Wireless Set No. 52 Canadian - Project

[David Dunlop]

Back to this portion of the project once more, to get a couple of things done.

The first will be a close inspection of the surviving wiring inside the switchboard to determine what is still factory correct, and why has been reworked for whatever reason. Fortunately, this task got a lot easier with the help of two members of this forum who took the time to send me some very good photographs of the original wiring inside their Switchboard, Charging No. 5C Canadians for me to reference.

If the two additional pairs of input terminals were not present on this Mk I Switchboard, the rest of the terminals and switches are identical between the No. 5C and No. 5C Mk I Cdn versions of this switchboard. How the additional two terminal sets were actually wired in is not currently known to me, and un til it is, I am not going to mess with them, so my intent at this point is to just replicate what I know to be correct and workable. If and when I can obtain photos of the original internal wiring of an actual Mk I switchboard, or circuit diagram for same, I will go back in and finish this task quite happily.

The first requirement t was to get a supply of solid copper 10 Gauge wire in red and black loom to fabricate the missing wiring from. It took few days for me to remember I had purchased a spool of 10/3 copper wire for some household work a number of years ago. Took a little longer to recall where the heck I put it, and that got real embarrassing when it turned out to be on an open bottom shelf of a cabinet about 15 feet from my work table...in plain sight.

From initial inspection, there looked like 12 wires were either missing, or looked suspect in where they were installed. From the photos I received from our members, the longest wire runs were just a stink over 20 inches, so I decided to cut five 2-foot sections from what turned out to be a 75 metre spool of the 10/3 cable I had on hand. I had forgotten just how challenging it is to unwind the stuff from tightly wound spool and cut it, even with a good pair of shears.

Once the pieces were cut, I had to split open the wire plastic loom to expose the red, black, white and bare copper ground wires and remove them. They are all held together in a rather loose twist, so the next step was extracting the required red and black wires and leaving the white and bare copper for future considerations.

As you can see, these wires have quite a few twists and curves to them once freed up and I needed them to be as close to straight as possible to blend in with the surviving originals. They are also a heck of a lot easier to handle and work with when as straight as possible. I got the last of that work done this afternoon. It took a small bench rise with padded jaws, and some followup palm rolling on a thin dense carpet to get each piece to where I liked it, but I am now ready to open up the back of the switchboard once more and dive into its wiring restoration.


David

[Chris Suslowicz]

Um... hold fire for a bit. Later today (it's 04:00 here) I will drag my Switchboard, Charging, No.5 out of the shed and photograph both sides, plus draw out the wiring diagram and the switching "truth table" and measure the wiring.

It's not the same as your switchboard, but some of the basic wiring should be the same and you may be able to derive the connections for the missing terminals.

(I still think yours is an early Air Ministry version that bears little resemblance to the WS52 or WS19HP (Canadian) switchboard. Mine is intended for permanent installation in a Wireless Truck and I suspect there was a demountable switchboard issued with the "Truck & Ground Station" kit.)

Right now I need sleep.

Good Morning!

Chris (G8KGS)