30-Year-Old Rechargeable Flashlight with Gallium Arsenide LED & Simple Circuit Reverse-Engineered
Pretty novel old design – with some slick-looking nickel-cadmium cells that are still in incredibly good shape given their age.
Watch:
A bit of electronic treasure from the past. I bought this unique little rechargeable flashlight from a long gone (and much missed) shop in Glasgow called RME. The RME stood for Radio, Mechanical and Electrical, and it was a surplus and salvage store based in Howard Street in Glasgow, Scotland.
What made this little flashlight appealing was that it was rechargeable directly from the 240V mains supply with a standard figure-8 style mains connector. I was very intrigued by how they had managed to fit a charging circuit inside such a small light. keep in mind that this was from the 1980’s so it seemed a remarkable electronic feat.
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