J A Crew?

Crew sold the business a few years ago and after that there did not seems to be much innovation or changes in stock so I strongly suspect that it has gone the way of Whistons. As well as the obvious needs of customers, these places rely on good contacts to access new surplus stocks that don't seem to survive the sale of the business. Ken Whiston sold the business to his staff and shortly afterwards it folded.

This lot might be of interest?

Bob

I bought some ebonite bar from the chap that took over. while the original web site was still up. I can't remember his name or contact details. He seemed to be rather disorganised.

I tried looking for him a couple of weeks ago and couldn't find any trace.

Mark Rand RTFM

Thanks Bob/Mark

I had just the same experience as Mark, so I guess the new buyer couldn't make a go of it. A real shame because it was a great source of useful and inexpensive goodies. Bardwells looks interesting (thanks Bob), but doesn't have such a wide range of stuff.

My reason for trying to make contact was that I needed (and still do) a 12 volt 2 amp plug in adapter to replace the burnt out item on my fibre optic Xmas tree. Basically it's just a 12 volt transfomer, but there isn't a suitable item in my junk box, and the usual suspects (RS etc) want to charge an arm and a leg, so I was looking for a surplus part. eBay has dozens of cheap far-eastern plug-in 12 volt supplies, but they all seem to be switched mode DC supplies, and my Xmas tree needs AC.

Mike

CPC stop at a 1Amp one :( Might have to be a transformer , plug and duck tape ;)

Suggest have a look at the electronics at the lamp end . If there is a bridge rectifier or diodes and smoothing cap, it should be quite happy being fed with dc. You will probably need more than 12v dc input, to take account of rectifier drop and also the fact that the rectified dc will be greater than the

12v rms input, but this can be confirmed by measurement using any old 12v transformer. 15v dc might be a good value to start with.

The only proviso is if the input ac is being phase controlled to vary the intensity, this won't work, but probably unlikely...

Regards,

Chris

These trees need 50Hz AC as there is a synchronous motor inside to drive the colour wheel. It only needs a few watts of AC, the rest of the power is for the lamp (20w I suspect although I have seen 10W in this application) and that can be DC. So a pair of different wall warts could do the job if push comes to shove.

Bob

Quite right Bob. The Xmas tree just has a 20W halogen bulb and a synchronous motor wired in parallel. Thinking along the same lines suggested, I bought a cheap12 volt 2 amp switched mode DC supply from eBay in the hope of doing something with this and a small 12 V transformer. However, a quick test today suggests that the switcher doesn't like the load. It pulses on and off at about 1 Hz. Will investigate further when time allows.

Mike

You might find that a chunky capacitor on the output might just help and maybe a series diode?. The problem will be the cold resistance of the lamp or maybe a thermistor in series if you can find a suitable one.

Bob

Try an electronic halogen light transformer. The small 60VA ones usually do 20-60 watt loads.

Available at an electrical/lighting shop near you (which may well have a wound 12V 2A+ lighting transformer instead), or

or even:

1st class post, should maybe arrive in time... bdtrade are usually pretty fast...

-- Peter Fairbrother

Peter. Thanks for that. I thought I'd searched eBay, but you're obviously better at it than I am!

I've just placed an order fror the 12 volt 50VA transformer since I know it will work without any fiddling around.

Merry Christmas

Mike

or

>

even:

>

Remember that these lighting transformers have a high frequency output so you will still need a 50hHz source for the motor.

Bob

Yes, but the 2nd eBay item found by Peter, and which I've ordered, is a conventional 50Hz 50VA 12 volt mains transformer, not a switcher.

Mike

I just bought some sub-min reed switches from an eBay seller who signs his listings 'J A Crew'. He lists under the name of '583252'. See item number

290632841719. He gives an address in Offenham, Worcestershire under his contact details at the bottom of the listing. There's a phone no. there too - 01386 423718. Might be worth giving him a call to see if he's the guy who's taken over the original company.

-Neil F.

Thanks for that Neil. Curious. John Crew certainly used to live a Chipping Campden which it the location on the ebay item page. John sold the business several years ago to someone that was quite some distance away IIRC Maybe John has gone back into the surplus business through ebay who knows?

Bob

Yes, thanks Neil. I'll see if the chap has a catalogue in addition to the few items he lists on eBay.

Incidentally, the 12V 50VA transformer which I ordered from bdtrade after Peter pointed it out arrived 2 days before Xmas, and has proved completely satisfactory. Great value too.

Mike