Old faradism machine

[Graham R]

This is very much a long-shot; I am looking for information about a machine that could well be pre-war.

My late was an MCSP in the UK and practiced throughout the 50s into the early 60s from his surgery which was the front room in our house.

As a small child I was fascinated by the equipment he had in there, particularly the faradism machine, and I suddenly have the urge to find out more about it!

The machine was a large (to a child's eyes) console and the distinctive thing about it was the mechanism that rhythmically surged the current.
This was housed behind a glass fronted door in the machine and was a glass flask, or bottle filled with some electrolyte into which a plunger
moved up and down The bottle looked like a Coca-Cola bottle if I remember correctly.

I would like to find an image of this machine perhaps on some Web museum site, has anyone got any suggestions?

TIA,
Graham.

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[physiobob]

Have a look here: The Turn Of The Century Electrotherapy Museum Tesla Library

[gcoe]

Hey Physiobob that is one hell of a site! The illustrations are great!

Graham R, the Faradic machine was in use in the profession even during the the 1980's. I was trained to use it - the unit was a bit more automated than the coke bottle plunger variety but it basically did the same thing. the plunger was of course the induction coil and why the machine was named after one of the greatest physisicists and chemists, Michael Faraday.

It was actually a very useful piece of equipment for eliciting a muscle contraction although it hurt like hell. I still have a scar on my thigh from where a fellow student gave me an electrical burn while we were practising on each other.

Eventually the new battery-powered neuromuscular stimulators replaced the Faradic unit as the current was safer and more comfortable and you could do more fancy things with these little units like sequence a number of muscles to contract.

[Graham R]

Thanks gcoe & physiobob
That site is excellent although I had already seen a similar collection of
H. G. Fischer machines elsewhere, a company with a truly amazing history.
I suppose the nearest looking thing I have found is the two floor-
standing models at the bottom of this page

[Forum won't let me post link as newby]

but no nodding-donkey / coke-bottle rheostat!

Interesting that the brochure is dated 1953, that would be the year my Dad
set up his practice, but I always assumed that any expensive equipment would have been second-hand, times were hard then, and my parents had just got married bought their house and had me!

1. I would have been 6 or 7 when he Ceased practicing from home and his treatment couch was replaced by an upright piano, and the frosted glass in the front room windows were replaced with clear.

Also those machines in the brochure are described as low-voltage therapy,
I suppose that is broadly "faradism", I imagine that term is old-fashioned now.

Just another childish memory in passing; on one piece of equipment, possibly an infra-red lamp, the highest setting on the control knob was not "MAX" but "OUCH!"

Best Regards, Graham.

[physiobob]

for a newbie link posting just type blah blah dot com

[Graham R]

Easier said than done, and I am quite resourceful when it comes to this kind of thing.

This should count as my third post so future ones should be OK
I will wait till tomorrow before posting again as I note that posting
to soon just appends my comments on the previous post.

It's at times like these that I realise just why I spend so much time on good old fashioned, unmoderated, commercial free Usenet!


Graham.