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Got in on the tail-end of a recent episode of American Restoration and the guys had restored a 100-year-old electric car motor charger for a museum housing motorcar-related items. In spite of my best Internet searches, I couldn't find the item.

The charger was an interesting-looking contraption that had some sort of giant light-bulb attachment with a hand-cranked oscillator. In the "bulb" was a chemical that when agitated created an electrical charge.

If anyone can figure out what I'm talking about based on my inept description, all I can say is God bless you.

as always
Garrett Meadows

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That's it! Wow! This forum is a treasure chest of resourceful individuals. Thank you.
as always
Garrett M

Amazing what people then had to go thru to do what we take for granted today and equally amazing is they were able to do it with ingenuity and with what limited items were available. Thinking of that electrified chassis most likely out in the open in a garage like it is displayed and probably without much surrounding protection is also amazing. People were made of sterner stuff then and that setup and the glass tube reminded me of another old piece of equipment closer to home.

I've got books with a few photos of old xray equipment from the teens and twenties. Shielded cables and radiation safety items we take for granted were not in existence then. Bare copper rods over the xray area were used as conductors carrying several thousand volts and were just hanging from insulated attachments in the ceiling. The operator station for controlling the voltage to the rods was equally impressive with a chassis and bare switches a lot like the charger chassis.

To position the tube (which was just inches away from the patient in those days) over the part being examined the operator would reach up with a stick to move sliding connections along the bars as the tube holder was moved. The wires coming down to the tube were bare for the most part and the tube was sitting in an open holder over the patient. All was exposed to the world and throwing xrays in all directions.

To regulate the amount of xray the operator looked at the bare glass tube and adjusted the voltage for the right amount and color of glow. Several different tubes for various purposes. No such thing as consistency from day to day but since the average xray took seconds to minutes of exposure a good operator could usually dial it in fairly quickly. I know this side bit has nothing to do with battery chargers but it is about a charger of sorts. Just thousands of volts instead of tens. Has more to do with the look of the equipt but still it must have been exciting times.