, which is
probably cordless phone one, to replace it, but decided it wasn't worth
it.
On 20/10/2022 17:56, Jim Lesurf wrote:
I've been wondering how many people haven't twigged that their gas
central heating needs electric to run the motor and control system.
Certainly one of my neighbours questioned, on WhatsApp, why their
heating didn't work during a power failure. With our financial services driven and personal service backed, economy, very few people actually
need to know about how things work.
In article <titqij$js07$1@dont-email.me>, David Woolley <david@ex.djwhome.demon.invalid> wrote:
On 21/10/2022 10:05, Brian Gaff wrote:
You really need a wind up radio. I'd have thought a lot of these
should be around at the moment.
The problem with a lot of wind ups is that they really work by charging
an NiMH battery, which has a limited storage life, and also they don't
extract enough power from the winder to charge in a reasonable time.
On mine, I did discover that you can get at the NiMH pack, which is
probably cordless phone one, to replace it, but decided it wasn't worth
it.
With mine, I'd made battery packs that are external to the radio. So they
can easily be charged. And easy to have more than one charged set/pack to swap when the one that's been in use needs to be recharged.
The annoyance is that all the commercial NiMH rechargers I've seen require the individual cells to be connected and then only charge 2 or 4 at a time. Pest when I tend to use six or more. But I just use one or more charging arrangements in parallel as required.
I have 2 Tronic chargers from Lidl which will charge AA, AAA and PP3 in combinations from 1 to (for one of them) 8 at a time - odd or even. Not designed for commercial use but they have had heavy use here. More
recent versions still appear in Lidl from time to time. And it seems elsewhere
https://www.batterylogic.co.uk/tronic-universal-battery-charger.asp
Even better would be one that charges sets in series via a lead. That way I could keep them in their battery holders. But I guess no-one caters for
that. Too DIY!
How does the system in electric cars deal with it, I wonder? presumably
they have*lots* of cells in series as well as parallel.
On 22/10/2022 15:20, Jim Lesurf wrote:
Even better would be one that charges sets in series via a lead. That
way I could keep them in their battery holders. But I guess no-one
caters for that. Too DIY!
You would be limited to C/10 charge rates, and probably to NiCd
chemistry, as higher rates require monitoring individual cells, and I
have a feeling that NiMH is not so tolerant of overcharging at C/10, and really needs positive end of charge detection.
I'm not sure how PP3 chargers handle end of charge, although they may
rely on close matching of the cells or on good thermal contact between
the (dV/dt is based on the effect of temperature rises).
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
On Thu, 20 Oct 2022 11:58:51 +0100
nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do
people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/long-wave-radio/s?k=long+wave+radio
On 22/10/2022 15:20, Jim Lesurf wrote:
Even better would be one that charges sets in series via a lead. That
way I
could keep them in their battery holders. But I guess no-one caters for
that. Too DIY!
You would be limited to C/10 charge rates, and probably to NiCd
chemistry, as higher rates require monitoring individual cells, and I
have a feeling that NiMH is not so tolerant of overcharging at C/10, and really needs positive end of charge detection.
I'm not sure how PP3 chargers handle end of charge, although they may
rely on close matching of the cells or on good thermal contact between
the (dV/dt is based on the effect of temperature rises).
On Mon 24/10/2022 15:43, pinnerite wrote:
On Thu, 20 Oct 2022 11:58:51 +0100
nothanks@aolbin.com wrote:
The recent discussion about emergency transmissions got me thinking
about being a little more prepared than now ... what recommendations do
people have for reasonably-priced non-DAB battery/mains receivers?
https://www.amazon.co.uk/long-wave-radio/s?k=long+wave+radio
If any reader is worried about a mushroom cloud, the answer is to
find/get a valve radio as the EMP produce by the big bang doesn't affect >them, only semiconductors.
I've got an old Bush AC11 in the loft that I remember as our general
wireless when I was about 4 or 5 (and I'm now well over the old pension
age!) Live chassis and may need some new smoothing caps but I bet it
will work!
On Mon, 24 Oct 2022 16:19:25 +0100, Woody <harrogate3@ntlworld.com>
wrote:
If any reader is worried about a mushroom cloud, the answer is to
find/get a valve radio as the EMP produce by the big bang doesn't affect
them, only semiconductors.
I've got an old Bush AC11 in the loft that I remember as our general
wireless when I was about 4 or 5 (and I'm now well over the old pension
age!) Live chassis and may need some new smoothing caps but I bet it
will work!
Probably not for very long from batteries though.
On 23/10/2022 11:55, David Woolley wrote:
On 22/10/2022 15:20, Jim Lesurf wrote:
Even better would be one that charges sets in series via a lead. That
way I could keep them in their battery holders. But I guess no-one
caters for that. Too DIY!
You would be limited to C/10 charge rates, and probably to NiCd
chemistry, as higher rates require monitoring individual cells, and I
have a feeling that NiMH is not so tolerant of overcharging at C/10,
and really needs positive end of charge detection.
NiMH cell data sheets typically recommend maximum continuous trickle
charge should be C/20, C/40 or even lower for some smaller types.
In article <jrnt7qFu7ppU1@mid.individual.net>, Brian Gregory <void-invalid-dead-dontuse@email.invalid> wrote:
On 23/10/2022 11:55, David Woolley wrote:
On 22/10/2022 15:20, Jim Lesurf wrote:
Even better would be one that charges sets in series via a lead. That
way I could keep them in their battery holders. But I guess no-one
caters for that. Too DIY!
You would be limited to C/10 charge rates, and probably to NiCd
chemistry, as higher rates require monitoring individual cells, and I
have a feeling that NiMH is not so tolerant of overcharging at C/10,
and really needs positive end of charge detection.
NiMH cell data sheets typically recommend maximum continuous trickle
charge should be C/20, C/40 or even lower for some smaller types.
So it is 'safe' to constant current recharge NiMH provided the current is very low?
Some years ago my practice with recharging NiCads was to use a pulsed
charge as experience with electroforming showed that prevents crystal 'spikes' forming and gives a uniform structure to the deposit. However
since then I've just used low constant current as it seems fine.
The NiMH cells I have are mostly AA. I'll see if I can find some
plots/tables of how the voltage changes with charge level and where it
should be stopped. Then experiment with some old examples.
I've been using trickle chargers for AA and AAA NiMH cells for many
years without any problem. The batteries sometimes get a bit warm, but
they appear to be lasting a long time. I don't know what currents they supply, but 2100 mAH AAs are said to take 16 hours and 1000 mAH AAAs 28 hours. The chargers don't tell you when the cells are charged though.
Cells are charged in pairs and, I think, you can charge different pairs
at a time. They also charge PP3s but I don't have any.
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