Bottlehead Forum

General Category => General Discussion => Topic started by: josmiceli on January 10, 2014, 10:31:20 PM

Title: Identify a gapped transformer
Post by: josmiceli on January 10, 2014, 10:31:20 PM

I'm a total Newbie here, long time bottlehead, but technically rusty. Greets to all.
I'm sure this question has popped up in some past post.
How would I identify an unknown transformer as being gapped or ungapped?
Is there a way to tie the code to the manufacturer?
Without a code, can I do a test that will tell me?
I know the transformer should not saturate easily if gapped, but
that's all I know
Thanks, Joe Miceli

Title: Re: Identify a gapped transformer
Post by: Paul Joppa on January 11, 2014, 07:57:01 AM

Usually you can just look at the laminations and see the line where the gap is, or tell if they are interleaved.

Otherwise, you'd have to measure it. That's not easy because there are very few testers made for this. A long time ago I built a "choke-checker" to do that - not especially difficult but it certainly cost me more than a couple new transformers would.

Title: Re: Identify a gapped transformer
Post by: josmiceli on January 12, 2014, 01:38:42 PM

Thanks for the timely reply. I don't think I'll run into problems,
but it's a matter of curiosity. I always have more transformer
questions than answers.

J. Miceli