The Old Ferroresonant MAGNATEK Converters...
These dinosaurs were 30X as common as competitive converters and were a flawed design from the word go... OEM chose the BW Magnatek units because they were the least expensive of the lot. I came a MAG...
Forum Discussion
MEXICOWANDERER wrote:
Follow the PDF link above if you wish and familiarize yourself with a Gran Mal design, the converter with bleed resistor, relay, and capacitors so inferior, three years of continuous use rendered a finish voltage of 14.4 - 14.5 Pretty impressive nightmare for a "13.8 volts float charger".
That link is to the linear converters, not the ferroresonant. Here's the schematic for the 775-2 converter:
The linear converters were adequate when the only electronics were maybe a 12 volt black and white tv and radio- the charge circuit was regulated and adjustable, but the main output was unregulated and unfiltered. They didn't do a great job of charging, but they really did as well as most purpose bult battery chargers of the day- smart chargers were still a ways off.
The ferroresonant models were near bullet proof, and each different model had a different design voltage- I saw voltages from 12.6 to 14 volts spec'd. you can see by the schematic there really wasn't much to go wrong.
