Wireless Set No. 52 Canadian - Project

[David Dunlop]

Here are a few photos of the cleaning work on the Positive Cable from the Connectors Assembly.

The first three show the start of the process using the more aggressive of the two cleaners I like to use. The surprise here was the emergence of an actual red colour tone to the cotton loom. Part of the original condition, untreated loom is shown in each photo for comparison purposes. The second and third photos show how this cleaner can deal with dark, heavy duty stains.

The last photo shows the entire cable completed with the first cleaner and the second one. The second is a much milder solution that is great for light stains, but I use it here primarily to remove the first cleaner residue.

Once the cable is fully dry, I will mask the end terminals and looming, and hang it for application of the red shoe cream.


David

[David Dunlop]

I was able to get the Positive Cable prepped and hung this morning and a first coat of red shoe cream applied.

It will sit and set up for at least an hour before I brush it. This will remove the excess dried shoe cream residue and definitely lighten up the colour. It will simply be a case of repeating the shoe cream applications and brushing until the colour tone I am looking for is reached. At this point, I have no idea how many coats will need to be applied to get there. Like me, it’s a work in progress.


David

[David Dunlop]

I decided this morning to bite the bullet and see how easily I could remove the Negative Cable from the Bakelite Socket Assembly. It came out surprisingly easy compared to the Positive Cable the other day.

One tap on the wooden dowel and it popped back about one half inch and I could easily grab it and wiggle it free. It had accumulated about the same amount of salts build-up on the plating but I think the big difference in getting the two cables free was they were very tightly pressed together and the cording on both was in tight contact, thereby adding significantly to the resistance load. So the Positive one being first put up more of a fight.

As per the first photo, the excess salts have now been cleaned from the Negative Cable terminal socket.

The other two photos show the Bakelite Socket Assembly before and after getting cleaned up. Note that you can now easily see the ribbed outside surfaces of the brass screw fittings that were pressed into the Bakelite to provide a secure threaded connection for the four mounting screws of the front cover plate. When those were pressed into the brand new Bakelite 80 years ago, you can be sure they added a stress load to the surrounding Bakelite that probably has not diminished much over the years. The Bakelite will have aged significantly and it might not take much additional stress load for it to break around these small brass fittings today. Always a good idea to keep that in mind when tightening those 4-40 x ½-inch screws.

The other thing I noticed is the central hole in the Bakelite Socket assembly the long Clamping Screw passed through. Note the rough, broken rim. I found a small piece of broken Bakelite inside this assembly and the only place it could have come from is that rim. I will post a photo of it later as I think that originally on these sockets a tubular shaft may have been caste to guide the Clamping Screw passing through the socket.


David

[David Dunlop]

Here is the little mystery bit of Bakelite that was found in the Connectors socket assembly.

The curve of the piece matches that of the shattered rim around the central Clamping Screw hole. The wide end is actually a finished rim and the overall length is very close to one-quarter inch.

If the central Clamping Screw hole was formed with a quarter inch long tube projecting towards the front cover plate, then the half inch long threaded tip of the Clamping Screw would actually enter this tube before the threaded tip of the screw exited the front cover plate completely. The Clamping Screw would then slide smoothly towards and into the front panel of the Supply Unit.

As it currently stands, once the Clamping Screw clears the front cover panel of the Socket Assembly, it wobbles around enough that getting it into the hole at the back of the socket can be a bit of a challenge.

Be nice to see the insides of some other Connector Socket assemblies to see if more parts or a tube have survived, or even, perhaps a complete tube.


David

[David Dunlop]

Things took an interesting positive turn while working on the Negative Connectors Cable this last week.

I started with the usual cleaning to remove the years of waxy dirt accumulation, which resulted in pretty much the same amount of filth on my cleaning cloth as I obtained when cleaning the Positive Cable earlier. The surprise was in just how good a condition the original black coloured cotton loom was under all the dirt. So nice was it, I decided against applying any of the black shoe cream to it. Just a light rub of the Kiwi Neutral Shoe Polish and I was happy with the result.

Another find, or discovery, with the Negative Cable I had completely missed since obtaining the CONNECTORS, Twin, No. 17, was two little electrical tape patches on it. I have seen so many tape patches on electrical cables over the years, I rarely ever give them a second thought. They are always the same. A circular wrap of any number of layers of tape carefully wound over the damaged cable. These two were brand new to me, however. See the attached pictures.

When I first noticed them, I was looking at the full tape side and what struck me was that a rather wide roll of tape had been used to wrap the cable. Then, when I rolled to cable over to check for any possible loose end to the tape, I discovered these two repairs were not the usual circular warp of tape, but a careful build-up of several layers of rectangular cut patches of electrical tape. This was a first for me seeing this kind of repair. At first I thought the patches had shrunk and split but a careful look at the two opposite edges on both patches showed they were not the same lengths, even down through the layers.

