Foxhole Radio

What should have been a simple book about radios…

Category: Blades

Razor blades tested in foxhole radios

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These are the blades I tested as detectors for foxhole radios. These are all in black and white in the book so here they are presented in glorious color.

Captions are from the book.

(Above) Blades tested as detectors. From top left: WWII era Blu-Strike, Club, and Durex; a military issue Gem single edge plain steel blade; a Gillette “Blue” blade; a military issued Gillette blade in camouflage wrapper; an early 1920s Gillette blade; an early 1960s Gillette “Super Blue” blade; a WWII era Gillette “Thin” blade.
More blades tested as detectors. From top left: a WWII era Gilt Edge; a Marlin “High Speed” with 1s and 2s in the corners, similar to the one used in Paul Cornell’s radio; a civilian “High Speed” blade (note that the Marlin “High Speed” blades have the same center slot design as the Blue Strike and Durex blades in the previous photograph and likely were made by the same manufacturer); Marlin blade with an oval slot design; two versions of the Marlin “Perfect Edge” military issue blade in camouflage wrappers; the civilian version of the Marlin “Perfect Edge” blade with yet another slot design; a contemporary stainless Gillette Wilkinson blade; WWII era Pal and Star blades.

Previous: WWII era Gillette blades

WWII era Gillette blades

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More blades that appear in black and white in the book, this time from Gillette. Caption is from the book.

The next post will cover all of the blades I tested in foxhole radios.

WWII era Gillette blades, top to bottom the camouflage military issue blade, the civilian “Thin Blade”, and the Blue Blade. All of these had a varnish coating. The camouflage blade is from 1944. This particular “Thin” blade is from 1935 and the Blue is from 1942 but both models were still in limited production throughout the War.

Previous:  More WWII era blades   Next: Blades tested in foxhole radios

WWII era razor blades

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Here are some of the WWII era razor blades that appear in black and white in the book. The captions are from the book.

The post immediately following this one will cover Gillette wartime blades.

(Above) WWII civilian razor blades and their military issue equivalents. Gem produced a special “Armed Forces” box of five blades but the blade and wrapper were the same available in the civilian market.
WWII era Marlin razor blades. Two versions of the “camouflage” military issue blade, made by different manufacturers, top, and a civilian “Perfect Edge” blade sold in the blue version of the same packaging, second row left. The rest are “High Speed” blades made for Marlin by different manufacturers. Bottom left is the same model blade found in Paul Cornell’s radio. “Blu Srike”, “Durex” and a few other blades had the same slot shapes and all may have been made by Club.

Next: WWII Gillette blades

I’m ready for my close-up

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 If you’ve ever wondered what a razor blade looks like magnified 500 times, this is it. I was having it analyzed to see if there was any surface chemistry that would make it a good detector for radio waves. This is a WWII era “blue” blade. Despite popular folklore to the contrary, there was no selenium present. SEM image by Houston Electron Microscopy, Inc.

Here’s the same blade at 75x.

The iron oxide is likely magnetite, which can act as a semiconductor. It is a thin enough layer that it allows some light to pass through, causing thin-film interference, similar to the surface of a soap bubble. This accounts for the subtle blue color of the blade.