B&D 1/4" Holgun DC ???

[RedVise]

Looking thru my stuff to clear out the clutter and came across the drill.
Black and Decker HOLGUN 1/4" Type B
Marked as 110 Volts , 1.6 Amps.

Funny thing the nameplate/label  shows AC on one side and DC on the other.
It has a non polarized plug, may not be original.
So would this run on DC ? Was DC available via a plug ?

Brian

[rusty]

>Was DC available via a plug ?

Yup

ever so slightly different, but mostly looked the same, wide spade, narrow spade...

could still be found here and there up to the 50's or so...

(Originally the Edison system was 115V DC)

[OilyRascal]

I believe (IIRC) my grandfather would run DC power tools on his old Lincoln "Red Head" welding machines.

[Bill Houghton]

In addition to the regions around the country where DC power was the standard, I believe a lot of the early jobsite generators were DC.  Many of the portable power tools of the 40s and 50s were AC/DC, and Porter-Cable kept making them that way into the 70s, I believe.

[Aunt Phil]

In addition to the regions around the country where DC power was the standard, I believe a lot of the early jobsite generators were DC.  Many of the portable power tools of the 40s and 50s were AC/DC, and Porter-Cable kept making them that way into the 70s, I believe.

I can lay hands on 2 Fire Department portable generators from the 50s that are DC.  It was common knowledge in the 50s that DC was much safer than AC for portable lighting at firegrounds.  Less chance of killing a fireman standing in water according to the literature.

Pretty much all portable tools in the 50s were AC/DC if they had series motors.  The change to AC only came with variable speed controled by the tool switch.