I have no idea when these repairs were done, either in Military Service or in civilian life, but they are unusual enough to me to warrant they be preserved as is on the cable.


David

[David Dunlop]

It was very helpful that I switched over to work on the Negative Connectors Cable while waiting for the first coat of red shoe cream to set up on the positive cable. With the negative cable all cleaned up, I now had a reference point to match to regarding the overall look of both cables. I had not thought of it earlier, but there was a likely chance I could have over restored the look of the positive cable and had to try and redo it.

As it was, with the negative cable looking the way I wanted it, I rubbed back the excess polish on the positive cable and then applied a lighter second coat where needed of the red shoe cream and let it set up before a careful buffing.

Then came an application of the Neutral Boot Polish to cut the potpourri scent and help hold the arrived at red colour I wanted in the cotton loom, Yesterday, when I was giving the positive cable another buffing, it was still shedding far more colour than I liked, or expected. After thinking about it for a bit, I realized that with the wax base of the polishes in the cotton now, the only thing that could bind the colour to the cotton was a lacquer. Anything water based was not going to work at all. As it turned out, I had a can of Rust-oleum Painters Touch Flat Matte Clear Lacquer (#268390) on the shelf, so the positive cable got a light coat of that yesterday afternoon.

Checking the cable with a white cloth this morning showed the colour transfer is all but non-existent now and the outer surface of the cotton loom still looks and feels like cotton.

Next step will be to redo the cotton cording on the battery terminal ends of both cables.


David

[David Dunlop]

Today’s little adventure was to redo the cotton cording on the battery terminal ends of both Connectors Cables. I started with the negative cable as that cording had already started to unravel.

The first step was to determine the original length of the cording. This worked out well as a good shadow line had survived on both copper terminals. The length was found to be one inch. I then marked the start point for the cording on the cotton loom with a wrap of masking tape.

I did not realize the significance of the observation when I redid the negative cable cording, but a noticeable portion of the factory cotton twine appeared stuffed into the gap between the end of the cable covering and the end of the copper terminal fitting. I just assumed that had been a simple place to put the unravelling twine to keep it out of the way.

As I unwound the original twine, I came across a knot and then worked my way back down the loom to the tape. It was interesting to see how the cotton cording twine had cut into the cotton loom on the cable over time, and also how nicely the new cotton twine fit right into those grooves as I redid the cording. I did wonder, however, how I was going to deal with the gap between the covering and the terminal fitting. One often finds a wrap of the old cloth electrical tape covering such gaps but no sign of any at all in this application. So I went with what I had on hand and cut a length of twine, which I wound tightly into the gap to fill it in level as best I could, tied it off and trimmed it. I then proceeded to do the cording. The last time I had done this I was annoyed by the large spool of twine bouncing around the work desk while using it, so this time I rigged a temporary spool holder off to the side, which worked a treat! The final transition from cable to fitting was not as smooth as I had hoped but liveable. The big problem to me was the cotton twine was far too white.

Since the twine was going to get an acrylic top coat when finished, I thought I would use a bit of stale tea and brush it on to the twine to colour it up a bit. Two light coats gave it a nice light beige colour I was happy with and also helped tighten up the twine a bit as it dried. It then got a good top coat of satin Urethane finish to seal it in place.

Things got interesting when I started working on the positive cable. I found the end of the twine tucked under the battery terminal end of the twine, freed it up and started unwinding it. It unwound right passed the gap and continued on towards the marker masking tape I had placed at the starting point for this cording. When I got to the tape, at the last band of twine, it jumped back to the gap again and stopped at a knot. I was able to lift the knot just enough to cut the twine behind it and unravel the section that had been wrapped into the gap. In the second photo you can see the two pieces of original twine. The negative piece is on top and the positive one below it.

So now I realize how they dealt with the cable gap when cording these cables. They started by carefully infilling the gap tightly with twine. When they got to the top, they tied the infill off and then brought the twine down the loom to the required start point for the cording and started the wrapping process back down the cable to the battery fitting. In the process, all the twine leading to the gap, and in the gap, disappears. Armed with that newfound knowledge, I carefully duplicated the process when cording the positive cable and was quite pleased with the transition point and final look. That cording also got the tea stain treatment (coffee would probably work just as well) and the top coast of satin acrylic.

Both cables should be fully cured by tomorrow so I can reassemble the CONNECTORS, Twin, No. 17 and plug the Main 52-Set back in. I have actually missed listening to it over the last week or so.

By the way, in the last photo, no matter how I tried, the camera wanted to make the new cording look ‘camera white’. In real life, it is very much a nice cream colour.


David