1910 radio, crystal set

[vintagecollect]

I just got a 1910 pat. date radio coil, married w/ a 1915 heaphones, w/ a solid state diode for better performance. Volume is medium, even loud somewhat depending on skip at times where headphone can be placed away from ears and still be easily heard .. Good earth ground and antenna coupled near one of the sets wires I believe produce a regen. effect to make station louder. A six to ten ft. antenna wire is all that's needed. CAN anybody show pics or plans to make a 1910 galena crystal detector setup? What does the double detectors do like in early AK sets???

DOES anybody here have a pre1919 or 1918 set here? Info is hard to find. NICE forever set, nothing to fail.

[leadlike]

Nice set. Very little info on these early sets, as most were homebrew. The headsets looks like Baldwins, which are the ideal crystal set headphones. Are they type C's? If so, I believe they continued to sell those headphones well into the early 20s.

[Dangler]

I don't know if this is what you are looking for or not. Thought I would post it anyway. I built one like this about 50 years ago!

[jr_tech]

If all else fails, Amazon has a few books such as this:

http://www.amazon.com/Radios-That-Wo...7513273&sr=8-1

I got the spiral bound copy years ago... but I think that it was only about 10-15 bucks then.

not affiliated,
jr

[Jeffhs]

Are you sure of the patent date on that crystal set? Commercial radio broadcasting in the United States did not begin until 1920. Anyone who had one of these sets in 1910 almost certainly had nothing to listen to, unless one counts experimental and/or amateur stations.

[N2IXK]

You can buy mounted chunks of galena and the cat whisker detector stands that they go into here:

http://www.xtalman.com/detectors.html

If you want to make the whole thing yourself, there is a good starting point here:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Buil...sker-detector/

[jr_tech]

For grins, here are a few pix of my 1920s Steinite xtal receiver. The xtal mount is fairly clearly shown in pix 2.

The patent date, IMHO does not really date your coil, as it is valid for 17 years after issue date... coil could have been made in the 20s, or it could have been used in the era of "spark gap" code transmissions in the teens.

jr

[Reece]

There were plenty of kids and men who experimented with radio fifteen years and more before broadcasting became common in the twenties. They built receivers, strung antennas, learned code, listened for code stations, and built transmitters from spark coils. This was going on from the early 1900's. Here and there some developed ways to transmit voice and phonograph records, etc. Here are a couple of boys transmitting and receiving in 1904. This website has many other interesting articles.

http://earlyradiohistory.us/1904ama.htm

[bgadow]

I had a crystal set given to me, a homebrew with a 'Quaker Oats' coil (you can kinda read the label around the wire). I need to study it some more to learn just how to use it, there are a number of adjustments. With some fiddling I can pick up one station fairly clear (WBT-Charlotte, I think my antenna must be just right for them) but not a lot of volume.

[vintagecollect]

Thanks for response one and all. What year is that article dangler, I've never seen a double slider coil?
This is basically the same as a loose coupler coil, just w/o the loose part. I believe this to be an early coil, is larger than most coils and lacks bakelite anywhere in construction. I have not seen any coil similair to this.

I believe this to be used when radio was experimental and or for wireless gap too.
The loose coupler coils go for a lot of money and accomplish same thing, most don't have any patent dates, teens mostly.
Yes, those are type C headphones, They ARE awesome!


Can anyone tell me what the benefit of a double galena detector like AK's does?

Does anyone have 1910 to 1915 galena construction details to give my set a period correct detector?

Thanks for early web info, info is sparse and scattered.

IS there any clubs that Have this type of stuff? I've had complicated inventions from last century, primitive items are zero maintainance.

I recently got interested in these, to have an early tube radio, you want early tubes. Those tubes are only getting more expensive. Just too involved for my interests.

[leadlike]

Not to throw us too far off topic, but I highly recommend this article on a 1912 wireless set found almost totally intact at a garage sale! M.H. Dodd's station is important in that the equipment gives you a wonderful idea of what people who were into wireless were doing at the time; from the silver dimes soldered onto the key contacts, to reading all the pubs Gernsback was putting out:

http://www.radioblvd.com/DoddStation.html

[jr_tech]

Have you looked around on this board?

http://theradioboard.com/rb/viewforum.php?f=2

jr

[Reece]

A modern 1N34 or = diode will be as good or better (and a lot less trouble) than an early galena crystal where you scratch around with a catwhisker. Many different schemes were tried like double galena etc. but didn't prove to be any more sensitive than one good chunk of rock. However, a good piece of galena and a period-correct detector is fun to operate and is a trip back in time. Here are some pictures of various old and new galena/catwhisker setups:

http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isc...1489l1.11l12l0

And here are some raw parts for building your own detector stand:

http://www.google.com/search?tbm=isc...1489l1.11l12l0

You can buy the already mounted galenas as shown. I have also bought a hunk of galena about the size of a golf ball from a rock shop and it has a lot of hot spots on it and would yield enough to make dozens of detectors.

[Dangler]

Originally Posted by vintagecollect

Thanks for response one and all. What year is that article dangler, I've never seen a double slider coil?
This is basically the same as a loose coupler coil, just w/o the loose part. I believe this to be an early coil, is larger than most coils and lacks bakelite anywhere in construction. I have not seen any coil similair to this.

I believe this to be used when radio was experimental and or for wireless gap too.
The loose coupler coils go for a lot of money and accomplish same thing, most don't have any patent dates, teens mostly.
Yes, those are type C headphones, They ARE awesome!


Can anyone tell me what the benefit of a double galena detector like AK's does?

Does anyone have 1910 to 1915 galena construction details to give my set a period correct detector?

Thanks for early web info, info is sparse and scattered.

IS there any clubs that Have this type of stuff? I've had complicated inventions from last century, primitive items are zero maintainance.

I recently got interested in these, to have an early tube radio, you want early tubes. Those tubes are only getting more expensive. Just too involved for my interests.

It's from 1923. The article came from a small booklet called "100 Radio Hookups" by Maurice L. Muhleman. It was published by The E.I. Company. I don't know if that was a forerunner of EICO or not. It pretty much covers everything from crystal sets to Regerative, Neutrodyne and Super Heterodyne radios using anywhere from one tube to six tubes.

There is one interesting diagram that uses a crystal detector and one tube for audio amplification. Probably an 01A.

If you,or anyone else,would like some of the diagrams,I would be more than happy to post them. There is a total of 48 pages. I also have another booklet titled "All American Radio-Hookups" by Rauland MFG. Co. It's also from 1923 and covers homebrew sets using only tubes. I'm sure some of you have heard of All American Mohawk. Same outfit. Hope this helps. Good luck. Dan

[old_coot88]

There was an interesting project in Popular Electronics (it might have been Electronics Illustrated) when hobby transistors first became available back in the late '50s. It was for a "free power" amplifying crystal set. It consisted of two receivers running off a single longwire antenna (though the 'crystals' used were 1N34 diodes). The first receiver used the carrier of a strong local station to provide rectified DC (a volt or so) to power a one-transistor amplifier. The second receiver could tune to any station and feed the audio to the transistor which amplified it, using nothing but the "free power" from the first station's carrier.