I found this the other evening

Ken Cook wrote:       https://www.amazon.com/Exell-Battery-EB-R40-Carbon-Replaces/dp/B00KWH50AG   I used to exclusively use the Burgess and Ray O Vac versions.

They mention the use of fahnestock clips in the description. The Eveready No.6 photo that Rene posted, has them instead of screw-terminals. Do you use the clips?  

In the early 40's I remember the telephone company periodically replacing those batteries into a compartment for the purpose in our basement.

Battery labels here:

http://www.radiolaguy.com/Batteries/Vintage_Batteries.htm

Admin sent a post about do it yourself battery at:

https://www.coxengineforum.com/t11506-what-type-of-battery-does-this-cox-item-connect-to

rsv1cox wrote:In the early 40's I remember the telephone company periodically replacing those batteries into a compartment for the purpose in our basement.

Yea, those are the ones I would get from my HS sweethearts Dad. Future FIL, worked for Michigan Bell and would provide me with the “used” batteries. Worked great. Tossed out my last two when I moved to my present house 18years ago. Sorta wish I’d kept em now even though they were dead. But, now I can make NEW ones!

roddie wrote:

Ken Cook wrote:       https://www.amazon.com/Exell-Battery-EB-R40-Carbon-Replaces/dp/B00KWH50AG   I used to exclusively use the Burgess and Ray O Vac versions.

They mention the use of fahnestock clips in the description. The Eveready No.6 photo that Rene posted, has them instead of screw-terminals. Do you use the clips?  

No, but by golly you can still buy them!
https://www.amazon.com/Fahnestock-Clips-Electrical-Chrome-Plating/dp/B0093AICBW/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1516568284&sr=8-4&keywords=fahnestock

I still use a No.6 battery, available here in OZ through a toy store chain & imported by Model Engines (local OS engine importer).  Here's a poor photo of a leaky one.

I expected to find that they had separate alkaline cells inside but when I pulled a dead one apart I found it to be an original single cell carbon battery.  

They certainly don't last as long as the original old Eveready ones from my youth.

Just the other day while talking to Jason in the chatbox, my old Energizer #6 came up. It was the battery I used to start my Cox engines before I started to use one of those 2-D cell battery boxes. It lasted a couple years until it got weak and ended up getting buried on the workbench in the garage. Several years ago it got pushed off the workbench and the top split off it. I was going to toss it out, I even stole its brass knurled nuts for use on something else. The damn thing cost me $15 so I couldn't just throw it out...it just ended up getting pushed up against the wall where it stayed until now.







It contains 2 alkaline "F" cells in parallel. They went to this design after mercury was banned as a battery additive.



Looking at it closer, I might pick up an alkaline 6v lantern battery the next time I'm out and try to rebuild it with new F cells. Might have to pick up some new nuts too unless I can remember where the originals went.

Where do I start ?
After graduating from college, I went to work for Union Carbide Eveready Battery Products Division (that changed ownership in 1985 to Energizer Battery Company) and I worked there in many capacities until a few months shy of 30 years.
The early batteries that are pictured like the Eveready #6 Ignitor ( 6 stood for 6 inches tall not 6 volts) and the Western Electric 1.5 volt battery ( private label made by Eveready) were all carbon-Zinc formulations with a carbon rod down the middle.
There was the regular screw terminal type and a Fahnestock clip type for different customer applications.
Being CZ technology, the outer can under the paper label was made of electrolytic (high purity) Zinc hence the white acid leakage that always ruined a lot of stuff.
The company had many reasons to change to the Zinc Chloride Super Heavy Duty technology that came next.
1. All of the CZ plants were going on 70 years old ( Fremont, OH., Asheboro I, NC., and Cleveland, OH. AKA " The Russian Front") and could not be financially updated for a dying technology.
2. A constant threat by scientists that the World supply of Zinc would totally dry up in 10-15 years.
3. Increasing pressure to eliminate mercury from the formulation.
4. The manganese oxide filler ( AKA "Black S***") was extremely nasty to work with for the workers and it was hard to find any sane people to open the 50 lbs. bags and mix it.
The batteries  then went to ZC formulation but still needed some Mercury to meet performance standards.
Once Mercury and other heavy metals were banned for use after January 1, 1994, then they changed design again for ZMA (Zero Mercury Added) alkaline type product.
The new ZMA versions like the EN-6 shown ( E for Energizer, N for Ndustrial, 6 for 6 inches tall) had the alkaline "F" cells with a lot of empty space taken up by an ultrasonic welded plastic case.
I sold, in my many duties including Industrial Business Manager, millions upon millions of those batteries.
As mentioned in an earlier thread, there were some ER#964 "F" cell batteries sold with very limited production.
Most Eveready radio batteries, before the transistor was invented in 1957 and hence the 9V battery, were #759 farm packs that weighed about 10 lbs. each. You'd be surprised how many hundreds of thousands were sold every year in rural America for Grand Pa's "Fireside Chat" radio.
Hope I didn't bore you too much with boring info but I really had fun time doing it and they even sent me a paycheck every month !!!
Steve............

