Bodges

[G6Tanuki]

That speaker-replacement's not a total bodge - at least you used a proper piece of board as an adaptor.

In the past I've seen a small replacement speaker suspended over the hole where a larger speaker should have been, using four lengths of coathanger-wire twisted through the small speaker's mounting holes and then looped round the old mounting studs on the case.

Bass response was, er,,,, there really wasn't any!

[HamishBoxer]

Tidy and practical job I would say too.

[Denis G4DWC]

That modification looks fine to me and it keeps the set in use. It'll be part of it's history now. I did a similar mod to one of my Mayflower IIs when the speaker failed O/C. That taught me not to waggle the output valves when it was on in an attempt to clear an intermittent crackle.!

As an apprentice in the 60s I was repairing a rather large elderly radiogram. I had it hooked up to the Bench speaker and after fixing it, I have to say it sounded rather good.

Popped it back into the cabinet feeling quite pleased with myself, switched it on and there was no bass at all from it's own loudspeaker. Pulled the chassis out and put it back on the bench and it was fine. Put it back in the cabinet and it was still tinny. Poked the cone of its own 10" loudspeaker and it was moving freely and not rubbing. Removed the Speaker and I could immediately see what the problem was. Suspended behind this large loudspeaker was a small 4" jobby. Apparently the owners had bought this Gram from friends!

Some friends they must have been!!

Denis

[Keith956]

So at the weekend I picked up a Sony TC-366 reel to reel that was part of a house clearance. It was a bargain that I couldn't resist despite the seller saying it didn't work as far as he was aware.

Of course the first thing to check was the plug and the fuse. A 10A one, which was OK as there is an internal 0.8A fuse anyhow. But the twin power cord was wired to the earth and neutral!

Of course although the lights came on after that was fixed but there was no sign of life activating play, rewind etc. A quick check inside revealed the main motor belt has been replaced by a (much perished) rubber band.

It's definitely been 'got at'!

[HamishBoxer]

The classic I used to get, "my husband has had a look at it, he is a pit electrician" ! Agh!!

[Michael Maurice]

I had a Garrard slimline in for service, after a week it came back with the comment ‘not ejecting when playing LP’s, (45’s worked ok). He even supplied a Jim Reeves record.

Sure enough at the end of it, the arm just sat there. It might have been caused by the runout groove being eccentric like on a 78.

My ‘fix’ was to fit a piece of sleeving from a 3 core mains cable onto the pin which is part of the tone arm bracket and which pushes the sliding bar.

A bodge maybe but it works

[Dave Moll]

Originally Posted by Keith956

Of course the first thing to check was the plug and the fuse... But the twin power cord was wired to the earth and neutral!

Well, it's logical isn't it? After all, brown is the colour of earth.

Joking aside, I had a similar experience with an electric drill I bought at my local household auction - complete with a green PAT label*.

When I got it home, I plugged it in (uncharacteristically without checking the plug first) and zilch! Choice words were mumbled about having wasted my money. Anyway, I opened up the plug to find the same wiring scheme described above. After moving the brown wire to the line terminal, the drill gave me a number of years faithful service.

*I subsequently had the opportunity to observe the auction house's so-called Portable Appliance Test in progress. It simply consisted of a staff member plugging the appliance into a tester (without operating the appliance's on-switch) and pressing the button to check the absence of leakage to earth, then applying a label. No physical checks such as opening the plug to check state of wiring or the fitting of an appropriate fuse. In the case of my drill, operating the trigger would, of course, have created a leakage-to-earth fault.

At work we have "laser safe rooms" with all sorts of interlocks etc. the main one is a special dual gang mains socket with T shaped earth pins. Dual gang would be OK but for two things, 1) we test more than two instruments at once, this requires an multi output extension not being obtainable with "special" pins they are normal BS1363s. 2) The instruments have IEC (kettle) input connectors so any lead will do. Easily defeated by an idiot, luckily we don't have idiots doing this.

I made the extension leads and upon being PATed the operator didn't have a suitable socket for the special plug and (after reading their book) resorted to a visual inspection. This is the only time I have seen a PAT test include taking the plug top off for a look.

To keep up with the bodge themes and on topic, not taking the top off is a bodge.

[ChristianFletcher]

I think I recognise that gold foil coming out my fathers fag packet. I remember the foil was paper coated on one side.

[dglcomp]

Originally Posted by merlinmaxwell

I made the extension leads and upon being PATed the operator didn't have a suitable socket for the special plug and (after reading their book) resorted to a visual inspection. This is the only time I have seen a PAT test include taking the plug top off for a look.

To keep up with the bodge themes and on topic, not taking the top off is a bodge.

I always take the top off, how does the tester know that it not only has the right fuse, is wired correctly and all terminal screws are tight?

As for another bodge of mine, broken Henry at work with a faulty on/off switch. Now this one has the foot operated switch that numatic used for a while and couldn't be bothered to get a replacement.
So as a simple fix I removed the high/low motor speed controller and used it's switch as the power switch instead, wiring the motor directly to the mains inlet.
I've removed the motor speed control PCB in many other Henry's as that is known to fail and completely kills the vacuum cleaner, removal is much easier than replacement and it means the fault cannot reappear.

[emeritus]

Talk of fag packets reminds me that my early 1950's Hornby Dublo train set used a seperate mains transformer with 1 1/4" glass fuses in both poles of the 12VAC, 1A-rated, secondary, and a speed control unit that did the rectification and polarity reversal. The speed controller has an electromagnetic cut-out that was supposed to deal with the inevitable short circuit when something derailed, but at least one of the two transformer fuses always used to blow as well. Dad never smoked, but a visiting uncle used the foil from his fag packet wrapped round the dead fuses to get things going again. I suppose dad must have been using the fast-blow fuses he used for his radios rather than slow-blow types. I later fitted a couple of 10A BS 1363 plug fuses. The transformer still worked last time I tried it some 10 years ago.

