Old battery

[roadster]

I recently acquired a Triplett 1200-SC multimeter. I do like Triplett meters and this on is quite interesting looking like a prewar meter with a later meter movement added but the movement is correct for the meter. The meter indicates quite accurately on DC volts but there is no damping at all. I don't know if this is as it was new or if it has a fault.
When I opened it I found this battery inside, not actually leaking but pregnant. What do I do with the battery? I am a bit reluctant to just chuck it in the battery recycling bucket as it has survived sixty five years and I guess that there will be a collector of old dry cells somewhere.
Rod

[ppppenguin]

That's a military battery. You could open it up carefully and put modern cells inside. Don't know if 15x AAA would fit? CR2032 button cells would fit easily but you might need more than one stack of 7 in parallel to provide the current.

[Mike Watterson]

The CR2032 are best used up to 1mA max. However as the discharge is very flat, it may be that only 6 needed in each stack. They need fuses and 1N4148 diodes to parallel the stacks. They can explode or go on fire if a stack is shorted. About 12c to 20c each from China, same quality as Tesco sells at €2.50 each. Zinc Layer PP3 may do if 12V to 18V works. Or 27V maybe fine. Some Alkaline PP3 are oval stacked coins and some are similar to AAAA. One of the AAAA based ones can be opened and 3 cells (half pack) added to the pair of 9V.

I'd be interested in the dimensions etc to add the pack here: http://www.blaukatz.com/tables/layer-ht-...batteries/
I do have a lot of catalogues, I've just not got round to filling in the tables!

I only collect the card outers.

[roadster]

I hadn't actually planned on using the meter on the high resistance ranges. I do use stacked coin cells in other multimeters. In the meter there is also space for a single cell, which looks like C size for thelower ranges. There is also a 110v line input connection. I haven't yet managed to find any information on this model. I have noticed that the date does not show clearly in the photo, it is 1955. I hadn't thought of removing the contents of the battery and saving the outer. I think that is what I will do. I guess that it is best to neutralisethe empty wrapper then stick it back into the meter. My plan is to rinse in a bicarb solution. Any better advice gratefully received.
The battery leads in the meter have ring terminals to which the flying leads on this battery had been soldered.
The dimensions of the battery are approx. 87x48x63mm. These are approximate as I have tried to allow for the swelling.
Rod

[Mike Watterson]

Thanks.
Indeed my AVO uses a single stack of CR2032 in a plastic tube, one spring slightly bent. The load current ought to be little different to the FSD meter current, I presume the meter is much more sensitive than 1mA on your meter.