66 Malibu wrote:Hope I didn't bore you too much with boring info

Absolutely not, this was very interesting info! Would actually like to hear more.

Admin wrote:

66 Malibu wrote:Hope I didn't bore you too much with boring info

Absolutely not, this was very interesting info! Would actually like to hear more.

Steve, thanks for the short history/chemistry lesson. Very informative and entertaining to learn more about the products used in our hobby. Their origins and demise. Thanks for taking the time to type it all out.

One of the issues that plagued Eveready/Energizer and the other dry battery manufacturers was accessing the raw material manganese dioxide. There were only two places on Earth at the time that electrolytic manganese dioxide could be mined and used straight out the ground without expensive purification costs that would put costs up tremendously to the consumer.
The first place was the West African country of Gabon that had an entire natural mountain of the stuff but it was extremely dangerous and unstable to do business there. Management would develop a long term contract to buy ship loads of material at a time and that would work for maybe 6 months until that Warlord would be killed off and a new Warlord wanted his own contract. Apparently, that happened numerous times and management tried to find another source. We heard later that the situation in Gabon was loosely used as a basis for the 1970's movie, Dogs of War, starring Christopher Walken where mercenaries went to West Africa to take over a country for raw materials.
The other location was a mine in Colombia, South America, that Union Carbide already owned but it was deep in the drug cartel province. The inside joke was that if you really messed up, then they would give you an assignment to go see the mine but you probably wouldn't be coming back !!!!!!!
By accident, someone discovered a WWII military stockpile in KY that had maybe a million tons of manganese dioxide already to go. That probably delayed newer technologies for many years as they were the sole source with that supply.
Once the R&D engineers experimented with substituting dirt into the paste mix to reduce consumption and costs of short supply materials but the KY stockpile stuff was actually cheaper than dirt !!!!!
Crazy stuff !!!!!

My first picture shows the battery "bleeding" white corrosion as the zinc case disintegrated. The next shot shows the carbon rod imbedded in the Black "Stuff" Steve referred to. Never thought it might be dangerous
I scraped it off into the trash and had this neat carbon rod about 5" long and 3/4" diameter. Not sure what to do with it, but looks handy for something

Roddie, come up with some ideas for me man!!

Congrats and thanks to Ken for this fascinating thread, and for the great posts it started.

 We started our planes with these great batteries, and as a kid, I was shocked to find them on a shelf in a General Store just across the alley from my back yard!  The same store stocked small blister cards of Epoxy---my first exposure to that adhesive. I figure that local demand for them might have diminished by 1968, and that the store owner was probably thrilled to have me and our little band of young modelers suddenly buying out his inventory.

We mostly used the Eveready brand, though other brands occasionally showed up.  The things were great, and would start an engine right up, even well after chemicals started leaking from their seams.  A few years into the hobby, I encountered my first square 'hobby battery', which seemed to lose it's power in a fraction of the lifespan of our beloved old telephone batteries.

Guess I'm gonna have to crank up the PayPal account as one of these would look good in my 'Retro Field Box'!!!

Marleysky wrote:

Admin wrote:

66 Malibu wrote:Hope I didn't bore you too much with boring info

Absolutely not, this was very interesting info! Would actually like to hear more.

Steve, thanks for the short history/chemistry lesson. Very informative and entertaining to learn more about the products used in our hobby. Their origins and demise. Thanks for taking the time to type it all out.

