# electronic part



## james122964 (Dec 28, 2013)

I got some old telcom boards that have black parts that seem to be diodes the look like tiny rootbeer barrel candies and have 106A on them they do not have the anode or cathode marking like diodes but have crystal inside and appear to be silver soldered to the 2 conductor leads 

the insulating black plastic is very thick 

anyone who knows what they are help would be appreciated 
also links for ceramic ic from 1986/87 would help


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## resabed01 (Dec 28, 2013)

I've been working with electronics for 40 years now and have practically seen everything out there but your description leaves me baffled.

Perhaps a picture would be better? 

All diodes and Tantalum caps will be marked for polarity. Early MLCCs were encapsulated in black epoxy or glass and had axial/radial leads. Maybe that's what it is.


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## butcher (Dec 29, 2013)

There are many different types of diodes, not all of them may be marked with a polarity (although the majority are), some even can look like transistors (except with two legs) or can look like capacitors, rectifiers and diodes come in many shapes and sizes, some can even have more than two leads (although these types are not the common rectifier).
https://www.google.com/search?q=diode+rectifier+circuit&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Ss2_Ur-SLIfmoATNxoGICA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1024&bih=587#q=types+of+diode+rectifier+&tbm=isch

I have an old battery charger that has a diode that looks like a big light bulb (Tungar tube diode).
https://www.google.com/search?q=diode+rectifier+circuit&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Ss2_Ur-SLIfmoATNxoGICA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1024&bih=587#q=Tungar+tube+diode&tbm=isch


106A, does not look familiar and I did not find it in my cross reference, and search of data sheet does not look promising of what you describe, although aftermarket replacement sometime use their own numbers, are their any other numbers letters or symbols on the part?

I agree pictures and stating Numbers or manufacture symbols can give more clues to help decide what you might have.


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## james122964 (Dec 29, 2013)

the only marking are 106a through d no manf or anything if I can figure out how to post a pic I will


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## james122964 (Dec 29, 2013)

does anyone have a email I can send the picture to? that is something I know how to do


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## Pantherlikher (Dec 30, 2013)

Hit reply and look to the bottom to find the "upload attachment" tab.
From there you will hit add and then a window opens where you go find the picture to add. Just try to edit the pic so it's rather small in size to save on server space.

B.S.


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## Harold_V (Dec 31, 2013)

butcher said:


> I have an old battery charger that has a diode that looks like a big light bulb (Tungar tube diode).
> https://www.google.com/search?q=diode+rectifier+circuit&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Ss2_Ur-SLIfmoATNxoGICA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1024&bih=587#q=Tungar+tube+diode&tbm=isch


Brings back memories of my youth, with tube type car radios. Anyone here remember the old glass OZ4?

Harold


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## butcher (Dec 31, 2013)

Heck your not that Old You can still buy those today:
http://www.ebay.com/bhp/oz4-tube

It is funny , some of the older equipment, works and works well, and if needed you can still get parts for fairly easy.

And today we can have some modern equipment that will have more troubles, and less than ten years old we cannot get parts for it, because it is obsolete.

What happen to the days, when your radio or TV would work for many many years with no troubles, and when it finally developed a problem and did not work did not work you could walk down to the store with a hand full of your tubes, and test them at the store and pick up a new tube, to fix it.

Those old tubes needed High currents, usually in the hundreds of volts, and we had to sometime run them on direct current power, a transformer has to have an alternating current to work, (it will not work on DC or steady current) to be able to to transform power (step it up or down), or run a transformer in a radio, we had to have Alternating current, to change DC battery current to AC to step up the voltage and run transformers, or radios in cars the had a type of relay (set of points and a coil).
The relay was wired so that the power to the coil of the relay went through one set of normally closed points on the relay, and as soon as the relay was powered, the power to the coil was shut off as soon as these points opened as the coil was energized, this in turn would close the points which would again power the relay coil, so basically it sat there buzzing the coil coming on and off, opening and closing the sets of points, these relays could be wired to switch polarity of a battery, or to just act like AC current, so we could run transformers off of the DC battery.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vibrator_%28electronic%29


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## g_axelsson (Dec 31, 2013)

Interesting... never thought of that. I'll have to check an old tube based car radio I have sitting at home, it should be quite obvious if there are a relay like that in it.

A bit of nitpicking, it's high voltage, not high current the tubes needed. 8) 

Göran


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## james122964 (Dec 31, 2013)

I think my part is a capacitor


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## butcher (Dec 31, 2013)

https://www.google.com/search?q=vibrator+relay+circuit+DC+TO+AC&source=lnms&sa=X&ei=tsHCUoOQAdXloASPsoCwCw&ved=0CAYQ_AUoAA&biw=1024&bih=618&dpr=1#q=Mallory+vibrator+

https://www.google.com/search?q=Mallory+vibrator+circuit&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=LsLCUsiDJorvoASAqILwCA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAQ&biw=1024&bih=618

some old gauges used vibrating relays as regulators, the old generators in cars used them as voltage regulators...


