[Boatanchors] Partially Off Topic Question

[Larry WA9VRH]

Hello Jack and all,

I had a 6V 1960 bug that I wanted to run a SR-46 6m AM rig in. I bought a 6v 
to 110V inverter and it worked pretty well unless you needed lights, car 
running, radio running, and oops windshield wipers running. The 6v system 
couldn't deal with all of them.   So a friend of mine that ran a service 
station gave me two 12v batteries. One was in my parents garage and the 
other was on the floor behind the drivers seat. On 12v the SR-46 would make 
it about two weeks before dying off.   There were about six of us on in the 
morning drive to work on 50.4.  Had a Squalo on the roof of the bug. Still 
have the Squalo but the bug is long gone. Ran the Squalo on the roof of my 
Grand Cherokee a few years ago using my Icom 706. Got lots of looks from 
people looking at the "roof rack"

73 Larry WA9VRH


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jack Antonio" <scr287 at sbcglobal.net>
To: <boatanchors at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Sunday, August 09, 2009 1:40 PM
Subject: [Boatanchors] Partially Off Topic Question


> When did American automobiles go from a 6 Volt system
> to a 12 V system?
>
> I have a 52 Ford car radio which is 6 V, and I know
> that by the time I was aware of such things in high school
> in the mid 60s, all the family's cars were 12V, but when
> did the change occur?
>
> Was it an all at once starting with a given model year?
>
> Were 12V systems optional, becoming standard at some point?
>
> This was prompted by some idle thinking about using the 52 Ford
> car radio as a basis for a simple cheap ham receiver, by adding
> a BFO and a converter front end, a project that I may explore one
> of these decades.
>
> Thanks
>
> Jack Antonio WA7DIA
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