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John Doran's
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Decades ago, while I was still in grade school, I borrowed a book from the school library and practically wore it to tatters reading it over and over again-- "The Boy's First Book of Radio and Electronics," by Alfred Morgan.

For some reason,  I never actually built a single one of the many radio and amplifier projects that Morgan had presented in his book.  I must have been more of a dreamer than a doer, way back then.

Well, in June of  2003, I ran across a copy of the book in a used book store and bought it.  The ensuing wave of nostalgia proved overwhelming, and before I knew it, I had ordered parts!
Tregenrear2.jpg
« Here is a rear view of  the one-tube Regenerative Receiver I built from the design shown in Morgan's book.

This is an example of "breadboard" construction; mounting all of the parts on a piece of wood rather than on an aluminum or steel chassis--a popular, inexpensive technique widely used in the early days of radio and electronics.
Tregenfront.jpg
« Here is the receiver's front panel.  I laser-engraved a piece of black-painted clear acrylic to make it, using the same technique described in the Design and Construction Notes for the D16/M minicomputer.
Tonetubeamp.jpg
« This is Morgan's transformer-coupled, one-tube audio amplifier, intended for use with the receiver.  As in the receiver itself, I substituted an older "Coke-bottle" envelope triode (a 6C5 G) for the miniature type 6BF6 that Morgan had specified in the book.
Ttwotubeamp.jpg
« Morgan also presented this little two-tube amplifier!  I kept the 6BF6 tubes for this one.  This amp, as shown in the book, had a fatal flaw even in the13th printing (easily fixed, though; see my Radio Notes)--making me wonder just how many kids actually built it.
Telimfront1.jpg
« Projects like Morgan's  were intended to be run on  radio "B" batteries; 22.5V, 45V, 67.5V, and 90V units were typical. You can still buy these batteries, but they are really expensive and last only a short while.  Why not build my line-operated "battery eliminator" power supply instead? 
Teliminside.jpg
« Here is a look inside the battery eliminator.  It contains two independent transformer-isolated dual-output regulated DC power supplies in one cabinet, arranged so that they may be connected in series to get the range of simulated battery voltages.  A separate filament transformer provides 6.3V AC for the tube heaters.
Documentation follows; Adobe PDF unless otherwise stated.

ELIMINATOR_SCH     Schematic diagram of the battery eliminator power supply.

radio_notes     (HTML) Construction Notes for the radio gear and battery eliminator.
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