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## macfixer01 (Dec 31, 2013)

butcher said:


> Heck your not that Old You can still buy those today:
> http://www.ebay.com/bhp/oz4-tube
> 
> It is funny , some of the older equipment, works and works well, and if needed you can still get parts for fairly easy.
> ...




Yeah on a transformer primary coil a pulsating DC voltage works also. I used to play around with the old wood-cased induction coils used for Model T ignitions. Those ran off DC power and had a vibrator built onto the end of the case which worked pretty much the same way as the radio vibrator described. The primary coil was wired in series through a set of contact points that were normally closed. One of those contact points was on a steel flapper that was drawn to the transformer core behind it (the core extended through the end of the case) when the coil was energized. So when the flapper was drawn toward the core the points opened, and the coil lost voltage. Then the flapper dropped away and the points made contact again and the process repeated.


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## butcher (Jan 1, 2014)

Lets look at a few things to set up how this works:

We can make a magnet by wrapping an insulated (varnish covered copper wire) around a bar of iron, and applying DC (direct current) to the wire, the bar of iron becomes magnetized.

We can generate a current pulse, in a coil of copper wire by moving a magnet across a coil of wire, the magnet being moved past the coil of wire induces current in the coil of wire, (if we just sit the magnet next to the coil of wire nothing happens), the movement of the magnet and the collapsing magnetic field is what generates the current in the coil of wire.

These are the basic principles of motors, generators, and transformers...

Now lets look at a simple generator, using a magnet and a coil of wire, we fix a bar magnet on a spindle were we can turn the magnet past the coil of wire, the magnet has a north and south pole, we will measure the polarity of the coil of wire we are generating current into with our magnet, when we spin the magnet and the north end of the magnet passes the coil we generate a positive current into the coil of wire (as the magnet moves the voltage climbs form zero and peaks when the north end of the magnet is closest to the wire, and falls back towards zero volts as the north end of the magnet moves further away from the coil of wire, this creates the positive half of an AC (alternating current) sine wave, then as the magnet turns the south pole of the magnet passes the coil of wire the current polarity of the coil is negative as the magnet moves by so as the magnet spins the output of the coil generates an AC sine wave, if the magnet turns a complete revolution 60 times in one second the output of the coil is 60 Hz, the coil peaked positive then peaked negative (one sine wave 60 times in that second.

Now lets look at a transformer two coils of wire in close proximity to each other, one the primary coil, and the other the secondary coil (some iron to help with magnetic properties), a transformer will not work on DC, we can power the primary coil with a battery and it will make a magnet out of the primary coil, but just like our magnet sitting by the coil of wire in the above example we induce no current in the secondary coil of wire. Remember we had to swing the magnet past the coil of wire to generate current in the coil of wire, now if we hook a battery to the primary coil of our transformer and switched the polarity of the coils wire on that battery back and forth, we would generate a magnet in the primary coil switching polarity of this magnet as we switched wires of the coil on the battery, if we could switch these wires on the battery 60 times in one second we would be making our primary coil a magnet switching from north to south just like we did with the spinning magnet in the example above, and the magnetism from the primary coil inducing an alternating current in the transformers secondary coil.

Normally the transformer is not fed with Direct current from a battery it is fed with alternating current.

We can step up, or step down voltage with a transformer, what's in is what's out, actually that is (watts in = watts out), the number of turns of wire in each of the transformers coils or windings determines voltage, the size of the wires of these coils in our transformers determine the current the coils can handle.

Lets look to winding our transformer to step up the voltage, for every one turn of wire in our primary coil we will wind ten turns of wire in our secondary coil.

So if we put 12 AC volts into the primary winding or coil we will induce 120 AC volts into the secondary coil, (because of the turns ration of our coils).

Watts in = watts out
If we have a one amp primary current, at 12 volts
(Using ohms law) 
12volts X 1 amp = 12 watts (primary)

So watts out will also =12 watts on the secondary coil.

We already know because of the turn ration we have 120 volts so the secondary so we can figure the secondary amperage using ohms law.
12 watts / 120 volts = 0.1 amps (or 100 milliamps)
Notice when we step up voltage in the transformer we drop the amperage, but the wattage of both coils is the same.

Now lets use this same transformer and wire it the opposite as a step down transformer with the 10 turn winding as the primary coil, and the one turn winding as the secondary coil, this time we will supply the primary coil with 120 volts AC, to get 12 volts AC out the secondary, again we will use a one amp primary current, 

120 V X 1A = 120 Watts (primary)
So secondary is also 120 watts at 12 volts
So the secondary amperage is
120W / 12V = 10 amps (secondary current)
Notice stepping down the voltage we have a higher current.


Now I said a transformer will not work on DC, we seen above sitting a magnet next to a coil did not induce current in the coil, or hooking a battery to the transformers primary did not induce current in the secondary, so a transformer will not work on DC.


But we can trick the transformer, with a DC current.

