May 1967 Electronics World
Table
of Contents
Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles
from
Electronics World, published May 1959
- December 1971. All copyrights hereby acknowledged.
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I know I keep saying this,
but it keeps being true so I say it again: The basics of electricity and electronics
have not changed in the last 50 or more years, so these articles from vintage issues
of electronics magazines are as applicable today as they were back then. If you
are just getting into the field of electronics, valuable information can be found
here to supplement your learning process. In fact, I have seen examples in some
of these articles where I re-learned something long-ago forgotten, and some of the
stuff is rarely, if ever, seen in contemporary writings. Regardless, making yourself
aware of the work done by pioneers in the industry is always valuable because it
gives you a sense of approaches taken that have led to success, and sometimes failure
on the way to eventual success.
Here is a May 1967
Tips
for Technicians, a February 1969
Tips for Technicians, and a May 1969
Tips
for Technicians.
Capacitor stability at bargain prices
Any capacitor changes its microfarad value
when temperature varies. And some capacitors change more than others. In some circuits,
capacitance drift with temperature can cause real problems.
Look at circuits where you have fractional microfarad values of paper, film,
ceramic or mica capacitors. During warm-up from room temperature to 65° C ambient,
a capacitor with a temperature coefficient of, for example, 500 parts per million
per degree C will increase capacitance value by 2%. This change is enough to cause
troublesome drift in tuned circuits, where inductance also increases with temperature.
It can knock the accuracy of a timing circuit off, or mess up the performance of
a differentiator network. For these applications, we have a new kind of capacitor
that beats anything we've seen in the stability race. It's the new Mallory Polystyrene
Capacitor. They're made of stretched polystyrene film and high purity aluminum foil.
The assembly is fused into one piece, with the polystyrene forming a solid case
of clear plastic that you can look through and see the foil. Their temperature coefficient
is less than 150 parts per million per degree C, which is about half that of polyester
film capacitors. And the coefficient is negative; capacitance goes down when temperature
goes up, compensating for the upward drift of inductance elements in tuned circuits.
Want more? Mallory Polystyrene Capacitors have the lowest dielectric loss ...
only a small fraction of that of other film capacitors. Their insulation resistance
is way above that of mica, film or paper capacitors. And the best part of the whole
deal is that they're really low in price! There's something new from Mallory,
too, in stable electrolytic capacitors. It's the molded-case MTA, which has temperature
stability that beats most metal case types. It has shown up so well on life test
that manufacturers are using it in instruments and computers. And while it's priced
down with cardboard-case tubulars, it beats them every way on quality.
You can get these stable Mallory capacitors, and everything else you need for
service or experimenting, from your nearby Mallory Distributor. Ask him for a copy
of our 1967 General Catalog, or write to Mallory Distributor Products Company, a
division of P. R. Mallory & Co. Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana 46206.
DON'T FORGET TO ASK 'EM - "What else needs fixing?"
Posted July 12, 2019 (updated from original post on 3/4/2012)
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