+2! Thanks for the fascinating write-ups Steve! Feel free to write more, I for one was not bored, quite the opposite "Worked in different capacities" in a battery company...   Loved the pun, whether it was intended or not

Sometimes I think I should have become a historian instead of an engineer, since I find the history of technology and the stories and politics behind the inventions much more interesting than all the modern stuff

Kari,
Thanks for the comments and yes, many times my fertile mind expels puns but most of the time, I get odd looks. I spent two and one half years of my education and a majority of my work life in a mechanical engineering environment but my degree was in liberal arts. Sounds retarded but after a while I really began to hate doing calculus long hand before the hand held scientific calculators were invented. Now days, instead of 3 pages front and back of a yellow legal pad solving calculus problems, you can get the answer before you can say "calculus". So easy today !!!
To give you an idea how odd I am or how maybe you and I are more alike, given the choice between watching a ball game( any kind of ball game) or going on a factory plant tour, my choice will plant tour 100 times out of 100 !! Don't get me wrong, I played all the ball sports except soccer and have winners trophies from many of them.

Rod, Glad you broke the old #6 battery down and got rid of the white acids. It's not as concentrated as most acids that you may have but I lost count of all the shirts,slacks, and ties ( old time management required ties for many years) that had large holes eaten into them at the end of hard day in the field !!!
You can never tell when a pure carbon rod may come in handy in the shop !!! LOL...
Steve...............

lol, when i was just a li'l shaver, i remember finding one of these and peeled the cardboard wrapper open, kinda made a mess with carbon all over the place.

Mark,
When you broke that battery open, I hope you didn't get the residue on anything your mother valued like clothes or a tablecloth, because it was almost impossible to get it all out of the material.
To give you an idea how nasty the materials were, once we were in the Fremont, OH. plant, down in the center of the town, and the morning shift started about 8 AM. About 15 minutes later we went into the mixing area which had a giant cylindrical mixer two stories tall. The manganese dioxide bags were opened and the contents poured in the mixer on the floor above. If you've ever poured flour out of bag, you know how the dust goes everywhere even if you don't spill it.
We came up to the four guys pouring the stuff in the mixer and talked with then for a few minutes. A few minutes later, I suddenly realized one of the guys was a lady, and they were all so totally covered with black powder on their jackets, clothes, boots, faces, and hats that you visually couldn't tell the difference who was who. Only their eyes, mouth, and nose openings were not jet black.
The senior guy told us that their shirts, pants, and socks had to be thrown away every week.
Because of the thickness , their jackets were thrown away every month.
Their boots were only good for 4 or 5 weeks before the powder totally penetrated the heavy leather !!!!
I left that department wondering why they don't all die at the end of the day.
The plant manager said the health risk was none to zero !!! To this day I don't believe it !!!
By the time consumers got those old CZ batteries the black stuff was already mixed in a paste with potassium hydroxide, a splash of water, and a splash of mercury to get the electrochemistry show on the road. The carbon rod inserted into the center and the zinc can was sealed and labeled and another modeler was happy again....
Sorry to be long winded / boring but you had to be there.......
Steve..............

Cool stories of real life Steve , Thanks For sharing with us . Sounds like making a electric candle lol .

66 Malibu wrote:Kari,
Thanks for the comments and yes, many times my fertile mind expels puns but most of the time, I get odd looks. I spent two and one half years of my education and a majority of my work life in a mechanical engineering environment but my degree was in liberal arts. Sounds retarded but after a while I really began to hate doing calculus long hand before the hand held scientific calculators were invented. Now days, instead of 3 pages front and back of a yellow legal pad solving calculus problems, you can get the answer before you can say "calculus". So easy today !!!
To give you an idea how odd I am or how maybe you and I are more alike, given the choice between watching a ball game( any kind of ball game) or going on a factory plant tour, my choice will plant tour 100 times out of 100 !! Don't get me wrong, I played all the ball sports except soccer and have winners trophies from many of them.

Ah, calculus/math... Got an overdose of that while studying. My M.Sc studies contained a huge amount of mandatory math, all during the first two or three years and all at very abstract level. I mean the kind of abstract where your vectors had an infinite number of components, and the only numbers in the math book were the ISBN and page numbers  Not being particularly talented at it, I almost quit my studies a couple of times. Scientific calculators (or any kind of calculators) were not allowed in tests, and the use of them generally not taught/encouraged, which kind of sucked, as they may have helped in learning by experimenting. Well, I managed somehow to pass all the courses. Never used any of that scientific math stuff at work since.

Oh yeah, a factory plant tour or even a lecture on technology would be my choice over any sports event too. Unless the said sports event involves IC engines and/or any kind of aircraft