If we power a coil of wire with a battery we build a magnetic field from the coil of wire if we remove the battery this magnetic field collapses, to a secondary winding in a transformer this magnetic field of a building and collapsing of a magnetic field can appear to the secondary coil as a changing magnetic field (or a magnet swinging by it) it will induce a current in the secondary winding, if we keep doing this fast enough, but unless we change the polarity of our battery we do not change the magnet so the polarity of the magnet of the primary coil will be the same each pulse, so unless we change polarity of the battery we would not get an AC sine wave from the secondary of our transformer, it would be a series of DC pulses of current all either positive or negative depending on our battery polarity or primary magnetism (all north pulses).

Coil (high voltage transformer) works to make the spark for the spark plugs, the coils primary is fed 12 volts DC from the battery while the ignition points are closed, this builds a magnetic field in the primary winding of the transformer (at this point nothing is being transformed to the secondary winding) but when the ignition points open the primary coil in the cars high voltage transformer (car coil) induces a voltage in the secondary of the transformer (this many turn winding steps up the 12 volts to thousands of volts at a very low current) this high voltage fed to the spark plug jumps the gap across the spark plug to ground and fires the gas air mix in the combustion chamber driving the piston down turning your engine.

The primary coil which built a magnetic field when it collapses can generate a fast spike voltage that can go back across the opening set of points before the gap gets fully back open this can create an arc current across the points burning them as they open, to suck up this high voltage spike (to protect our points and make them last longer we use a snubber, in this case a capacitor (condenser) we wire this condenser across the set op points in our distributor to suck up this 400 volt spike to keep it from burning our ignition points (without this capacitor or condenser our points may only last a few days of driving.

Well I would like to go on and describe diodes and capacitors so we could get into a discussion of building a power supply for our silver cells but that will have to wait for another day.


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## pgms4me (Jan 1, 2014)

Those "relay" type things in the old car radios are called vibrators. They are easily recognizable. They are a large metal can that plugs into a socket. Most common was 4 pin,but they made 6 and 8 pin models also. They started using them in the 1930's to change the 6 volt dc to ac so it could be stepped up by a transformer, then rectified to get the required operating dc plate plate voltage for the tubes ,which was usually 125-250 volts dc.
Inside the metal can was a vibrating relay surrounded by thick foam rubber to deaden the noise of the vibrator. These failed far more often then the tubes did. Most often the relay contact points would stick or the flexible metal that held them would lose its spring tension. if you carefully opened them you could sometimes rebend the contact spring to get them going again,until you could afford to buy a replacement. Although still used when cars were upgrade from 6 to 12 volts,they stopped using them in many car radio models in the mid-late 1950's because they developed tubes that would run at 12volts dc plate voltage,and by that time they had large GE power transistors to drive the audio stage for the speaker. These were actually hybrid radios,eventually being replaced by all solid state radios in a few more years.


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## Harold_V (Jan 2, 2014)

pgms4me said:


> Those "relay" type things in the old car radios are called vibrators. They are easily recognizable. They are a large metal can that plugs into a socket. Most common was 4 pin,but they made 6 and 8 pin models also. They started using them in the 1930's to change the 6 volt dc to ac so it could be stepped up by a transformer,


Pretty accurate description, although a vibrator did not change DC to AC. That was accomplished at the transformer, for the induced current changes direction with the building and collapsing of the magnetic field. The build and collapse was the result of the vibrator constantly making and breaking the DC voltage. That was fed to the transformer, resulting on a pulsating DC input, and an AC output. Frequency (Hertz) was dependent on the rate of make and break of the vibrator. 

Harold


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## pgms4me (Jan 2, 2014)

Thanks Harold, forgive me everyone please,I stand corrected on that one. I dont know where my mind went, but i meant to Write " The vibrator by its opening and closing of the relay points changes the dc to a form of ac so that the transformer can step it up(or down as the need may be). Then the ac is converted(or rectified) to dc by the oz4 tube, which was the most common rectifier tube for use in old car radios." that was a neat tube because it did not need any filament,I believe it used a mercury vapor type gas. the disadvantage was they had quite a bit of voltage drop.


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## pgms4me (Jan 2, 2014)

I also meant to write that transformers have to have ac in and they give ac out, They replicate the same ac waveform at the output that is given them at the input within the frquency limits and efficiency of the magnetic core used. 
The building and collapsing of the field you mentioned is the result of the points closing on and off(this action is ac). After being stepped up by the transformer the resulting ac output is changed to halfwave or full wave dc by the diode rectifier tube then the leftover ripple is filtered by a filter capacitor(electolytic type) to produce a fairly smooth dc voltager,However, when the filter capacitor became weak(like us after age) you could start to hear the vibrtaor noise in the speaker along with the program material. The vibrator noises were much more annoying than the ac hum produced by weak filter capacitors in regular home ac radios. I dont miss working on them.


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## Plasmajunkie (Jan 10, 2014)

I saved up a good batch of them for a Future Coilgun Project,Good Vickers Military Capacitor's.


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