Over the weekend I picked up 3 interesting bits of TE, a Avo 8 (NATO one), Advance J2B AF gen and a Racal Dana 9802, the latter appeared to be all working but subsequent investigation has shown that a gorilla has been let loose inside it and some major work is required, more on this later.
So after discovering the damage done by the gorilla, I decided to look at the J2B gen instead which was indeed working and by checking on a cope and frequency counter was working really well the body was in need of some TLC here and there but overall it was pretty good condition apart from the usual stickers applied in the most stupid of places. This thing is really heavy and open opening up revealed why, it has two transformers. Overall build impression was good, I got the image of a tank when I saw just how modular the frame was and the thickness of the metalwork is very generous. Apart from the application of some switch cleaner, the replacement of the power cable which had seen better days and also had the fibre filler cords all exposed at the switch terminations and had a burn half-way along its length right down to the cores was all the remedial work that was required. Because the voltages were spot on and the frequencies similarly within spec, I decided that the caps were also OK, no visible signs of leaking or distress, so I elected to leave them alone for now.
The chassis was thick with dust though and this was removed and revealed that the top of the chassis was tarnished or treated all over and was a dark grey in colour so no further attempt was made to return this shiny metal as it added to the originality of the thing. Just before reassembling the gen, I noticed the cleaning process had broken a cable to the 600ohm terminals. Closer inspection showed that the cable had corroded, so cut back, stripped and resoldered this termination and tested, all was OK. Re-assembled the case and the only thing to do now is to source a replacement carry handle for it which is proving to be a bit difficult as the only ones I can find are longer and will not fit the case because they are bigger then the case
This was originally made in Essex so its rather fitting in a way that it has returned to its roots in Essex once again.