[radiomobile]

Back in the 1950's it was quite common to boost the heaters of a tv's failing tube. A cheap way in a series chain was to fit a large w/w resistor of around of around 4.5k between the live mains (after the on/off switch) and the "hot" side of the heaters, the other heater pin being invariably connected to earth. This would pass an extra 70mA or so through the 300 mA heater. One local "engineer" used to drive a nail into the top corner of the wooden cabinet, connect it to the live side of the mains and string a surprisingly large number of old carbon resistors in series to make up the required resistance, to the "upper" heater pin. A sight to behold when the back cover was removed.

[Beobloke]

Originally Posted by dglcomp

I always take the top off, how does the tester know that it not only has the right fuse, is wired correctly and all terminal screws are tight?

Sadly most allegedly ‘qualified’ PAT testers seem to forget that the first step in the test is a visual inspection, plus fuse value and wiring safety check. I’ve lost count of the number of PAT-stickered audio items I’ve bought that have a 13A fuse in the plug!

Back on the bodge topic, I’ve never had a ‘fag paper’ encounter in a 13A mains plug, but I have had one where the screw for the Live pin was missing, so the item’s Live wire was simply pushed into one end of the fuse holder and held in by the fuse!

I suppose I should be grateful they’d put it on the right end...

[kellymarie]

A bodge I saw at work once was that they needed to run a transformer on test for a 24 hour heat run rather than leaving the whole test bay supply on all night someone got a 30 amp 3 phase switch fuse and then put 2 fuseholders on each phase the idea being to use 2 fuses in parallel then remove one from each phase when it was up and running. Unfortunately the inrush was so great that at switch on 2 of the fuses just disappeared with a brilliant blue flash and the loudest bang you've ever heard needless to say we never repeated the test that way. Incidentally we never found the remains of the fuses or holders

[ChristianFletcher]

When I first started designing control panels I would often be working with three phase but often with no neutral connection. At some point in the future I would find the need for a 230 volt supply perhaps to power a laptop or some other low current device maybe a hand lamp. Anyway I discovered the cabinet Earth makes a good stand in for missing neutral conductor. Obviously a silly and dangerous thing to do. I was young a foolish. As opposed to now being old and foolish. But sometimes getting the job done was more important than safety and I’m glad to say my priorities have changed with the years.

[Leon Crampin]

Many readers will be familiar with a traditional room thermostat using bimetal or bellows operated contacts with an accelerator resistor. An accelerator heater, often a 470k resistor overcomes the mechanical differential. Wired correctly, these devices work very well.

My brother moved into a house in which the heating temperature could not be accurately maintained. Examination revealed a 2 core and earth cable - accelerator not connected. After establishing that there was no RCD, I wired the neutral end of the accelerator heater to earth. Problem fixed without excavating the walls, but a bodge none the less.

My defence could be that it was bodged originally....

Leon.

[Brigham]

Originally Posted by ChristianFletcher

When I first started designing control panels I would often be working with three phase but often with no neutral connection. At some point in the future I would find the need for a 230 volt supply perhaps to power a laptop or some other low current device maybe a hand lamp. Anyway I discovered the cabinet Earth makes a good stand in for missing neutral conductor. Obviously a silly and dangerous thing to do. I was young a foolish. As opposed to now being old and foolish. But sometimes getting the job done was more important than safety and I’m glad to say my priorities have changed with the years.

Some 3-phase contactors have the operating coil between one phase and Earth, where there is no neutral, and the control circuit is rated for 240 volts.

[ChristianFletcher]

I have to come clean and say using the earth in place of a neutral was a bodge I used far too frequently. I worked on a lot of equipment with PLC controllers and needed to update software ffrequently and with only the three phase connectors without a neutral. Off course in the event of the Earth line being at fault you risk pulling the chassis upto a dangerous potential. Definitely not a recommended practice. Oh well I’m still here luckily

[Graham G3ZVT]

Originally Posted by Leon Crampin

Many readers will be familiar with a traditional room thermostat using bimetal or bellows operated contacts with an accelerator resistor. An accelerator heater, often a 470k resistor overcomes the mechanical differential. Wired correctly, these devices work very well.

My brother moved into a house in which the heating temperature could not be accurately maintained. Examination revealed a 2 core and earth cable - accelerator not connected. After establishing that there was no RCD, I wired the neutral end of the accelerator heater to earth. Problem fixed without excavating the walls, but a bodge none the less.

My defence could be that it was bodged originally....

Leon.

I had the same bodge on my thermostat, this was gone long before the CU was upgraded to one that incorporated an RCD, but thinking about it, 470k only accounts for 500 microamps, so it wouldn't have tripped. It would have failed a leakage test if the electrician did it properly.

[winston_1]

Originally Posted by radiomobile

Back in the 1950's it was quite common to boost the heaters of a tv's failing tube. A cheap way in a series chain was to fit a large w/w resistor of around of around 4.5k between the live mains (after the on/off switch) and the "hot" side of the heaters, the other heater pin being invariably connected to earth. This would pass an extra 70mA or so through the 300 mA heater. One local "engineer" used to drive a nail into the top corner of the wooden cabinet, connect it to the live side of the mains and string a surprisingly large number of old carbon resistors in series to make up the required resistance, to the "upper" heater pin. A sight to behold when the back cover was removed.

A 1µF capacitor was better. Gave around 75mA and extra heat in the cabinet.