Originally Posted by David Dunlop
Took me a while to sort out as well, Bob, and I came at it from the opposite direction, finding the fuse box first and assuming it was the charging board. Let a whole whack of No. 5 boards pass by before realizing they were two completely different things and by then the boards had entered the Land of Unobtainium!
What you see in the Fuse Box is a complete, unique package, but does perform a bit of what the Charging Board does.
The Charging Board (and if anyone has a manual or working instructions for it, please post in the Wireless Section) was a piece of the kit the wireless team humped into the woods when they went remote with the wireless set, along with a chore horse, two cases of batteries and all the other easy to carry pieces to operate. Not certain of the details of it's operation but suspect it allowed for a number of combinations of power feed to and from the chore horse, batteries sets and wireless all at once, or various controlled patterns as needed.
When not needed, it was stored under the bottom of the wireless table: slid into two steel rails. If you look closely at the photos Geoff posted of the wireless table of tubular steel design, that, is an original wireless table for the 2K1 and 2K2 Wireless Bodies. The four legs would end on the floor on triangular steel plates with holes in them to bolt to the floor. Bolts came up from underneath the vehicle and were nutted inside the box.
It has been a while and I cannot find my photos of the wireless tables in situ, but if memory serves correctly, on the left side (?) of the table there was a large deep drawer which probably stored the spare parts and valve boxes for the wireless set. Either end of the wide open space under the table had the two flat pressed steel rails the charging board slid into. Under the table Geoff posted, the drawer has been removed and a pair of wooden rails have been added.
Backing up to the fuse box again, it worked to control the power distribution and prevent overloads or shorts burning things up, and also allowed flipping the charging current between the two sets of wireless batteries stored in the wooden chests on the floor in the front right corner of the box. In the event a fuse blew, the knife switch allowed the circuits to be disconnected for the fuse change, or any quick trouble shooting, without having to turn off whatever generator was running. I do not believe it allows for running the wireless directly from the generators. Just the batteries.
The generator box, which is a bit of a black hole since it is painted entirely green inside, not white or grey, has a set of three switches with a metal guard plate on the side of it that faces the front of the box. The first two are used to start and stop the two generators that have been installed. Remember, the Army installed them, not Wilson Truck Body. It would either be a pair of chore horses or an Onan AC/DC rig on the floor and a chorehorse on the upper shelf in the 'portable' position. The third switch I believe was a 'Mains' switch that isolated any power from getting out of the box. The outside of the gen box door had a large stencil warning the door must be closed and the two outside hatches open for proper ventilation when the generators were running. Green inside the gen box to reduce the visibility factor when those hatches were open. The edges of the gen box that mated up to the plywood walls of the wireless box, along with the perimeter edges meeting the floor, were lined with what appears to be fabric style fender welting to seal for fumes. Not much of that is usually left after things start leaking for decades. Also, where the armour cables exit the side of the gen box, these holes were sealed with a compound that looks a lot like Glazer's Putty. Maybe there is an Electricians version. Soft enough to apply but sets up rock hard.
As for the big copper buss bar, Bob, they only ever came copper. Strongly suspect somebody eventually saw dollar signs for all that copper and wogged it, substituting the aluminium you noticed.
Hope that helps a bit, Bob.
Cheers for now,
David
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