32 Volt and 6 Volt Farm Radios

[Jeffhs]

Originally Posted by radiotvnut

I've got a Philco 32V tombstone that I bought out of the old ARC magazine, years ago. After getting the radio, it had a standard AC power plug with a big red tag hanging off the cord that said "32 VDC ONLY!" Well, after examining the radio, it was evident that someone didn't pay attention to the tag and plugged it into 120 VAC. I guess one of these days, I'll pull it out and try to fix it.

I'm not sure it can be repaired. If the tag was ignored and the set plugged into a 120-volt AC outlet, the set might well be damaged beyond repair. I wonder how it would have been possible to insert a plug designed to fit a 32-volt outlet into a 120-volt one, as the lower-voltage plug should have had a different arrangement of the prongs (round rather than flat, for example), to prevent such accidents from occurring in the first place. Outlets designed for use with 220-volt circuits have what is known as a crowfoot prong arrangement, into which only a matching plug may be inserted. It amazes me that the old 32-volt farm outlets were not designed the same way. If the former owner of your Philco radio had put a standard 120-volt AC plug (with flat prongs) on the end of the cord, he or she was just asking for trouble, even if there was a red warning tag on said cord. Some folks just don't heed warnings, a habit which can and often does have disastrous consequences.